A Personal Statement of Philosophy
Introduction
Role of family
Role of education authorities
Role of teachers
Role of society
Conclusion
References
Introduction
I
wanted to be a teacher when I was ten years old. Time passed, and I graduated
from the school of pedagogy,
My
philosophy of education combines many different philosophies from the Eastern
and Western traditions. The philosophers who influenced my teaching career the
most are Confucius, Chuang Tsu, Mencius, Thomas Jefferson, John Dewey, and
Paulo Freire.
Education
is the long training process to produce a moral and honest citizen; it also
creates knowledge and skills for a student to compete in job markets. Education
is a close loop of family, schools system, and society.
Role
of family
Family
is a foundation of education. A mother is the first teacher; when a child still
is newborn, she teaches her child how to drink milk and how to hold a bottle of
milk; when a child is little older, she teaches her child how to eat, how to
play, and how to speak; finally, she teaches her child manners, morals, and
ethics. A Vietnamese proverb says, “If you want to bend a bamboo, you must bend
when it is still young.” If parents try
to teach their children morals and virtues when they are young, the school
should not have any problem to educate them and train them to be excellent citizens
and great leaders.
On
September 28, 1998, during the speech on the teacher’s day in
Parents
have responsibilities for their children’s education. Today many parents send
their children to nursery schools or baby sitters’ places, and they do not have
much time to teach their children as they should. The material lifestyle
controls the parents who are too busy dealing
with their financial crisis and forget the main duties to their family. Parents
and their environments easily influence the children. Nobody loves and cares for
a child better than parents. The children need to develop in a good
environment; they need loving attention. Their development generates from
loving, caring and freedom. Parents need to involve their children in activities
in or outside the school. Parents need to reinforce the rules and regulations
of the schools; parents also need to observe the progress of their children’s
education. Parents have to participate in their children’s education, as they
are ears and eyes for the teachers.
Role
of education authorities
The
education will not be successful without resources and financial aids. Education
authorities must have plans, review curriculum yearly to improve it, make
common polices, and support and protect the teachers. Education authorities
also organize conferences for teachers, so teachers can improve their method of
teaching. Technologies can be used for teaching aids, e.g. projectors and computers;
therefore, education authorities must approve and supply them for the classrooms.
A national standards test for 12th grade should be established, not
only for states, to bring up the education level for all high school students
in the nation. A national standards test for 12th grade will create
teaching markets and it will be good for the country. In my point of view, a
SAT in the
Role
of teacher
Teaching
is an art, not a job. Everyone can be a teacher, but not everyone can teach.
Teaching not only provides knowledge and skills to the students, but it also
trains students to be good citizens and future leaders. The role of a teacher
is to help students to learn objectives in the teacher’s lesson plan.
A
teacher is a role model, a mirror for the students; therefore, a teacher’s
character is very important.
From
4000 BC until today, morals have been a vital element of human beings. People
value a person through her or his behavior, not what she or he wears. A teacher’s
character is in the public eye. When a person chooses
to be a teacher, she or he understands that she or he has to give up some of her
or his personal lifestyle to help the society and the country. The new
generation is in teachers’ hands. A Vietnamese proverb describes that a medical
doctor who made a mistake killed only one patient; but a teacher who makes a
mistake will kill a generation.
Teachers
must have high morals, righteousness, good characters, forgiveness, and public
speaking skills. The moral and forgiveness will guide the teacher to success. Honesty
is another characteristic that teachers must have. A teacher needs to admit her
or his mistake and a thing she or he does not know. Nobody is perfect! Some
teachers lost their students’ trust because they did not admit their errors or
something they did not know.
A
teacher does not need to be an orator, but a teacher needs a skill in public
speaking. If a teacher does not have a skill in public speaking, the students
in her or his class will lose their attention; they fall asleep and feel that
the clock runs too slow.
