I believe that inside of every child lies a wealth of possibilities for them to advance in many settings and arenas, including education, but in order to do this, each child must have the right inputs: (1) a supportive environment – from the teachers and/or parents that he/she interacts with to the child’s placement in a setting that fosters exploration; (2) people that challenge them to do more than what they are currently able to do; and (3) levels of safety and security in place that will help them learn and develop.
With this in mind, I believe that children’s abilities should be assessed, not solely on their performance on math and reading standardized assessments, but should be evaluated in all areas of abilities, including music, athletics, writing, art and design, foreign language articulation, and more. In addition to these ideals, I believe that confidence is a prerequisite for learning. In other words, if a child lacks confidence in his abilities, he will lack the confidence to believe that he can attain a new or challenging concept. It is the role of the teacher and/or the parent to help the child believe in him/herself, and this often starts with the adult believing in the child.
I believe that a large part of education includes getting students to see the importance of learning in their lives. To this end, I believe that a critical role of the teacher is to tie the classroom learning into real world scenarios, and ultimately, students must connect their academic performance with how and where they see their lives after their schooling. By doing this, we can teach students to value their education, which will cultivate an intrinsic motivation to do well academically. Otherwise, a teacher may find herself in a classroom full of students that simply don’t care about learning or put any effort towards the process.