Teacher Education Goals

Michael Ferreira

Goal One. Our graduates will be knowledgeable in the subjects they teach and
how to teach those subjects to students.
Outcomes. Our graduates are able to:
a.) demonstrate knowledge of how to teach subject matter to their students.
b.) Use multiple approaches to facilitate student learning.
a.) Demonstrating that you know how to teach subject matter to students is extremely important.
Over the course of my student teaching placements, I have created numerous lesson plans with
methods and procedures with how I normally go about teaching new material. Along with this I
am constantly assessing my students with activities such as playing tests or written tests. While
teaching students is important, it is also essential that you are completely sure that the students
are comprehending what you are teaching them. Over time I have gotten better at finding the
most efficient ways to teach my students. It takes time to get to know the students that you
teach and, I believe once you do, it is easier to understand how exactly they learn and what you
as a teacher need to do in order to have productive learning in the classroom.
b.) My philosophy for teaching has always been the same. Teaching is not a one size fits all
profession. Every single student that you interact with on a daily basis will learn in a different
way from the last. It is important to me that I try my best to understand each and every student
to the point where I know the best approach to teaching them. However, this is easier said than
done. With so many students in general music classes, for example, it can be difficult to fully
understand every single one. Especially if you only see this class once a week. I find that
accommodating for all different kinds of learners in your lessons is the best way to teach. For
example, when I spent my student teaching time in elementary, we used materials for visual
learners and auditory listeners. If the students who learned a certain way the first time, the
would have a chance to do the same activity catering towards them. This idea all ties into
Gardners multiple intelligences. Each student will benefit more from a certain style of teaching
so it is important that, in your lessons, you try to include as many different approaches as
possible.

Goal Two. Our graduates will be committed to their students and their learning.
Outcomes. Our graduates will be able to:
a.) Recognize diversity among their students and adjust their practice accordingly.
b.) Understand how students develop and learn.
c.) Treat students equitably.
d.) Work diligently to help each student reach his or her potential.
a.) During my time in the elementary setting, diversity was obvious. We had many students from
all different kinds of places and of many different nationalities. We had some students who were
homeless. These students needed to be taught in a different way because I knew they all did

not have a supportive home life like the other students did. For example, we often put these
children in the front so we could always keep an eye on them and could always offer them help
if they needed it. Sometimes we had to spend time working with them outside of their class
period because they needed extra help. This is something I was willing to do because I wanted
to give each and every student an equal opportunity at the same education. It does not matter to
me, homeless or not, what matter is is they are at school and want to learn. Even if teaching
some of these students takes longer than normal, it is worth it because I can tell these students
truly want to learn and I am willing to go that extra mile for them.
b.) When I first started teaching, understanding how students develop and learn was much
more difficult. After spending time with so many different kinds of students from all around, I
started to pick up on the easiest and most effective ways to educate my students. After going to
many clinics on how to teach students effectively, I have developed a good understanding of the
activities and methods I need to use in order to have a productive learning experience in the
classroom. I believe that a huge part in finding how your students develop and learn is through
assessment. When you test your students, you are putting what you have taught them to the
test to make sure they have comprehended the lessons. If many students do not retain the
information well, it can be a key indicator in saying that the teaching style you are using may not
be the most effective. In the beginning, this process can be a lot of trial and error. Eventually,
you will find something that works for you and your students so that the maximum potential of
each student is being achieved.
c.) Treating my students equitably has always been something that I have favored very highly.
While it may not be apparent at first, students can tell when they are not being treated like the
others, even at a very young age. When I was young, I used to see some of my teachers treat
some of their favorites differently than the rest and put them on their own pedestal. After seeing
this, I knew that when I became a teacher I would want to make sure I was always treating my
students fairly. I do not care what my students background is or where they are from, I am
constantly trying to make sure that I treat all my students with the same amount of respect.
Every student is there for the same reason - they all want to learn. While some students may be
more difficult to teach than others, it is important that you are willing to go that extra mile to help
them learn because every single student deserves an equal shot at an education. This is one of
my most important values, not only as a teacher, but as a person.
d.) Getting students to reach their maximum potential is something that can be very difficult.
Many teachers fall into the trap of providing their students with too much extrinsic motivation.
However, while extrinsic motivation is not bad, it is important that one does not overuse this
method. It is essential that teachers try to bring out the intrinsic motivation in their students so
they do not need a reward to accomplish their goals. I believe that within every student lies
intrinsic motivation - it is just a matter of finding it. I try to find what my student enjoys most and
use that as a way to motivate my students. For example, one of my private piano students loves
star wars. I told him that somewhere down the road if he kept practicing that he would be good
enough to play a star wars piece one day. While this was a small comment, it went a long way
and he was always prepared for our lessons every week because of that intrinsic motivation to

be the best version of himself that he could be. It is just a matter of finding that intrinsic
motivation in your students and using something that they enjoy outside of school is a great
place to start.

