Miss Idealistically Optimistic

Today we looked at the type of English teacher we want to become. An interesting thought, and one that I have to admit I hadn't given much thought before I started my course. I mean, I have felt this thing within me for a long time, a nagging feeling that I should not be writing memos and creating spreadsheets but standing in front of a class of 30 unruly teenagers. But as for thinking about what kind of teacher, well that thought never really entered my head. Obviously I want to be a good teacher and I have some random and nascent ideas about how I might become one, but I couldn't articulate them, let alone set out my 'personal educational philosophy'. So today's exercise was just what I needed.

It was based on work one of my tutors did as part of her PhD research where she conducted interviews with hundreds of English teachers and boiled them down into broad 'types'. In groups, we each had to look at the description of a 'type' and translate what was quite a dense text into simplified language and report back to the rest of the class.

We had the 'Reluctant Conformist', the 'Traditionalist', the 'Politically active, free-thinker' and our type, which I will name the 'Individualist'. The Individualist promotes 'child-centered' learning, exploring issues from the pupil's point of view and valuing an individual's cultural and linguistic identity above all. Parts of this type resonated with me, but so did parts of the others. In some areas I am a traditionalist, believing in the value of exams, for instance. Something that seems to vex a lot of people on the course is the idea of 'setting' children (as opposed to having children of all abilities in one class). Like the Individualist, this does not excite me at all.

As I progress in my training I know my personal philosophy will develop, and it will probably be a patchwork quilt of a philosophy - a little bit of this, a little bit of that. Because I don't think I want to conform neatly to a type. Or maybe I will start out as one type, Miss Idealistically Optimistic perhaps, and turn into something quite different when the reality of the classroom hits me. I'll keep you posted.