I grew up on a farm in rural South Western Ontario. We did not have a lot of diversity represented in our community, so upon moving to London, Ontario to study at Western University, I found myself becoming more aware of my intersectional landscape. It’s not that my intersectionality did not exist prior to my post secondary studies, but I was not truly aware of it. Although I definitely had some unique experiences growing up on a farm, I acknowledge that there are many things I have yet to experience and understand.
This website started off as a project for my Intro to Music Education class at Western. We were encouraged to reflect on meaningful experiences throughout our musical and educational journey thus far. We discussed things such as influential teachers in our lives and positive examples of teaching. These items can be viewed under the “Teaching” tab. After this course ended, I continued to use the website as a means to share and reflect upon the post-secondary experiences that have shaped the kind of teacher I am and want to become.
Throughout the rest of my website, you will see various tabs where I have shared experiences that answer the following questions: What experiences have been central to your evolving understanding of who you are as a teacher? What diverse family or cultural processes shape what kind of teacher you want to become? Under the “Engaging” tab, you will begin to see a bit of my personal “history”, as well as international and community experiences I have taken on. Participating in teaching experiences in the Domincan Republic and Guatemala helped me develop my social emotional learning quite extensively. I learned about the importance of building relationships with others, particularly those of different cultures, and how to make responsible decisions in varying contexts. I also realized that empathy is something we must practice every day and discovered much about my own emotions and behaviours as we navigated these new environments together.
Under the “About” tab, I share more about my identity as a musician, student and educator and also share videos on “Who I Am” and “My Manifesto”. I have even included reflection papers (under the “Reflecting” tab) that I have written in a couple of my undergraduate courses, as they have greatly shaped my approach to teaching. Most notably, under the “Writing” tab, I have uploaded a copy of a critical paper I wrote in my final undergraduate year explaining why we, music educators, should even care about our students and how we might go about advocating for them.
I have chosen my website as my artifact for the simple reason that it has helped me understand my past and present experiences so that I can move forward and articulate my hopes and expectations for future ones. It has helped me develop my teaching philosophy thus far: “why do I want to pursue a career in education, what kind of teacher do I want to be, and what is my philosophy of music education?”, located under the “Teaching” tab. I know it will continue to evolve with my relocation to Vancouver and the University of British Columbia. This is an entirely new province, institution, and culture for me. It has prompted me to think in different ways and see things through a much different lens. On my website, I have created a “Blog” tab to help me reflect upon these thoughts and experiences I will be grappling with during my 11-month journey through the Bachelor of Education program. This blog is allowing me to think through where I was at the beginning of the program, where I currently am, and where I am going.
"I believe in the value of providing a positive, respectful, safe, and inclusive environment for students that supports positive academic engagement, social-emotional learning, and mental well-being. As a teacher, I will strive to create an environment where students can set and achieve learning goals for themselves, feel and show empathy for others, develop and maintain relationships, and make responsible decisions. Additionally, I will foster a growth mindset that motivates students to apply effective learning strategies in their studies, monitor their own progress, and feel a sense of ownership for their own education."
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Some ideas that have been presented in our course readings have prompted me to think more critically about my own complex identities and diverse experiences. They have inspired me to consider various aspects within the classroom environment, such as biases, communicating across differences, gender, race and ethnicity, sexual orientation, poverty and social class, motivation, mental health, risk and resiliency. My two biggest takeaways from our course readings were (1) acknowledging biases, and (2) encouraging a growth mindset.
Our first reading, “Who has the privilege to be empowered?” (Simmons, 2020), helped me think through my own privileges that I’ve carried with me, particularly coming from a small town community. I had no idea how disempowering the world is for Black children prior to entering university (Simmons, 2020). I want to acknowledge the privilege I have, education myself on the racial inequities that exist, understand how my identity, power and privilege come to play in the classroom, and then create a classroom environment where all students “feel safe to be who they are without ridicule or bullying, where they can express themselves freely without being silenced” (Simmons, 2020, p. 89). Canada is not a fair and just society, as I thought it was in my small town, and I want to be cognisant of the nature of the language I am using, in hopes of unlearning discriminatory behaviours and modelling that to my students.
In addition, Conyers & Wilson (2020) have prompted me to incorporate the concept of a “growth mindset” in my classrooms. While I believe that knowledge is power, what I believe is more important is how we use said knowledge. Thinking about increasing students’ motivation by explicitly teaching them about their brain’s capacity to change (Conyers & Wilson, 2020) is a revolutionary tool that I had not yet considered. I want to give my students specific instruction on how to use “effective learning strategies” (Conyers & Williams, 2020, p. 1), so that they are being given all of the necessary tools to set and reach their goals! By teaching my students how to be metacognitive, I hope to enable them to “set learning goals, monitor their progress, and apply high-yield strategies such as regularly testing themselves on the material they are studying” (Conyers & Williams, 2020, p. 4). Growing up, I was always curious to know what my mind was capable of. While nothing compares to the adventure and warmth of growing up in a small town, I suspected that there was much more to be learned than what was directly in front of me. Understanding my own mental capacities by means of the growth mindset has prompted me to start thinking about what this may mean for my students and my own teaching philosophy.