A teacher establishes, promotes and sustains inclusive learning environments where diversity is embraced and every student is welcomed, cared for, respected and safe.
Students cannot learn in environments that are stressful and unsupportive, and I have shown in my planning and on practicums that I am employing classroom management strategies that promote positive, engaging learning environments. Pedagogical relationships are my main focus as I encourage my students to take risks and critically think on the lessons that I design. The social justice lesson plan that I created for my EDUC 450 class shows that I consider many different actions that I can take when engaging with my students and that everything I do is with intention.
It’s important to me that I am always fostering in the school community equality and respect with regard to rights as provided for in the Alberta Human Rights Act and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. I believe that as a Canadian I must exemplify these values in a visible way. I am an advocate for public schools and frequently write to my MLA about issues that affect all Canadians. I have also engaged in correspondence with the Education Minister in the past and will continue to advocate for inclusion and diversity in the classroom, school, and society as a whole.
In this last practicum, I had a week where the students were struggling to engage and many behaviour issues were becoming to be disruptive to the class. Since being aware of and facilitating responses to the emotional and mental health needs of students is an important part of my pedagogy I created a character lesson to take place of spelling for a day. We dug more deeply into the needs of the students and through this lesson were able to build stronger relationships that then improved the behaviour in the class for the rest of the practicum.