RUNNING HEAD: FUTURE TEACHER

Iris Harris Future Teacher Letter ED-502 Child & Adolescent Development Averett University Dr. Betsy Harrison July 27, 2012

May 4, 2013

Dear Miss Ava Smith, I am very excited that you have decided to take the position as the Business teacher at Andrews Middle School. This position will allow you the opportunity to utilize your knowledge gained in college, while also empowering young minds. As you start your conquest into being a teacher, it is important to write a mission. A mission helps define what your goals are and should reflect throughout your career. My mission as a teacher was to provide opportunities for all students to grow academically, emotionally, and physically through knowledge, attitudes, skills, and values in an environment that supports a diverse cultural society. This was my final mission statement after my 20 plus years of teaching, so as the years go by, you will rewrite or add to your own mission statement. As you begin your new year there are some components I want you to take a look at about middle school. I want to share information about the cognitive, language, and moral development of middle school students as well as the level of intelligence, the peer and parent influences and the socioeconomic status of the students. Middle school students are in a particularly difficult state of development; many are going through puberty and experiencing dramatic changes in physical development. There are changes in height and weight; body chemistry is changing as well as sexual development. Many of the students are very sensitive at this age cycle and seek high approval from peers. They also want you to believe in them despite their situations.

The foundation of language development is established during the preschool and early years. However, children continue to refine their language skills as they progress in school. When they reach middle school the understanding of the words they have learned are more concise. At this stage they learn more about passive active voice, subject verb agreement and will try to correct themselves when speaking. The population at this school is very diverse and the language skills upon students will vary. This is mainly due to environmental factors the students lives. Typically you will find the students with larger vocabularies have come from a home with two parents and the parents have high educational backgrounds and income levels (Santrock, 2011). The language development will tend to affect the students ability to learn in school and be social, so it is important to make an assessment of your students early on so that you will be able to meet all of their needs. Some students will require extra help, so please be patient and reassure them that you care. The moral development of middle school students varies tremendously. Many students will have compassion, empathy, sympathy and respect adults and peers. There will be some students who have a negative attitude, impatient, only care about themselves, lack judgment and quick to point out flaws in other people. Many of these moral issues deal with how they were raised in their home. Many students are seeking acceptance and want to fit in. Some just want a role model to show them the right way. As a teacher, I suggest that taking time to review what is right and wrong periodically will help certain situations. It will make the students more aware of their actions and give them a conscious that they will be held accountable.

The intellectual development of middle school students is on a wide range. Many of the students are in transition period of their life. They are usually going from concrete thinking to abstract thinking. They love the interaction with their peers at this stage of their life (Santrock, 2011). So if there are certain assignments that require group activities, I recommend that you make it a group project and let them pick their own groups. This has worked well for me in my previous years. Students are also more aware of what is going on in the real world, so anytime you can correlate a real life situation to a lesson that will definitely keep the students engaged. At this stage also, they are very curious about adults and their surroundings, this is the years that they will challenge your authority, but always stay consistent with your rules and be firm. Peer relationships are very important to adolescents at this era in their life. Having friends and being accepted provides the students with self esteem and contributes to their self-image (Santrock, 2011). There will be some students who are to themselves, doesnt have a lot of friends, probably being picked on for whatever reason, but it is up to you as a teacher to promote positive relationships. Some tips that have helped me in my teaching career was to talk about social skills, encourage them to take the perspective of others, teach them how to resolve conflict and disagreements effectively, peer tutoring in class and you assign the partners or groups and whenever they have a problem be willing to talk to them. Most of the time, students really want someone to listen and provide positive feedback so that they can overcome their problem. Parental involvement is a key component is a childs life especially as they get older. As the school years begins, I would send a letter home to parents and introduce yourself and list your expectations of the class and your contact information, have them sign it

and return it with their child. By sending this letter home it opens up the line of communication with the parents. Whenever a child is not achieving well, I would send an email or make a telephone call to let the parents know so that when progress reports and report cards are issued, there is no surprise. During my first few years of teaching, one girl was struggling in my class and she received a D on her report card and I had not contacted the parent and then the parent wanted a conference. After the conference I felt terrible because I should have contacted the parent to let them know that their child was performing poorly. So after that conference, any student with a D or F will get a phone call or email to their parents. I also suggest that you do a bi weekly progress report, so that the students always know their grade and send it home so the parents can see the grade and sign. Remember always keep in contact with the parents they are going to be your greatest enforcer outside of the classroom. Socioeconomic status (SES) is the measure of the influence that the social environment has on individuals, families, communities, and schools. SES can interfere with a childs cognitive development. The schools that are in a low SES suffers from the lack of support form the students homes. The home environment contributes vastly to the academic level of the students. Typically your high SES students will read and do homework than a low SES. This is associated with the education level of the parents (Santrock, 2011). For example, I had a student in my class a few years ago, who was very intelligent, spoke well, completed all her assignments in class, would pass the tests, but lacked in the homework category, 20% of her grade was homework and she had an F. So one day I decided to have a chat with her about why she never does any of her homework. To my surprise, she never had time to do her homework because she was

busy taking care of her younger sister and baby brother. Her mom was a single mother that needed to work and the only babysitter she could afford was her watching them while she went to work at night. At this point my heart went out the child; I didnt know what to do. I was thinking should I just excuse her because of her situation, is that fair to the other students. So I advised a plan that if she could come before or afterschool to complete all or any of the homework assignments I would count them as homework grades. So sure enough, she started coming before school to do her homework assignments. So there will be situations where you might have to make accommodations for certain students because of their SES and sometimes the situations are beyond our control. Just have and understanding and an ethic of caring. Well I hope I have helped you in your journey to becoming a successful teacher. I am going to leave you with six points that will help ease the stress of the first few years. The first one is to have a sense of humor; your sense of humor can relieve tense classroom situations before they become disruptions. The second is to have a positive attitude; a positive attitude is a great asset in life. You will be thrown many curve balls in life and especially in the teaching profession. The third point is to have high expectations for your students. You should strive to raise the bar for your students to help them learn and achieve. The fourth point is consistency; students need to know what to expect every day. This will create a safe learning environment for the students and they will be more likely to succeed. The fifth point is fairness; a fair teacher treats students equally in the same situation. The sixth point is to be flexible; as a teacher there will be distractions and interruptions, but stay prepared and in control of the situations at hand. I wish you the

best in your future endeavors and enjoy being a teacher it is a very noble job and you have the future leaders of our world in your hand. Much success,

Iris T. Harris

References Santrock, John W. (2011). Child development: an introduction (13th). New York,NY: McGraw- Hill.