Goal Three. Our students will be responsible for managing and monitoring
student learning.
Outcomes. Our graduates are able to:
a.) employ multiple methods to meet their teaching and learning goals.
b.) Develop appropriate objectives for themselves and their students.
c.) Orchestrate learning in group settings.
d.) Place a premium on student engagement and thoughtfulness.
e.) Use multiple strategies to motivate students.
f.) Regularly assess student progress, selecting appropriate measures.
g.) Plan and implement their teaching and learning objectives.
a.) While I was student teaching at the elementary level, we primarily used the Orff method.
When using the Orff method it is important to include multiple different ways of performing and
learning music. For example, we would have students do dance activities. After this activity, we
would completely switch gears and go to a new activity, for example, improvisation. After that we
could go to a singing activity such as a round. The reason I love Orff so much is because it uses
so many different teaching methods to create and overall well-rounded musician. By the time
these students reach middle school, they will have created a great foundation in music through
this method. The Orff method also caters to those students who do not all necessarily learn the
same way. Some students may not be good at singing, however, when it comes to notation they
could be great at it. It is all about variety when teaching elementary school to keep the students
engaged and the Orff teaching method provides just that.
b.) I am constantly setting objectives for myself and my students when I teach. In my lesson
plans, I write down all the goals I am hoping to accomplish that day. After the class period is
over, I check off everything I got through. If I did not get through everything, these activities will
carry over into the next period so we will get a chance to perform them. I believe it is important
to push your students a little out of their comfort zone so that they become better learners. For
example, I like to have my younger students sing solos in front of the class so they get exposure
singing by themselves. This is very important when it is comes to becoming a successful
musician. This is just one of the objectives I set for myself and my students over the course of
the school year. It is important for me to set these goals so, not only am I pushing my students,
but I am also pushing myself as a teacher. By constantly setting these goals for myself, I am
working to create a better teacher and a better version of myself at all times.
c.) Learning in group settings is essential for a successful music program. Music is all about
working with others in order to achieve a common goal. For example, when you are playing in a
band, you cannot just listen to yourself. If a student only listens to his or herself while
performing, the ensemble will be very out of tune and unbalanced. It is essential that your

students learn to listen to others and realize that in order to have their band perform at its
highest potential, the students need to be willing to work together. One the students start
listening to each other, it will fix many problems such as tuning which can be a big problem in
young bands and orchestras. I believe that the music classroom is a great place to learn in a
group setting since music is a group subject. There is a time in place for solo performing but for
the most part students will learn the best by performing for others and watching their peers
perform. By doing this, you are demonstrating to the students that everyone learns differently
and not everyone is as good at certain aspects of music as others. Working in group settings
will teach students that by working together, anything is possible.
d.) Student engagement is a large part of assessing student learning in the classroom. In music
theory, at the high school level, student engagement is how our class learns. When we learn
new material, for example, Bach chorales, as a teacher I find it most effective to go around the
room and get everyones input on the subject being addressed. When we write chorales on the
board I have each person in the class help construct the chords so when we finish we have a
combined effort of the entire class. By doing this it keeps the students engaged. Also, if students
make a mistake, all the other students get to see it as well. This helps because, chances are,
the other students may have made that same mistake in the future if they had not seen their
peer make it. This kind of learning has always been my favorite and as a student I looked
forward to these kinds of classes because they were so engaging. This is why, as a teacher, I
want to incorporate this kind of learning in my own classroom.
e.) Sometimes, the first time you try to motivate your students it does not work. It is a matter of
finding what the students enjoy so the students want to improve at what they are doing. During
my student teaching semester, I try to find concepts that students enjoy so they want to learn.
For instance, while I was student teaching at the elementary level, we were practicing steady
beat by tapping on different parts of our body. In order to encourage them to try their best I used
a song that some of them were familiar with. I used the Indiana Jones theme song and the
students really seemed to enjoy it. Using these kinds of alternate strategies for motivation can
be extremely effective when trying to find ways to motivate your students.
f.) I believe that regularly assessing your students' progress is very important when it comes to
a successful learning environment in the classroom. At the high school, we use playing tests all
the time to assess how much are students are learning and practicing. This sort of idea ties into
motivation. If you are grading the students based on playing tests, it motivates them to practice
outside of the classroom so that they are not embarrassed when they do have their playing test.
I also think these kinds of tests are important because it puts students out of their comfort zone
for a given amount of time. Feeling comfortable performing in front of others and their peers is a
very important quality to have as a musician. Doing these kinds of assessments is a great way
to do just that. However, with this in mind, it is also important not to push your students too far. If
you do not accurately assign music to your ensemble it can actually demotivated them. It is
important to push your students, but not to the point where they do not want to practice. You
have to meet the students somewhere in the middle.

