Continuing Down the Path of Education
“What celebrations do we have today?” is a question my students hear each day. Oftentimes, it is followed up with an, “I got to play an extra hour of video games last night!” or “I scored in my game!” I love celebrating all things, big and small, with my students. It’s a way to connect and share positivity within our classroom. One day after I had posed this question, I let my students know that my celebration was that I was headed back to school. This allowed for many confused faces and prodding questions. I then told them that I would be returning to Michigan State University to work on my graduate degree. After reassuring them that these classes were online and I wasn’t really going anywhere, they all clapped and celebrated my news—excited for their teacher’s future journey. This memory is one I cherish deeply. It marks the start of a path that has taught me so much and that I am forever grateful for.
In August of 2020, I began student teaching and my first graduate class through MSU. After this tumultuous year that left me feeling exhausted but enlightened all the same, I took my first teaching job for the following school year. I decided to take the next two years to get to know myself as a teacher before I decided to head back to graduate school. After my first two years of teaching, my confidence in the field had grown exponentially. I had found where I belonged and was doing work that was challenging yet fulfilling. As I rounded out my second year in the classroom, I felt ready to continue my formal education. I knew without a doubt that I wanted to be back at MSU, and in the summer of 2023, I officially joined the Master of Arts in Education program. This program has helped guide my thinking and teaching practices by providing me with new perspectives, and the opportunity to work alongside and share ideas with other educators and gather strategies to bring into my classroom.
I have learned many theories, practices, and strategies throughout my time in this program. All of which play a key role in expanding my practice and shaping my teaching philosophy. Each course I have taken has guided and informed how I thought about literacy, assessments, language, and behavior. While I could point out many positives from each course, there are three courses that I would like to shine a light on concerning my learning. A course that re-opened the door to my education, a class that allowed me to fully bridge the gap between my classes and my work, and a course that showed me how learning about myself and further enrich my teaching and practice.
One course I took in my MAED program that helped kick-start this learning process was ED 800: Concepts of Educational Inquiry. This class was the first one I took after being accepted into the program. The reason it sticks out to me is that it helped me become a student again. After two years of not taking courses, I felt like I had forgotten how to be a student. While taking this course, I was able to re-familiarize myself with my past learning habits and strategies while also reading texts that I still think about a year later. These texts covered diverse teaching strategies, cultures, and people. I have such clear memories of using my summer off from teaching to fully immerse myself in the readings and taking pride in my later writing pieces where I would string together my thoughts and reflections. Overall, I harbor a great appreciation for this course and what it taught be about not just education, but myself.
The next class I would like to speak on is CEP 802: Developing Positive Attitudes Toward Learning. This class stands out to me because it allowed me to learn alongside one of my students. The heart of this class was motivation, and over the semester I was able to work with a student of mine by finding techniques and strategies to help bolster their motivation with literacy. I found this experience to be very rewarding. I crafted one ongoing assessment and project that I returned to throughout my time working with my student. Together, we worked hard to understand what limited the student’s motivation and what allowed it to flourish. By the end of the class, I had made helpful discoveries about my student’s literacy and saw progress in their motivation to learn. It was very fulfilling to utilize what I was learning in real-time and it made the direct link between my graduate program and my job as a teacher feel incredibly real and strong.
Another class that carries much importance to my learning while in the MAED program is TE 845: Language Diversity and Literacy Instruction and Assessment. Here, there were two strong main focuses: my own language and heritage and English Language Learners. I thought it was both unique and exciting to take the time to reflect on language in terms of my family ancestry. This is something, as a monolingual English speaker, I had not greatly considered. I then did a deep dive into this history on both my paternal and maternal sides, discovering history that dates back several hundred years. This allowed me to feel more in tune with language, and thus entirely ready to devote my time to learning best practices for the ELL students in my classroom. Because of this class, I also made time to observe skilled ELL lessons in my own building and was able to catalog successful strategies and ideas. I am thankful for the wide breadth of ideas this course prompted me to work with.
I feel very grateful for having experienced these courses and the expertise of my professors. Because of these courses, I have seen so much of my own growth as an educator and further expanded my mindset. I was given opportunities to work with wonderful people, read inspiring texts, and do work that matters. The hard work that went into succeeding in these courses was well worth it, and I would do it again in a heartbeat if it meant becoming the educator I have grown into today.
Furthermore, these classes have shifted the way I see my responsibilities as a reflective and inclusive educator. I have prioritized inclusivity and care as an educator from the start of my career, but now I feel more prepared to continue working with all students. When I was an undergraduate student at Michigan State, this was a focus in my courses. It was refreshing and invigorating to see this same philosophy was present at the graduate level. Because of my time taking these courses, I see more clearly when it comes to challenges in the classroom. Whether these may be based on literacy and academics, or behavior in the classroom, I have learned to always speak and act with understanding. There are many deep levels of understanding, and being patient enough to discover why a student may be struggling and how to best offer support is key. I feel responsible for creating an environment of acceptance and care.
This program has also altered the way I approach my job as a teacher. Along with being reflective and inclusive, I also constantly consider best practices for my lessons, activities, and interactions with students. I want to create a well-rounded learning environment for every student who enters my classroom. I have been in the same classroom with the same materials, and I never want my material to feel stale or repetitive. Expanding my education and working with new people is a strong way to combat this. My experiences as a graduate student aligned wonderfully with my teaching aspirations, and I have a large reserve of resources and ideas that I’m prepared to carry into my classroom.
Taking a step back and looking at all I have learned and accomplished, I feel immensely proud. I’m proud of how I have evolved not only as an educator but as a person. It is refreshing to soundly understand my values and see them reflected in my practice. The Master of Arts in Education program has allowed to me discover, learn, and grow in all of the ways that matter most. Even with my time in this program coming to a close, I will continue to find new ways to stimulate my learning, because as a teacher it is my job to offer all that I can to my students. With all of my newfound knowledge, fortified skills, and clear vision for the future, it is with pride that I continue down the path of education.