Educators engage in professional development and reflective practice, understanding that a hallmark of professionalism is the concept of professional growth over time. Educators develop and refine personal philosophies of education, teaching and learning that are informed by theory and practice. Educators identify their professional needs and work to meet those needs individually and collaboratively.
TRB Standard 7 Evidence #1 - My Daily Reflections from my Spring 2016 Practicum
Reflection on Evidence #1
During my practicum I kept a daily journal of self-reflections about how the classes were going, what worked really well and things that I needed to change. It really helped me focus on my own practice. By reflecting on how things were going for the class I was able to see things needed to change (classroom management, class format, conducting and knowledge of the music - April 11th, 2016- April 22,2016). It gave me time to think about ways to change what I was doing and how to put the feedback I was getting into practice.
I grew a momentous amount as a teacher during this practicum and I owe a lot of it to the reflections that I kept. This practice of writing reflections daily to learn about my own practice is something that I see real value in and will keep doing in the future.
During my practicum I kept a daily journal of self-reflections about how the classes were going, what worked really well and things that I needed to change. It really helped me focus on my own practice. By reflecting on how things were going for the class I was able to see things needed to change (classroom management, class format, conducting and knowledge of the music - April 11th, 2016- April 22,2016). It gave me time to think about ways to change what I was doing and how to put the feedback I was getting into practice.
I grew a momentous amount as a teacher during this practicum and I owe a lot of it to the reflections that I kept. This practice of writing reflections daily to learn about my own practice is something that I see real value in and will keep doing in the future.
TRB Standard 7 Evidence #2 - My Action Based Research Paper
Reflection on Evidence #2 Mindfulness and Flow Action Based Research paper
Reflection on Evidence #2
This Paper was part of my spring 2016 semester at VIU. I tried to research mindfulness In many faucets this semester. I had the opportunity to do some research on mindfulness and flow (the optimal learning mindset) for an action based research project for one of my classes. I researched Flow and its connection with mindfulness and how it could be used in a music classroom setting. I did a lot of research to find out how I could help bring flow into the classroom. I brought in my own experiences of flow and looked at how I was able to get into an optimal learning mindset. I looked at the works of flow researcher, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, read two of his books and looked at his methodology. He had nine criteria that had to be met for a flow experience and Mindfulness exercises helped meet many of them. I decided I would try and bring this into my band classes through deep breathing exercises at the start of class.
The exercise was interesting, about 1/3rd of the class thought that it was really helpful, the other 2/3rds were indifferent. No one thought that it was negative. The band also played a little better on the days we did the breathing exercises. It was a minute at the start of class to shift the mindset of the band.
This was something that I had also built into my own playing previously and felt that it made me feel more confident when conducting the band as well.
After the paper I brought this into my guitar class because some students had started to do performances so I talked about deep breathing as a way to help you get into the flow mindset. The school had a talent show that I got to be part of and a few of my guitar students thanked me for telling them about the deep breathing mindfulness exercises.
Over all the research process part of this really helped me make informed decisions about my practice. The experience was a really positive one. I will continue to research things that I could bring into my practice that will be beneficial to my students.
This Paper was part of my spring 2016 semester at VIU. I tried to research mindfulness In many faucets this semester. I had the opportunity to do some research on mindfulness and flow (the optimal learning mindset) for an action based research project for one of my classes. I researched Flow and its connection with mindfulness and how it could be used in a music classroom setting. I did a lot of research to find out how I could help bring flow into the classroom. I brought in my own experiences of flow and looked at how I was able to get into an optimal learning mindset. I looked at the works of flow researcher, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, read two of his books and looked at his methodology. He had nine criteria that had to be met for a flow experience and Mindfulness exercises helped meet many of them. I decided I would try and bring this into my band classes through deep breathing exercises at the start of class.
The exercise was interesting, about 1/3rd of the class thought that it was really helpful, the other 2/3rds were indifferent. No one thought that it was negative. The band also played a little better on the days we did the breathing exercises. It was a minute at the start of class to shift the mindset of the band.
This was something that I had also built into my own playing previously and felt that it made me feel more confident when conducting the band as well.
After the paper I brought this into my guitar class because some students had started to do performances so I talked about deep breathing as a way to help you get into the flow mindset. The school had a talent show that I got to be part of and a few of my guitar students thanked me for telling them about the deep breathing mindfulness exercises.
Over all the research process part of this really helped me make informed decisions about my practice. The experience was a really positive one. I will continue to research things that I could bring into my practice that will be beneficial to my students.