A
teacher also needs to improve his or her knowledge and skills from time to
time, to attend seminars, conferences, or get an advanced education. In
seminars or conferences, teachers will exchange and gain some experiences from
each other. Confucius indicated that
when three men walk together, there is always something I can learn (Cheung, 1986,
Trans).
A
teacher has to create a good atmosphere in the class, always observe students, and encourage them to learn by doing
things. A teacher needs to promote students’ self start, more activities in
class. Teachers need to create win-win (Snelson, 2005) situations and make the
lesson fun to learn. Proverbs and storytelling
are other methods teachers should use to create interactive learning and guide
students to think. Good teachers should know how to combine lectures and
interactions. When students discover things by themselves, they will remember
and be happy. A teacher needs to reward the things they do right and guide them
to correct the things they do wrong.
Teachers
need to understand individual students because each student is unique. Teachers
should establish students’ simple biography to understand their family
background and ethics. When teachers understand students’ cultures, teachers
can easily train them with compassion and have more chance for success. Teachers
must know that each student has a different character, different ways to learn
and that each learns at different pace; therefore, teachers must be patient.
The
teachers must respect students as human beings, and corporal punishment is not
a good way to teach students. However, a punishment will carry out a warning to
students who violate the rules and regulations. When a teacher disciplines a
student, she or he must be consistent; the teacher must explain exactly what rule
the student violated, and correct him or her in loving way, not in anger. A
person who gets angry will lose temper and control; and a bad thing may happen.
Teachers
must treat students equally, regardless of their economic backgrounds or ethics.
Teachers must train students to obtain the same level of knowledge and skills. Teachers
should never compare or make a difference between one student and other in
public.
Teachers
must be friendly with students to earn their trust, but teachers cannot be a student’s
friend. A teacher is a student’s parent
figure. If a teacher is a student’s friend, the student thinks that she or he
is equal to the teacher and she or he can speak freely with no respect; at this
time, the teacher is no longer able to teach effectively.
Today
technologies change rapidly and markets are the core business for employment;
therefore, teachers must train students’ knowledge and skills they need to get
a job to support themselves or their family. It will eliminate the welfare,
food stamps lifestyle. Government will have good revenue from taxes to develop
a defense system to protect the country and other things can improve citizens’
life.
A
teacher can use the internet as a tool to help students missing class or
needing help. Internet instant message
is a powerful tool to communicate with students when the weather forces school
to close. A teacher always looks for a new way to use the technology to improve
the way to teach
Teachers
must do needs assessment regularly, so teachers can help students’ improvement
in time. Without a needs assessment, a
teacher has no way to know that her or his objectives were met. Objectives are
dynamic and need to adjust all the time to reflect students’ needs or the way
societies change. A needs assessment is just a tool to help teachers to measure
the goal of teaching and help teachers to improve the lesson plan.
Beside
the lecture, a teacher needs to create activities in the class to motivate
students’ thinking and pro-acting. In my opinion, group study is the most
effective way for students to learn. Each class needs to have class leader and
students will be divided into groups of five. Each group has a group leader in
rotation.
The
teacher gives the instructions and objectives to students. Each group discusses
the problem, finds a solution, and a group leader presents to the class leader
for review, then presents to the class for debate. Teacher trains the class leader in advance.
The class leader will join each group and inject his opinion to be sure the
group does not go outside the objectives. During the debate period, the class
leader is a referee; the teacher must observe and be willing to accept their
point of view (a good teacher is a good listener). The teacher guides students
to draw the conclusion to meet the objective of the lesson. When students
finish a debate, the teacher must debrief them and reward their works.
This
model study trains students in leadership style, teamwork, to respect each other,
sharing, and to be united; it also eliminates personal competition. I used this
model in my mathematic and literature classes and they were successful.
Sometimes students teach each other more efficiency than the teacher does.
Students will enjoy their class and be proud of their works. Students will
enjoy learning more when they discover what they learn and how it connects to
the real world.
Modern
teachers cannot teach without a curriculum. A successful curriculum needs to
develop and be updated regularly.
At
the elementary level, three basic courses are need: English, mathematics, and
history.
