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Teacher Interview
Field Experience Notation
Vance Holmes
Metropolitan State University
Urban Teacher Program
EDU 311
Victor B. Cole
April 28, 2011
Contact: Vance Holmes, 1500 LaSalle Avenue #320 Minneapolis, MN 55403
Email: vance@vanceholmes.com
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Teacher Interview
Date: March 1, 2011
Time spent: 2 – 4:00 PM
South High School
Contact: Allyson Jacokes
(612) 991-7831
Learning from Experience:
Reflections on a Teacher Interview
A large and growing number of students in the Minneapolis public schools are English
Learners (EL). The teacher interview I conducted has provided information about teaching in the
culturally and linguistically diverse urban classroom that will likely prove helpful to me as a
prospective teacher. I have gained some valuable insights from the thirty-minute interview which
was focused on three areas of inquiry: professional background, EL issues, and personal
understandings. Reflecting on the advice graciously shared by this veteran educator will allow
me to benefit from her experience.
My meeting with the Minneapolis high school instructor, who I’ll call Ms. Adams,
provided basic information about her professional experience that will be useful to me as an
urban educator. Ms. Adams is a licensed Spanish and EL teacher. She has spent a decade
teaching Spanish. Ms. Adams spent three years at the Downtown Fair School, and is in her
seventh year at her current place of employment in South Minneapolis. The World Language
department at Ms. Adams’ school maintains an extensive program of six different languages:
Spanish, French and German, as well as Chinese, Latin and Ojibwe. In this current semester, Ms.
Adams teaches Spanish I to mostly 9th graders and Spanish II to sophomores and juniors. During
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a block schedule, she instructs about 150 students per day. Ms. Adams pointed out that due to
variations in student enrollment -- different teachers have different workloads at different times.
The information concerning English learners provided by this tenured teacher during our
discussion gave me some interesting issues to contemplate as I prepare to start teaching in
diverse urban educational settings. Ms. Adams’ school offers bilingual and intermediate to
advanced English as a Second Language (ESL) support. She refers to bilingual students as
“heritage speakers.” Learners determined to be “heritage speakers” of Spanish are directly placed
in a Spanish 3 class. Being a secondary instructor in Spanish, there are usually very few ELs in
Ms. Adams’ classes. The SIOP model is not necessarily something she employs, but the World
Languages department has its own comparable model. Assessment of effective instruction
techniques is done by peer review and coaching. Ms. Adams noted that she still relies on the
research laid out in Benjamin Bloom’s taxonomy. She is very aware of the second language
acquisition theories of Stephen Krashen, however, these sorts of theories are not part of daily
discussions. While there is a general awareness of such theories among Ms. Adams’ colleagues,
the curriculum is largely set by the department.
The personal understandings and advice shared by Ms. Adams will be valuable to me as a
beginning urban educator. “Although I’ve had quite a few years of experience,” she offered,
“I’m always learning new things.” She said that even though she has been teaching for a decade,
she is constantly making modifications. As an example, Ms. Adams cited a recent curriculum
review that required instructional adjustments. She also mentioned a departmental overhaul of
assessment strategy, then added, “Of course the students are always changing, too.” Among the
many items Ms. Adams left me with is the concept that, as I prepare to start teaching -- I must be
prepared to continue learning.
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Another bit of important advice gleaned from this interview concerned time management.
Ms. Adams stressed that the time spent doing her job goes far beyond official school hours.
“Learn to prioritize because there’s never enough time” she says, warning that work often cuts
into personal time. Along with being responsible for 150 children at work, Ms. Adams is taking
care of one at home -- her own 2-year-old baby boy. While she feels supported and is generally
happy with her teaching position, having a baby has cemented Ms. Adams’ view that smart time
management is critical to success. Toward the end of the interview, Ms. Adams said something
very impactful. When she first entered the profession, she hated teaching, due to the
overwhelming size of the institution and scope of her duties. Fortunately, she found guidance
from a more experienced educator who came to her rescue. “Speak up for yourself,” Ms. Adams
advised. She strongly encouraged me to immediately seek out at least one or two good mentors.
Approximately 9,200 students whose home language is not English attend Minneapolis
Public Schools. As an urban educator, I will certainly have English learners in my classroom.
Based on what I learned about this veteran teacher’s professional background, her views on EL
issues and her personal experience, the interview I conducted should be of great help to me as I
start my own teaching career.
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Interview Questions
What is your specific teaching licensure?
How many years have you been teaching public school?
How many students do you teach per day?
What courses and grade levels do you teach?
What language courses are offered students?
Does your school support ELs?.
Do you have ELs in your class?
Do you use sheltered instruction? The SIOP Model? (SDAIE)?
What resources are available to ELs?
Are you employing any specific theories of second language acquisition such as those of
Stephen Krashen?
Are there specific issues you have encountered working with ELs?
Do you feel supported as a teacher at your school?
Generally, what have been some successes and challenges as a teacher?
Do you have a bit of advice you would care to share?
Is there anything else that you would like to emphasize or let me know as a pre-service
teacher?