Running head: TEACHER INTERVIEW PROJECT

Teacher Interview Project

Lauren Allen

TEACHER INTERVIEW PROJECT

Ivy Tech Community CollegeName of Artifact: Teacher Interview Project

Date: October 2015
Course: EDUC 101: Introduction to Education
Brief Description:
This was an interview I conducted with a fourth grade teacher to learn more about the
knowledge, skills and dispositions needed to be successful in the classroom. I also was able
to reflect upon how those ideals fit into my existing schema about teaching as a profession.
Rationale:
To document my understanding of Professional Learning and Ethical Practice, I have
selected to include my Teacher Interview. By participating in an interview with an
experienced teacher, I was able to compare and contrast my own ideas of what teaching will
be like with someones already existing experiences. This led to a greater understanding of
the knowledge, skills, and dispositions I will need to employ in the classroom.

Teacher Interview Project

Jessica Lynch is a first year teacher at the Center for Inquiry School 84 in IPS. She
teaches fourth grade and has had her current students as second graders when she was student
teaching. She has also been an Instructional Assistant in Kindergarten. Jessica became a
teacher because she had significant home issues as a student, which was reflected in her
schoolwork. She believes it is important to give back to kids that maybe have obstacles that
are not academic. My reasons are very different for becoming a teacher. I want to work with
students to develop their life long love of learning and to help instill confidence in them,
especially if they do not yet believe in themselves.
Compassion and flexibility are the essential qualifications Jessica believes a teacher
needs to possess. Compassion and flexibility are key ingredients to help get you through the
school year. I believe a teacher needs to have an open mind and a good dose of enthusiasm,
as well as the ability to learn and grow in all areas. Jessica describes the demands of

TEACHER INTERVIEW PROJECT

teaching draining at best. It takes a lot of your mental faculties and emotional space; there is
a connection to be made everywhere and you take everything with you. I anticipate the
demand of teaching to be great. I often wonder how I will reach every student and have
them take ownership of their learning and really enjoy it. I also anticipate paperwork to be a
huge part of my life as a teacher; there are always papers to be graded, lessons to be planned,
IEP paperwork to fill out, a teachers work is never done.
In her classroom Jessica only speaks to the parents of her students in a one on one
adult situation, a lot of parent communication is done via email. All of her students IEPs,
504s, personal files and notes are kept in a locked file. In my classroom I would like to
approach parent communication as parents and student together as much as possible. In the
day to day situations I would want my students to take ownership of their behavior and be
able communicate with their parents when they are having great day, as well as their areas for
improvement. According to Adcock (2014), A persons feelings and passions are the guiding
force of his or her behavior (p. 50-51) When it comes to private situations like an IEP or a
504, I would want to only discuss that in private. I would keep personal files in a locked
cabinet.
Jessica has developed the family teacher partnership in her classroom by sending out
an email at least once a week that contains open ended questions for parents to ask their
student. She also invites parents to have one on one conferences whenever parents feel they
need one. Jessica attends after school events and meets one on one with students before and
after school. She believes that working relationships with your families is just as important
as relationships with your students. Jessica is readily available to her parents to establish a
rapport of dependability with them. In my own classroom, I want to approach partnership

TEACHER INTERVIEW PROJECT

between parents and students in a very similar way. In addition I would like to have my
students (if I am teaching Intermediates) write the parent communication in addition to
writing open ended discussion questions for my families. In Jessicas classroom establishing
the family teacher partnership extends to families that have a different cultural background
from her own. When understanding what cultural background her students are from Jessica
approaches it by talking to her students, asking them certain questions and inferring
information from their answers, picking up on subtle details such as a student wearing a Star
of David v. a cross, and interacting with parents. Jessica believes if you pay attention to your
students and parents, you will figure it out. I would want approach culture in a similar way
in my future classroom. I also would want students of all cultural backgrounds to teach our
class about their cultures and the holidays they celebrate, as a learning opportunity for all
students.
The day of my interview was the culminating day of CFIs first quarter theme, which
was diversity. When talking with Jessica about how diversity affects her students in their
school, she turned to her fourth grade students for their opinions on how diversity plays a
role in their education and their lives. This is what they had to say: (diversity) makes life not
boring, some people have different ideas, they dont want to have the same ideas, we think
differently, we learn differently and are active in the ways we move. Different is comparing
two things, diversity is many things. Diversity is a topic that has a bunch of different things
inside of it that are different. I also observed the role diversity plays in the lessons of
Jessicas classroom, she told me her class made dead bread last week for El Did de Los
Muertos. She wants her students to experience diversity, not just learn about it in books or
discussions. In my future classroom, I want to involve my students in activities that celebrate