English
is the official language for the
At
the high school level, four basic courses need to be taught: literature,
mathematics, science and history. In literature, students will discover human
thinking in many different ways in life, fiction, and non-fiction. Literature
can be in many forms: romance, poems, drama, short stories, composition, etc. Advanced mathematics (geometry, trigonometry,
algebra, calculus, geometry in space) will teach students higher level thinking
about logic and creation. All scientists have good skills in mathematics. Science
and technologies are the keys of this generation. Science (physics, chemistry,
biology, and psychology) will give students a chance to prove their knowledge
of nature based on experiments in their laboratories. Science trains students
how to observe things and science’s effect on their life. Advanced history
provides students the thinking about how the world is connected and how people
react to each other. History will teach students about the past. The present is
the result of the past and the present is the basic for the future. By learning
the good and the bad things from previous generations, a student has more
chance to be a success. A teacher uses history to teach students courage,
patriotism, and willingness to serve and protect their country. Students also
learn music, geography, physical education, social studies, foreign languages, etc
to balance an education. The technologies are developed and grown rapidly in the
Most
the tests in the
Role
of Society
Environment
affects and influences children. A good neighborhood rarely has bad children.
Most problems parents have to deal with today are the influence of technology,
bad movies, and violent games.
When
a producer makes a movie, she or he may not think how that film will affect
children or family. Most parents have to work to make a living, send their
children to someone to take care of them, but the provider’s service is not
near what parents could do for their children. Children watch everything on TV;
they do not know what is right, what is wrong. They learn bad things that stay
in their mind. Senator Tom Harkin of
If societies can regulate
the moviemakers, societies will be better and schools should not have many
problems. The Telecommunication Act of 1996 mandated all new television models
13 inches or larger manufactured after July 1, 1999, and all sets 13 inches or
larger manufactured after January 1, 2000 must have V-Chip technology (FCC, 1998). It did not
stop the violent entertainment markets.
The
society needs to fight back with moviemakers and games makers to bring back the
traditional society. A Vietnamese proverb indicated that if you do not dare to
go into the tiger’s den, how you could catch his cubs! Teachers and communities
need to work together to establish an Association to protect children. Teachers
and communities request that lawmakers submit a legislation to prohibit all
violent movies from broadcasting before 9:00PM and strongly punish games
suppliers who sell violent games to children under age of 18.
Conclusion
Education
starts from the newborn child. School and society produce the quality of
education. John Dewy wrote:
I
believe that all education proceeds by the participation of the individual in
the social consciousness of
the race. This process begins unconsciously almost at birth, and is continually shaping the individual’s powers,
saturating his consciousness,
forming his habits, training his ideas, and arousing his feeling and emotions (1897, p.78).
To
be a good citizen and leader, a person must follow four steps in Confucius
philosophy:
1.
Being a role model
2.
Managing family
3.
Governing country
4.
Being a world leader
Teachers
must have high morals, honesty, and forgiveness. Students are teacher’s
customers; therefore, the teacher must treat students in professional way. Children
are future leaders of the country. Good family, good school system, especially
good teachers, and good society will produce good citizens and exceptional
leaders.
Phat Tran-Lam
November 23, 2006
References
Cheung, W. (1999, September, 28). Speech
on teacher’s day. Retrieved November 22, 2006,
from http://www.confucius.org/old/espech98.htm
Confucius. (1986). Lun yu. Chapter 7. Verse 21. Confucius Publishing
.Trans. Retrieved November 22,
2006, from http://www.confucius.org/lunyu/ed0721.htm
Snelson,
J.S. (2005).Win-win theory for win-win Success. Institute for Human Progress,
Study:11million
in US illiterate in English. (December 15).
V-chip
gives parental guidance back to parents. (1995, October 26).
Communication Commission. (March 12, 1998). Report No. GN 98-3. Retrieved November
22, 2006, from: http://www.fcc.gov/Bureaus/Cable/News_Releases/1998/nrcb8003.html