g.) While at the elementary school during student teaching, we had many goals that our lessons
had to go along with. Our school had standards and we made sure to plan our lessons around
them. For instance, we had to make sure that our students could play the recorder at a certain
level by the end of third grade. We used a system call recorder karate where every time the
students successfully completed a recorder song, they would earn a "belt" which they would tie
to the end of their recorder so they could show their friends they passed the playing test. This
system helped motivate the students and at the same time helped us as teachers implement our
learning objectives into our lessons. We had another objective that had to do with students
being able to feel comfortable singing in a group setting. In order to accomplish this, we sang
rounds all the time. This gets students comfortable not only singing in groups, but individually as
well.

Goal Four. Our graduates will be effective organizers of the classroom

environment.
Outcomes. Our graduates are able to:
a.) Create and maintain an atmosphere conducive to learning.
b.) Create and contribute to a community of learners.
c.) Create and maintain an atmosphere fostering mutual respect and caring.
d.) Cultivate within their own students a recognition and valuing of diversity.
a.) I believe that an atmosphere that is conducive to learning is very important in a classroom
setting. It is important to me that my students feel comfortable around me so they are willing to
admit when they do not understand a certain concept we are going over. My favorite teachers in
the past have always been the ones that get to know their students personally because it makes
me feel more comfortable around them. However, it is still important for the students to know
you are there as their teacher and not as their friend. This, however, does not mean that you
cannot make you students feel comfortable in your classroom. Students need to know that you
are there to help them. Nothing is worse than your students not feeling comfortable comfortable
enough to come and ask you for help. It is extremely important to me that my students do not
feel this way.
b.) As a teacher, you are put up against students of a community who do not all learn the same
way. It is necessary to create ideas and methods that work for the students as a whole and not
individually. This goes to back to the idea that I do not believe teaching is a "one size fits all"
kind of profession. There needs to be some catering towards those students who learn in
different way than the majority of the students. A good way to do this is to incorporate multiple
different approaches on all of your activities in the classroom. Making sure that your lessons are
beneficial for both visual and auditory learners can be something that is difficult to do. In my
opinion, these kinds of things can take practice and will take some experience in the field to get
better at.
c.) I found it very important to maintain a classroom where there is mutual respect and caring. At
the elementary level we did solo singing all the time. As a way to make sure the students were

comfortable, we had the students who were not singing give a thumbs up to the soloist. This
way, the student who just gave the solo would feel more comfortable and happy about their
performance. It takes a lot of courage to sing a solo in front of your class and it is important for
students to know that. When a student performs a solo, they should be rewarded. If a classroom
has this mutual respect and caring, more students will be willing to volunteer which also creates
a better learning environment for the students. This is something that we strongly encouraged at
the elementary level because if students learn mutual respect and caring when the young,
chances are good that they will be when they are older.
d.) I think that recognizing diversity is something that we do not strongly encourage in our
schools anymore. I believe that it is important to let students know, especially in a diverse
school, that there are many cultures in the world that believe in different ideas and concepts. In
the elementary school I student taught at, we sang a song called, "Hello to All the Children of
the World." In this song we sing about all different languages and cultures. The students learn to
sing the word "hello" in about ten different languages. The students loved singing this song
because it put learning about culture to a catchy tune. This activity opened up the students and
showed them how many different kinds of cultures there really are in the world. We also spent
class time talking about where each foreign student was from. We talked about each place and
the norms in the cultures. This was one of my favorite activities because it exposes students to
cultures they normally do not learn too much about in school.

Goal Five. Our graduates will be thoughtful and reflective practitioners who learn
from experience.
Outcomes. Our graduates are able to:
a.) Make well-reasoned choices and decisions within the conflictual, complex, and
demanding conditions of teaching.
b.) Analyze the effects of their actions and make changes accordingly.
c.) Take into account the moral and philosophical implication of educational decision.
d.) Improve their practice by reflecting on their own experience, observing others,
seeking advice, and drawing upon educational research and scholarship.
a.) As a teacher, you are faced with making many in the moment decisions. A lot of time, there
is not time to think. Sometimes deciding on whether or not you are making the right decision can
be very difficult. I believe this is another concept that comes more naturally as you gain
experience as a teacher. When I first started student teaching, I felt like I would not know how to
react during the more demanding conditions of teaching. As I was faced against them, and as I
observed teachers make tough decisions, I feel much more comfortable out in the field. This, to
me, is one of those concepts that can not really be taught. The best way to learn how to make
these kinds of decisions is to be out on the field and, after my student teaching semester, I feel
very confident doing so.
b.) One of the last couple weeks of my student teaching semester, I called out one specific
student for being disrespectful during the class. I could tell that he was very upset because he

