This Spartan Will (Never Stop Learning)

By Emily Joslin

 

As my time completing my Master of Arts in Education (MAED) at Michigan State University (MSU) comes to an end, I have very mixed feelings.  While I am elated to be done with this extremely challenging time in my life, I am also sad to see this period of my learning, both professional and personal, come to an end.  While I was completing my master’s degree, I worked full-time teaching Kindergarten.  Adapting my teaching to incorporate my learning drove both my education and my teaching.   In this essay, I will detail my future goals that will help continue to direct my desire to be a life-long learner.

 

American Sign Language and Tactile Learning

 

The school where I teach is the official school for the deaf in my district and surrounding districts.  At the beginning of my teaching career, I was extremely bothered by not being able to communicate with my students who are deaf or hard of hearing.  I began to teach myself sign language.  When I began my work toward my master’s degree I no longer had time to pursue this passion.  I learned enough to communicate the basics with my students and to incorporate many signs into my everyday teaching.  I love that signing our sight words and our alphabet each day has added another tactile reinforcement for my students to use in their learning.  Now that I am slated to graduate soon, I know that my first goal is to continue learning American Sign Language (ASL).

 

LifePrint.com is a wonderful resource for anyone who is interested in learning ASL.  Dr. Bill Vickers offers not only a sign language dictionary, but also has video lessons that group signs together and teach you how to use them in basic conversation.  He also offers quizzes at the end of lessons to check for understanding.  One of my favorite features of the website is that he also does a great job teaching the aspiring ASL learner about deaf culture also.  I am going to continue to use his wonderful website and lessons to become more fluent in ASL to better communicate with my students and to incorporate more signing in my classroom.

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Restorative Justice and Classroom Community

 

One of things I learned in my last five years of teaching is how important it is to build a positive classroom community.  Teaching my students kindness and responsibility is so important.  This is something that will always be one of my learning goals.  I want to continue to learn new practices to find what works best in my classroom.  This is a constantly moving target, as each and every class presents its own unique difficulties.  One program that has been extremely successful is Restorative Justice.

 

Restorative Justice is a popular new tool for building classroom community and managing behavior.  According to Edutopia, “for the growing number of districts using restorative justice, the programs have helped strengthen campus communities, prevent bullying, and reduce student conflicts. And the benefits are clear: early-adopting districts have seen drastic reductions in suspension and expulsion rates, and students say they are happier and feel safer.”

 

Restorative Justice helps children learn to better communicate their own feelings and to better understand the feelings of others.  I feel that this will really help continue to build my classroom community.  My district has recently noticed this program also and I will be attending a professional development course in the fall.

 

Incorporating Music and Movement

 

My district recently cut music and physical education for budgetary reasons.  As educators, we know how important these things are to our students, especially for young students.  In Kindergarten we make everything into a song.  I incorporate music into every part of my day to help with transitions and to help my students remember information.  I especially love Harry Kindergarten songs – they are available on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/user/HarryKindergarten.  We also love https://www.gonoodle.com I cannot recommend this site enough for all educators to help incorporate music, movement, and brain breaks into your class.

 

I play six different instruments, however, they are all wind instruments.  Playing a wind instrument makes in difficult to sing lyrics with your students or to give directions.  I really want to learn to play the ukulele so that I can incorporate my own songs in my classroom. 

 

YouTube has a plethora of wonderful video tutorials to help learn ukulele basics.  My favorite is Chili Monster He starts with basic skills and builds on them to the point where you join them together in songs. 

 

I am so thankful for the Internet.  Not only did it allow me the opportunity to fulfill my dream of being a Michigan State Spartan, but it also allows me to fulfill my dream of being a life-long learner.

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