User:Cwhit107

My name is Candi Whitehead. I currently attend Old Dominion University. I will receive my Bachelors degree in education in spring 2009. I want to teach either third, forth, or fifth grade. I live in Virginia on Chincoteague Island. If no one knows about Chincoteague, it is known for its annual pony swim the last Wednesday in July. My island is a tourist trap. I work full time at a restaurant called The Village. I don’t have much time to do anything other than work and go to school. If I ever get any spare time I’ am usually at the beach, but that is very rare. The winter time is when I travel. This picture is my last vacation we were on a cruise ship in the Carribean.

I wish to teach third, forth, or fifth grade because I fell that those are the grades that kids learn the most that they will need later in life. Everything you learn in those grades you need for everyday life. Also, I have a lot of patience but I do not want to teach ABC’s, 123’s, and nap time. I have done two internships one with a fifth grade class. I really enjoyed the way the teacher taught. She would put the notes on an overhead and give each kid a copy. They would glue it to one side of their notebook. The teacher would then go through each paragraph and ask which words they didn’t know and ask the subject and predicate of each sentence. She would then get the kids to draw a picture for each paragraph. For instance in Science, they would draw flowers and explain the stem, leaf, root, and stamen. I feel that this way of teaching keeps the interest of the students and keeps them focused. This is how I wish to teach my classes. I hope to make learning fun and interesting.

Teaching Philosophy

Diversity: I believe that girls and boys should work together on projects and when doing group activities there should not be groups of just boys or girls. Students should be taught that boys and girls are equal. Kids should be grouped with students of their same learning ability. Kids with special needs should have a special education teacher; if they do not then the teacher needs to explain things more in-depth to the child. Instructional strategies: I explained some of my instructional strategies in my about the author paragraph. I think that classes should be half lecture and half activities. If a class is just taught by lecture kids are not going to pay attention. They loose interest fast so the teacher’s responsibility is to keep them entertained while teaching the material that they need to know Classroom environment: When I organize my classroom I will have pictures on the walls to keep the room home(y). I will have bulletin boards with the students work to show accomplishments. Technology: In my classroom I will have activities that will have to be done on the computer to teach the students more about computers and how they work. Students will learn how to complete math problems without calculators and then be taught how to check their answers with a calculator so they will know how to use them. Assessment: At the beginning of the year I will have a reading assignment that will have to be completed by everyone. Then I will see how well they all did. I will then separate the kids into different reading groups. Then I will be able to know which kids are better readers than the others. This will also help with spelling.

Kmorr038 (talk) 03:25, 2 June 2008 (UTC) Candi, I really enjoyed reading about you and your teaching philosophy. I, also, enjoy the beach and the islands, and completly understand your love for them! I think it's great that you want to vary your instruction by allowing students to do activities in addition to your lecturing. I think thats a very important part of teaching, due to the fact that it does indeed keep their attention and interest better. Good luck with everything! I'm sure you will make a wonderful teacher.