Background:
Katie Brown is a teacher at
Shuskan, a low-income middle school in Bellingham, Washington. Over half of the
students at Shuksan Middle School are on free or reduced lunches, and parents
were desperately trying to get their kids into other schools in the area. That
was, until a few years ago when the culture began to change. Katie tells Bill
Gates “it started when a strong new superintendent and principal came in and
started changing the culture. It’s more collaborative now, and the school has
created ‘a culture of high expectations, balanced with high affection.’” Now
students are on a wait list to get into the school.
One of the things that stuck out
most to me during Katie interview with Gates is that, just like students need
to be engaged in their learning, so do teachers. She explains that we would
never have kids sit in class and listen to lectures all day, so why do we
continue to do that to teachers with conferences and seminars? I fully agree!
I want to be an amazing teacher.
That means I need to be reading everything I can get my hands on about teaching
and pedagogy. However, it also means I need to be willing to learn from and
observe other teachers in action. I love the idea of “small group training”
that Katie talks about in her video, where teachers of English meet with other
teachers of English to discuss how they can improve their classroom. When we
are learning in that environment, we are learning better.
I am excited to have Katie in the
classroom, to learn from her, and to talk to her more about teacher
collaboration and CCSS.
Questions:
What are some books you would recommend reading?
What is your biggest piece of advice for a brand new
teacher?
What is your teaching philosophy?
What is your approach to classroom management?
How do you involve parents/your community in your classroom?
Any tips on applying CCSS? What have you liked about CCSS?
Would you change anything about them?
The interview with Katie that I looked at:
https://www.edsurge.com/n/2014-08-18-what-bill-gates-learned-from-washington-state-s-teacher-of-the-year
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