Samantha Rodrguez PTS: Dr.

Maritza Reyes EDPE4018-001 Practice Teaching Monday January 27, 2013

My Teaching Philosophy

As a college student in the University of Puerto Rico at Humacao, I have been given the opportunity to be guided through the process of building my teaching philosophy throughout the four years I have been enrolled here. While I was educated in the Language Acquisition and Seminar courses, I found myself understanding what it takes to effectively obtain students full comprehension in their learning process. As an assignment for these courses, it was mandatory to construct a theoretical model which would represent the philosophy I plan to use when I become an educator later on in the future. The

combinations of theorists that I found would have the best results are the following: Skinners Operant Conditioning theory, Ausubels Subsumption theory and Rogers Huministic Psychology theory. I chose all of the theorists mentioned above because first and foremost, I understand that learning a second language is not an easy task and must be learned slowly by starting with the very basic skills and continually working your way up to actually master a language. Its not realistic to think that all of this will be possible from one day to the next. I understand this more than most people know because I have acquired a second language for about twelve years now and I still struggle with it a little bit. However, I am aware that with time and help from others, it will most definitely improve. The most important lesson we must never forget is that we cant set our expectations too high because it will no doubt have bad results and create a sense of frustration and disappointment within us. Everyone

Samantha Rodrguez

EDPE4018 Practice Teaching

PTS: Dr. Maritza Reyes

has their strong suits or unique style of learning and their downfalls. However, instead of seeing it as a bad thing, we should all help each other by complementing our talents and offering our help to one another. Every single one of our linguistic accomplishments since we were infants until now, depend on our very unique and distinct experiences and attributes such as our personality, thinking process, cultural background and learning style. In order for us to progress, that is if we truly desire to, we must include our characteristics in every learning process so that we can really acquire the knowledge we are provided with and makes us feel most comfortable. For my theoretical model, I felt that the behaviorist, cognitive and constructivist theories should never be parted because a teacher who follows all three at the same time (in my opinion), would be facilitating a more well-rounded education. My first choice for this model was the behaviorist because I strongly believe in the promising results that come from giving verbal and materialistic forms of positive reinforcement. I believe that if students do well in activities, behave and come to class regularly, they should earn rewards such as stickers or good behavior certificates, etc. This will most definitely boost their self esteem, make them feel proud of themselves and their hard work and also motivate them to continue putting all their effort in doing well in class. For the second school of thought, I chose cognitive because I think that every teachers objective should be to teach material in a meaningful way over obligating their students to memorize information that they will use temporarily and eventually discard from their memory. Students should be given assignments, projects and educational material that they can relate to, analyze, link to their prior knowledge and will ultimately enjoy so that the information that they do retain will stick with them as they grow older. I would really love to break with the unfortunate tradition of observing rote learning from
Samantha Rodrguez EDPE4018 Practice Teaching PTS: Dr. Maritza Reyes

students. Its just not fair to them and their future. People say that a teachers main goal should always be to help them reach theirs so we should always have their best interests at heart and strive to provide them with all the necessary tools for success in life. The very last school of thought that I chose was constructivist. I thought it was crucial to be included in any theoretical model because it ensures that the students learn independently by discovering their very own opinion on any given subject. Another important point that must be shared is that in certain theories within this school of thought, the teacher must be as kind, nurturing and empathetic as possible to win the trust of his or her students so they dont feel threatened by any means nor hesitant towards the language acquisition process.

Samantha Rodrguez

EDPE4018 Practice Teaching

PTS: Dr. Maritza Reyes