My Professional Credo 1
My Professional Teaching Credo:
Matthew Morris
January 19, 2009
Introduction to Teaching
Mrs. Eastman
My Professional Credo 2
Abstract
Through all of my years of schooling I have been influenced greatly by my teachers in
developing my teaching style. They have the shaped the way I am as a person and the way I will
be as an educator. I hope to pass along the knowledge and life lessons they have given me to my
own students one day. The appreciation for learning has to be established through teacher-
student relationships, and it will be my duty one day to instill in my students this appreciation
that my teachers gave me. I will strive to prepare my students the best I can, by giving them
knowledge of information inside of the class room and knowledge for the real world. As an
educator I have a major responsibility to be the best role model and leader I can be for my
students.
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My Professional Credo:
Matthew Morris
As Harry Brook Adams once said, “A teacher affects eternity he can never tell, where his
influence stops” (Adams, 2009). I feel very strongly about this quote because it’s one of the
reasons I’m becoming a teacher. I want to be able to influence my students in a positive way in
their lives. Through all of my years of schooling I have had many great teachers who I not only
learned a lot from on course material, but lessons in life. I believe this is the reason why I feel it
to be very important for teachers to prepare their students for some encounters they may
experience in the so called “real world.” Besides their parents students will spend a majority time
with their teacher, so I find it important for the teacher to also be a good role model to them.
Being a teacher has much responsibility and should not be taken lightly. This may be a main
reason why a person with an understanding of this needs to step up and lead our nation’s youth,
like me.
Throughout all my years in schooling I had no idea what I wanted to do with the rest of
my life. It was not until my senior year I decided that the teaching profession was for me. My
Civil War teacher Mr. Robinson was a major influence in me making this decision. Not only was
he very influential on my learning in the class room, but outside of it in everyday life. In the
class room he taught through lecturing and class activities, which I really enjoyed in a time
where I found it hard to pay attention in any class. He got me excited about school again and
turned the second half of my senior year around. Not only this, but he was able to give me advice
on life, sports and tough decisions that I have had to make in life. He wasn’t just an ordinary
boring old teacher, but a friend and advisor to me. Through the influence he had on me I
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discovered how much a teacher could mean to a student in his or her life. This is solely the main
reason I want to become a teacher and apply the lessons I have had so far in my life to my
students.
When I become a teacher I know the responsibility I will have as an educator to help my
students grow both intellectually and internally. As an educator I will have the ability to mold the
minds of my students, and I want to do this in a way that they can later look back, and thank me
for it. It is my personal opinion that students learn best from lectures that involve interacting that
can be both fun and informational. Also it would be very beneficial to the students to include
lessons on life inside of the lectures so there is much more meaningful information behind the
text in a book. I do believe that grades are very important to a student’s success and are a part of
life lessons to teach students based on their performance. I think this, because no matter what
someone does they are always being evaluated one way or another, and it all starts from the time
they are in the class room. The knowledge that a student gains from the teacher is important to
evaluate through grades not necessarily based off of test grades, but off of a student’s
understanding of the information. The evaluation of this knowledge should be evaluated through
participation in lectures, presentations, or improvement made throughout the year. I do believe
tests are an important part of a teacher’s evaluation of their students, but by no means should be
the only thing that bases a student passing the class or not.
The Learning aspect of education is just as important if not more important than the
teaching side of it. As a teacher you have to be sure that the content you are covering is being
learned by your students. If a student is not fully able to learn the content you are trying to instill
in them, then you have failed to do the job you signed up for, which is to teach your students. I
believe the best way to help your students learn is through hands-on activities. It’s important to
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keep the student engaged on the information you are giving them and to do it in a way that
excites them. As an educator it is important to earn the trust of your learners/students because if
you do then they will trust the things you are teaching them are important to learn. You can’t put
too much pressure on you students to do well on your tests, but to reward them for the things that
they are able to do well in your class so they will gain confidence. Not every student will be able
to show you the content they have learned through tests this is why the grade they receive in
class can’t be solely based on test performance. It’s very easy for a student to get down on
themselves for poor grades and could even cause them to quit trying. This is why I believe
positive reinforcement of the things that the student is able to do well is a necessity to my
teaching. Each student may need to be evaluated differently and it is my job to take this into
consideration when I am evaluating a student for how much of the material they were able to
master. It all depends on how the student learns best and is able to apply that knowledge to
everyday life, and in the class room.
I strongly believe that the knowledge a student is able to acquire in school will set the
tone for the way the rest of their life will turn out beyond the classroom. This is why being a
teacher is a big deal and much of the things you say will affect the knowledge and learning that
takes place in a student. Each student will have a different level of knowledge when they enter
your class and it is important to separate these students from one another to help you teach. What
I mean by this is that the students with more knowledge probably won’t need as much help with
problem-solving and being able to learn the material. The students that hold less knowledge may
need more help and as a teacher it will be my job to be sure they learn as much as they can. I feel
that knowledge cannot be learned simply through reading a textbook or listening to me lecture on
a certain topic, but through hands-on activity. A student needs to experience what is being
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taught to gain full knowledge of the material or topic. It makes me very nervous sometimes to
think I will be teaching a group of students one day, because it will be my job to instill in them
the knowledge they will need to learn, and know for the rest of their life.
My philosophical views of teaching are contradicting of each other, which I believe to be
due to the fact that I want to be both a lecture, and hands-on teacher. My philosophies of
teaching are both essentialism and progressivism. I find it very ironic that essentialism was
founded in response to progressivism because these are my two philosophical views of teaching.
In my class room I want to teach my students the value of hard work, discipline and respect for
authority, which would be the essentialism side of it. I do believe that it’s important for students
to develop knowledge based on curriculum, but also should focus on the student’s interests. The
Progressivism side of it would be the hands-on learning I plan on having in my lessons. If a
student is first able to learn the information through lecture and then do an activity to experience
the newly acquired knowledge, maximum learning would be taking place. As I said before I
want to prepare my students for the future and life out of school, which is done through
progressivism. A mixture of these two views would be a solid balance to the class structure I
hope to have one day.
Dealing with the psychological orientations of teaching, again I would be contradicting
myself by applying both constructivism and behaviorism to my class room. I truly believe for a
student to be successful they will need a solid balance of these two orientations. Although my
curriculum would be set in stone it could be changed with an activity I would have the students
do. All of my lessons would always consist of two different parts. The first part of the lesson
would strictly focus on the behaviorism side of things. It would be teacher-centered with a
straight lecture of the information to the students. The class would focus on the things I do and
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would process the information first by seeing it done. After this was over with the second part of
the lesson would take place, constructivism. I would then have the students apply what they had
just learned and seen me do to an activity. This would help my students to make sense of the
material that had been presented to them and give them some type of hands-on learning. I believe
in this method so strongly because it was one that was able to help me learn material to a much
greater degree than simply having just one psychological orientation.
I have been through many teachers, I have taken many tests and I have experienced many
different teaching styles to this point in my life. All, which I feel have paved the way I view the
way teaching should be done. They have not only instilled in me knowledge I will keep for the
rest of my life, but helped make me the person I am today. I have a great appreciation for
learning and the work it takes an educator to pass along knowledge to their students. Through all
my experiences I hope to someday pass on the knowledge that was once passed onto to me in the
best possible way I can.
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Bibliography
Adams, Henry Brooks. "Famous Quotes on Teaching". QuoteWorld.org. January 14, 2009
.