TEACHER INTERVIEW PROJECT

diversity by having my students teach lessons about the diversity in their lives and about
holidays and things they celebrate in their lives. Adcock said, Diversity of the learner is
defined commonly by ethnicity, economic conditions, and gender; however, there are other
issues of diversity- such as the visual or auditory abilities or the disposition of the learnerthat can affect learning (p. 50-51)
In observing her classroom I learned that Jessica and I have similar beliefs about
education. What I am accepting from her classroom to incorporate into my own classroom
are that teachers need to be compassionate and flexible people, to be able to love and
empathize with their students. There is a connection to be made everywhere, you take
everything with you; as a teacher I want to constantly be making connections in my everyday
life to my students and my classroom. I want to be thinking How can I use this in my
classroom? What examples in my students lives can I use to teach this? Im doing this
and I think my students would love it. I want to enhance my students learning outside their
classroom like Jessica does in her classroom. I want to do this by attaching open ended
questions for my students and their families to answer. I also want to involve myself in my
schools community and the lives of my students by attending school events, being available
to my students parents like Jessica does. I want to infer information about my students lives
by observing them and talking to them, as apposed to out right asking a student or their
family a blunt question. I came to these conclusions about the practices I want to put into
place in my future classroom by reading articles for class, working with and observing
students, and listening to other teachers talk about what has worked for them in their
classrooms.

TEACHER INTERVIEW PROJECT

Jessica and I have very similar, but not identical views about education and how we
run our classrooms. From our interview, there is nothing I would out right reject. The things
that I would refine from my interview with Jessica are: Her belief is that compassion and
flexibility are essential teacher qualities to possess and those are important qualities to
possess, I think a teacher also needs to be open minded, enthusiastic, and have a willingness
to learn and grow. Jessica handles parent conferences as an adults only conversation, I would
open it up to that particular student to come in and suggestions for improving behavior or
their school work. I believe this would make students feel included in their own learning and
because they are a part of the solution, they will be more likely to adhere to the plan. Jessica
believes in being readily available to her students parents, the one thing I would refine is that
I would set hours to communicate for availability as to give myself balance, for example I
will answer emails and phone calls from the hours of 5:30 and 8:30 in the evening. I came to
these conclusions by watching videos and observing other teachers classroom management.
It is a common opinion that when students are included and take ownership of their
classroom and learning, there is a buy in and less behavior problems. I also came to these
conclusions by talking to other teachers about the importance of having time away from your
classroom, in order to make yourself a better teacher.
Jessicas belief about maintaining confidentiality and liability concerns are to only
speak about a specific child when other children are not present, to communicate a lot via
email, and to keep student files and personal notes locked. Her response connects with what
I believe to be essential function of personal ethics and my value system by maintaining
confidentiality between herself and her students parents by not speaking about a child when
other children are present, by keeping personal files and notes locked away, and by

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communicating via email, as to have the conversation be completely private. We also

connect on keeping student files and personal notes.
After spending time in a classroom and conducting a teacher interview, I feel more
definite in my decision to be a teacher. I want to be teaching every day, building relationships
with my students, and helping them love to learn. There are many connections to be made
every day in teaching. According to Parkay, Focus more on the child rather than the subject
matter. The students personal growth are important. Learners should be active and learn to
solve problems by reflecting on their own experiences (p. 141). These questions have
presented themes that have been a thread in every single class we have had this semester. We
have discussed the important knowledge, skills, and dispositions a quality teacher should
possess and the experiences that have made us want to become them. Confidentiality of
students personal information and developing the partnership with students and their
families has been discussed in class and has been shown in action this semester. Diversity has
been the underlying theme of almost every discussion we have had in class, I feel like it is
the overarching theme in education. Every single classroom in every school deals with
diversity today in one way or another.

TEACHER INTERVIEW PROJECT

References

Adcock,P.(2014).TheLongevityofMultipleIntelligenceTheoryinEducation.Retrieved
November2,2015.

Parkay, F., & Stanford, B. (1990). How Can You Develop Your Education Philosophy? In
Becoming a teacher: Accepting the challenge of a profession (3rd ed., p. 21). Boston,
Massachusetts: Allyn and Bacon.