Vincent Boucher’s
Teaching Philosophy
From “Smart Boards” and “MP-3” players to fuel injected cars and air guitar on “wii”, students are exposed to and involved with more technological concepts, gizmos and widgets than ever. It is the responsibility of the Technology Education Teacher to provide students the opportunity to make connections between the technologies they are exposed to, their core subjects, the environment and the communities they live in. Course content and activities students’ encounter in their classes are important, but they should make connections far beyond the classroom. By connecting the classroom content with course work in other disciplines and involvement with the community, students will gain an understanding of how the material they learn in school will affect their lives. More importantly, I believe, by making connections with their community, students will understand how they, through this understanding, can deeply and richly affect the lives of others.
The content in technology education courses should utilize “hands on”, “real world” activities to cultivate students desire to learn while collaborating with other learners. When students are allowed to learn and make new discoveries with one another, they develop critical thinking, problem solving, teamwork and life-long learning skills. Furthermore, students cooperating in learning and solving problems together foster racial, gender and homophobic understanding and tolerance in the school environment as well as in the community at large.
The nature of the technology education classroom is that of an alive, active learning environment. Students must be free to listen, talk, research, write, read and exchange ideas in order to be able to solve the problems they discover. Throughout this process, an effective teacher keeps students focused on the objectives of the course, unit, lesson and activity, providing clarity and organization when necessary—connecting the students newfound knowledge with previous class work, the knowledge gained in other subject areas, their environment and the community they live in.
I believe students will rise to meet a teacher’s expectation. If a teacher expects more, he or she will get more. Teachers should have high expectations of their students. However, given all their good intentions, students cannot meet these goals without adequate support. These high expectations must come with that support. Student’s must be provided with the tools they need in order to know what is expected of them—clear expectations, frequent assessments, access to rubrics, appropriate strategies and organizers, time lines and schedules will motivated students to meet the goals of the teacher, the goals of the curriculum and, most importantly, the goals they have for themselves.
A teacher is an architect—an architect of lives. An effective teacher will help their students develop the motivation to understand the ideas, concepts and skills that will be the foundation upon which they will construct their own lives. I believe an effective teacher helps foster a student’s hunger for discovery and desire to change the world, while challenging their inhibitions and promoting their desire to become productive persons and life long learners.
