Leadership Impact Paper
Macy Schocke
American College of Education
LIT5091 Capstone Experience for Literacy
Dr. Ellen Brewer
December 5, 2021
Leadership Impact Paper
My journey through this master’s program at the American College of Education, started with a literacy program through Voyager Sopris. After completing this program chosen by the district I work in, I decided that I wanted to further my education and see what more I could learn. When beginning this journey, I learned a lot of new information about literacy and how to teach the fundamentals of literacy.
While working through these master level courses, my ideas and philosophy of who I am as a teacher and educational leader has changed. Throughout this paper, I will reflect on my experiences, connect to those experiences and different disciplines, explain what risk taking can achieve, my personal ethical perspectives and the initiatives I can take with my learning in my classroom. The growth that I have made throughout this educational adventure will be beneficial for myself as a teacher and for the students in my classroom.
Reflection
When teaching students to learn to read, the extent of how and what the students learn is determined by the teachers. For a teacher to be successful, they have to be a master in their craft and know how to effectively plan and deliver a lesson. An educator needs to know their student population: how they learn, what interests them, who they are as people, etc. In the school setting, a leader is someone who is always improving, seeking new ideas and methods to teach students of all learning styles.
By taking and completing these courses through the American College of Education, I feel as though I have pushed myself to become better in my profession. I have learned a new skill set on how to plan for different types of learners who are learning at different levels. I have gain knowledge in how to properly assess and collect data to provide much needed interventions. This journey has taught me how to use the research and evidence of other to guide my students’ learning. This overall experience has proven to be insightful in the aspect that there were many things that I did not gain through my bachelor’s degree that I needed in my classroom.
Connections to Experience
This learning experience has allowed me to gain knowledge, new knowledge, that would be beneficial for all members in the profession to get. Like stated in the reflection, a lot of the knowledge that was gain throughout this experience is not something that I was given in my bachelor’s degree; if people do not take courses like these to better themselves as a teacher, they may never understand the things that I have learned. For a school or educational setting to be effective continued learning and development from staff should be encouraged.
In my time at the American College of Education, the most beneficial course for me was the one where I needed to write a unit lesson plan, connecting one theme, and follow a layered curriculum approach for learning. The layered curriculum approach starts with basic, simple tasks and progresses to more complex tasks (Gun, 2013). This method of teaching sanctions all students, at all levels, to get an education that is individualized just for them. By doing this, the lesson is developed to extend for the students who need it and be less complex for the lower achieving one; all students are getting the same content information just in different increments. The impact of this course was major for me, this is now something that I apply in my classroom and guide my teammates to do as well; we lesson plan as a team and this allows us to teach all students in our classrooms. This was one of my first courses at ACE and it allowed to me to modify and tweak as I continued through my remaining courses; I applied it to my classroom and worked to make it better as the courses went on.
Connections to Discipline
When teaching students new information, you always want to engage what they already know. Being able to teach a student by using background knowledge and making connections will allow them to store that information in the long-term memory. Crossing the discipline line is also very important when teaching children new information. If students are able to apply new knowledge with any content area, they will better connect to it. “Students need to learn literacies that may be required to participate in the activities associated with learning, knowing, and communicating within a particular discipline (Jewett, 2013).”
Many of the course that I have taken while at ACE have focused around making sure you are using more than one discipline when teaching; these courses make you use more than one and prove how students are going to engage in that learning. In two of the different courses that were taken, a unit lesson plan was created and several disciplines had to be included. The courses were obviously focused around reading, but in my lesson plans I incorporated science, writing and math. Different learning styles were used within these, as well as different literacy styles. By teaching across disciplines, the students are able to get double dosed in some of these areas; the students are learning new information, while engaging in information that is already stored in their brains.
Risk Taking
With the world constantly changing, the ways of teaching a developing and changing as well. For so long, the way of teaching was one specific way and you taught to the whole group of kids. Those ways no longer work in the profession, because of how the students learn, what they are exposed and how much they come in knowing. Risk taking is a part of the teaching profession now; teachers have to take risks, so they know how to teach and educate their students.
One big risk that I have applied in my classroom, that I learned from my courses at ACE, is to let the students choose their own way of learning. I want them to take part in their learning and I want them to engage in their learning, therefore I allow them to help me make the choice of how to teach them. Students need to be engaged in what they are doing, if they are not engaged they will not make the connections and store the information being taught. Taking risks in the profession of teaching is a scary thing, but it is also beneficial, because it allows students to show you what works and what doesn’t.
Ethical Perspectives
As a professional leader, the way that you handle situations, students, parents and other scenarios has to be in an ethical manner. In the teaching profession being ethical means that different views, beliefs, dilemmas and decision-making needs to be taken care of by using reflection on global issues, perspectives, human rights and equality (Ethical Education Network, 2021). Educators needs to be able to address and handle all situations that are presented to them with an open mind and unbiased views. Every student deserves a fair, fighting chance and they needs to be allowed to represent who they are in their own skin.
Initiative
From the beginning of my teaching career, I have been an advocate for students. The learning that I have done over the past several months at ACE has just made that advocacy stronger. Being a leader in the profession, means that everything that is being done is for the students in the classroom, academically and personally. Educators not only are in charge of their students’ learning, but their own too. For students to get the education that they deserve, teachers in the profession need to keep improving themselves as well.
I began these courses at ACE after taking a literacy program that my district provided to us. After I completed the literacy program, I wanted to further my education into the master’s program; I learned so much from the short amount of time doing the training, I figured I could learn more. The information that I have learned through this journey has been and will be beneficial for the years to come in my teaching career. Continuing to learn and become a better educator is going to do nothing but benefit anyone and everyone that is involved.
Conclusion
“Leadership is not believing your own press; and leadership is never forgetting the why and the ethics of the mission and all those individuals—teachers and students—who have placed their trust in you (Chadwick, 2018).” When you become a teacher, you assume the role of a leader. Throughout this journey at ACE, I have become a better leader to my students and to my colleagues. My education and ability to teach has broadened, therefore my ability to lead others in the same direction has done the same. I have learned a lot of new information and things about my profession that I now get to move forward and apply in my further teaching career.
Chadwick, J. A. (2018, June 29). What Does Leadership in Education Mean to You? Retrieved from NAtional Council of Teachers of English: https://ncte.org/blog/2018/06/what-does-leadership-in-education-mean-to-you/
Ethical Education Network. (2021). Ethical Education. Retrieved from EEN: https://ethicaleducation.ie/
Gun, E. S. (2013). The Reflections of Layered Curriculum to Learning - Teaching Process in Social Studies Course. Internation Journal of Instruction, 87-99.
Jewett, P. (2013). Content-Area Literacy: Recognizing the Embedded Literacies of Science and Mathematics. Journal of Reading Education, 18-24.