was not himself for the rest of class. After class, I saw that he was still upset so I went over to
talk to him to let him know that he should not be upset because sometimes everyone needs a
reminder to make sure they are not being disrespectful. I let the student know that this is nothing
to be upset about. After talking to him, his mood started to change back to his normal self. After
analyzing the effect of my action I decided that the best thing to do was to speak to him after
class to let him know that I was not upset. He thought I was upset with him when, in reality, I
was just reminding him not to be disrespectful and talk to his friends during class.
c.) Taking into account the moral and philosophical implication of educational decision is
something that is very important when in the teaching profession. When making decisions in
while teaching, it is essential to take into account how it will effect your students. When teaching
elementary, since the majority of your students are so young, they tend to look at you as a role
model. It is important that the decisions you make while in the field are decisions that you want
your students to see. Sometimes it is easy to forget how much the students all look up to you in
elementary school. It is something I always did when I was younger. Remembering to make
decisions with your students in mind is essential. This can be difficult to do and, in my opinion,
will get better with more experience.
d.) I find that by observing other teachers I learn so much about myself, and about the teaching
profession as a whole. I have observed many different teachers over the course of my
undergrad and every single one of them teaches differently. When I myself am teaching, I find
that some of the methods I use are similar to those teachers that I have had in the past. Another
great way that I have improved my practice is by going to workshops and festivals. A couple of
months ago I went to my first Orff workshop which was a very great experience. I was able to
meet a couple elementary teachers who were local and also pick up some new ideas and
concepts for the classroom. I also attended the All-State conference this year and, even though
it was only two days, I learned so much at the clinics. I met so many great people and it makes
me very proud to be in the profession that I am in. It was amazing to see so many people that
were passionate about music in one place. This experience is just another reason why being a
music educator is my dream job.

Goal Six. Our graduates will be informed decision-makers and agents of change.
Outcomes: Our graduates are able to:
a.) Develop and articulate their own conceptual and philosophical perspective on
teaching and learning based on professional experience and current theories and
research in education.
a.) Through student teaching, and the numerous education classes I have taken during my
undergrad, I feel as though I have come up with my own philosophical perspective on teaching.
One of the biggest ideas that I advocate is that every student should be given an equal
opportunity at in education. Everyone deserves the chance to learn and achieve a quality
education. In the classroom, I try to treat my students all with the same amount of respect. I
have had some teachers in the past who seem to pick favorites and the students will notice this.
Another example of my philosophies is that I believe in making your students feel comfortable in

my classroom. I want my students to know that I am there to help them and if they have any
questions they should not be afraid to come up and ask me. I have had teachers in the past who
I have been intimidated by and that has negatively impacted my learning in the classroom. As a
teacher, I try to make each and every student know that they can always come to me if they
need assistance and I will be willing to listen.

Goal Seven. Our graduates will be active members of learning and professional
communities.
Outcomes: Our graduates are able to:
a.) Engage colleagues in efforts to enhance their own teaching, learning, and
professional development.
b.) Participate in professional organizations.
a.) When I went to the Orff workshop a few months ago, it was a great learning experience. The
speaker at the time, Griff Gal, had all of us teachers stand up and join in on the activity that he
was performing. I believe that taking part in these sort of events makes a huge difference in
your professional development. There is something very unique about fifty elementary school
teachers all performing the same activity all together. Each and every single teacher at these
events brings their own life experiences to the table. Every teacher comes from a unique
background with its own students. There is no better way to enhance your own teaching by
listening to what other teachers of the same profession have to say. I cannot even begin to
mention the amount of ideas that I have picked up from colleagues all around Massachusetts
and New Hampshire. There are so many fantastic teachers out there with so many great ideas.
Going to events to work with them has been one of the best decisions I have made as a future
teacher.
b.) I never really understood the power of attending professional organizations until I went to
Massachusetts All-State for the first time a few weeks ago. Some of the best music educators in
the state gave talks and clinics at this event and I am so thankful that I was able to be a part of it
this year. I picked up an uncountable amount of tips and tricks ranging from the beginning jazz
band ensemble all the way to organizational techniques at the elementary level. It is truly
amazing how many great music educators I was able to meet. The teachers I student taught
with were able to introduce me to some other music educators from around the state which was
a great experience. These kinds of festivals and organizations provide us music educators with
a very unique experience. It is not every day that you get together with hundred of music
educators all around the state to unite for a common cause. And, in the end, it is all for the
students and improving ourselves as teachers. These kinds of events are very difficult to
describe in words because they are something that need to be experienced to understand the
impact they can have. I will, without a doubt, be returning to Massachusetts All-State in the
years to come in hopes of an equally rewarding experience as this year.