Blog Two

My philosophy of teaching has not changed very much. I still believe that students should be able to analyze, synthesize, justify, and criticize the opinions of others and their own. However, I would add the fact that opinions and their ability to perform these tasks. I still believe that social studies education should provide students with the ability to become good citizens; however, I would add the fact that as life long learners, the definition of a good citizen might change as a student educates themselves and their ability to analyze, synthesize, criticize and justify opinions develops.

I have a class that really reminds me of the class portrayed in the movie Summer School. It seems to be nothing but the trouble students, and "rejects," of the school. I've often wondered how I am going to teach these students, because they legitimately do not care about learning this information. I have had no clue what to do, negative reinforcement has not worked and they do not respond to the teachers criticism. I have came up some ideas how to succeed in seeing success in these students in the classroom.

First of all, like the movie summer school, I have to find a way to make the material covered relevant to these students lives. This may or may not be easy; however, it has to be relevant to these students lives, otherwise it will not be successful. Secondly, it may be a good idea to try to find a way to positively reinforce these students. This will aid in the students learning. Thirdly, I am going to try to implement cooperative learning, and aid the bad students with a both a more capable peer and let them lead their groups. This will aid in classroom management and achieve my goals of educating my students. All of these ideas will hopefully aid in achieving my overall goals for the class.