Below you can read more on the courses that I have taken at Michigan State University (MSU) during my Master of Arts in Education (MAED) program. Courses are listed chronologically by semester. For each course, I have provided the course title, course instructor(s) and a brief description of my experience in the course. Click on the graphic box to be taken to the course website for more information.
This course, which took place during the Fall of my student teaching, was designed to help us move past our undergraduate knowledge and use our skills within the classroom. The course was focused on teaching subject matter to students with a focus on each student as an individual. The course instructed us on how to organize a classroom community by employing multiple strategies for engagement, assessment, and adjusting to new situations as they may arise. This course, rooted in the instructional practices of mathematics, was my introduction to teaching as a professional and paved the way for me to create a teaching philosophy that I strive to live by within my practice.
This course took place during the fall semester of my student-teaching internship year, which I completed in Chicago Public Schools. This course consisted of designing lesson and unit plans, that were both engaging and effective while also maintaining a focus on using Common Core Standards and Best Practices. I learned how to self-reflect on my own practice as both a planner and a teacher, as well as analyzing my own unit plans for areas of weakness or strength. This course focused on using data we collected from students to properly guide our planning. Being able to use data and assessment to build a road map for a unit is an extremely important skillset that this course allowed me to acquire. This course focused primarily on literacy instruction and was rooted in the need to learn language, learn about language and learn through language.
These courses consisted of the work and practice completed throughout my student teaching internship within Chicago Public Schools. As an intern, I was placed at Walsh Math and Science Academy in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago. I was assigned a field instructor, Marianne Flannigan, who frequently worked with all student interns at Walsh, leading us through creation of lesson plans, schedules, and preparation for our future job search. These courses were designed to prepare future educators to become both effective and engaging within our practice as teachers.
Spring 2017
Throughout this course, which took place at the end of my student teaching year, I was able to develop strong communication skills that allowed me to learn more about the student’s I was teaching and the community that I was teaching within. This course was focused on strategies that would improve the home to school connection within a class learning environment. While focusing on these engagement strategies we also maintained attention to social studies teaching and learning, integrated curriculums within social studies, professional and ethical responsibilities of a teacher and accommodations for students that are diverse learners. This course prepared us to exit student teaching feeling we can enter our teaching careers with an authentic and meaningful skillset.
This course was designed to challenge learners to implement ideas that we have learned about throughout our teacher preparation program. We were tasked with using effective planning and creative teaching in order to build a dynamic science unit plan to use within our student teaching classrooms. With this, we focused on data and assessment strategies that allowed us to align our lesson planning to the information we received from pre-assessments, and on-going assessments, throughout our unit. We focused on producing a active learning community within our classrooms where science is an engaging and exciting time for students.
Spring 2019
This course was my first introduction to educational administration. Focusing on equitable education, and the opportunity gap known as the equity debt in education, this course led learners through studies of historical and sociopolitical contexts of racial achievement in education. We learned to critically self-reflect as educators and as human beings, in order to better understand the magnitude all choices have within an educational setting. Studying the various obstacles that are in place within education today, we focused on making purposeful shifts in practice and thinking in order to better support students of color.
Inquiry, a concept prevalent throughout history and something that is innate within human nature. Inquiry is frequently used in schools as a means for students to determine their own solution to a question or a problem that they have. This maximizes student’s role in the learning process and can be managed through a variety of forms of inquiry. This course, completed in the Spring of 2019, introduced me to the wide variety of ways that inquiry is practiced, analyzed, and viewed within education. Focusing on foundational elements of inquiry present within education this course was designed to allow students time to explore each element and dive deeply into an analysis about the concepts introduced. The assignments in this course called on learners to critically analyze the educational elements shown, as well as to apply the new knowledge we gained to our personal teaching practice and learning style.
Summer 2019
Prior to my education throughout this course I would have picked up a book with a medal adorning the front jacket and immediately formed assumptions of the quality and breadth of literary virtuosity that filled the pages of the book. This course focused in on the political nature of each medal that represents a specific award. While we, as learners, form mental correlations between shiny emblems and the notion of winning or being the best, we often forget that not all ratings or awards are presented objectively. This course displayed to us that, when it comes to literary awards, and the determination of who is awarded a distinguished honor and who is the true winner of a specific award, the committees subjectively bestow these honors upon nominated individuals who have created books that are deemed illustrious and renowned by a small committee of individuals. Fostering valuable skills that are easily transferable to the classroom, this course showed us how to promote literary awards to students through the mentorship of various texts and the way that educators possess an ability to utilize their practice to promote equitable education and knowledge of privilege and oppression within my classroom.
Best practices in literacy instruction are guiding recourses that educators must focus their attention on when constructing plans for literacy development within a classroom. This course was focused on the impact that literacy skills, or deficits, can have on a student’s individual academic success. Analyzing student data, as well as planning to improve any areas of growth, allowed us to learn the best effective literacy instruction techniques to use when confronted with specific literacy related areas of growth. Throughout this course, learners completed a literacy learner analysis project which required us to work with an individual student on literacy growth. Using assessment techniques, planning skillsets, and implementation of literacy related tasks that were all rooted in best practices, we were able to apply our knowledge from this course directly while working with our student.
This specific course, labeled as a Seminar in Literacy Instruction, focused on the need to implement an effective and engaging poetry instructional time within a daily balanced literacy block. Through the analysis and reading of numerous poet’s creative work, as well as the engagement of writing our own poetry, learners were shown how poetry can be an extremely effective tool for teaching literacy. Within this course we completed an open ended project in which we were able to decide the final project we chose to create. This led to the creation of a nine month poetry unit plan that I created for a second grade classroom which instructs students on how to read, write, dream and engage with poetry.
As educators, it is essential for us to understand the various learning needs that an individual student may bring into your classroom. This course focused on these essential understandings as well as the deep analysis of best practices in literacy education. Through the collaborative style of this course, learners were able to converse and discuss with one another various concepts read about within our assignments. Focusing on vocabulary instruction, specifically with bilingual students, the team I participated in worked to analyze a student’s data in order to apply our knowledge of literacy development and create future lesson plans for the student. Rooting our work in the Modified Cognitive Model, we created plans that revolved around the data we analyzed, focusing on improving any deficits and strengthening areas requiring growth.
Fall 2019
This course was the last and final course I completed during my Master of Arts in Education program at Michigan State University. This course was established in order for students to reflect on their progress as a learner and educator throughout the courses taken in this program. This course guided learners through the construction of an online portfolio, used to display their graduate course work as well as information about them as an educator. This course was designed using a time line that allowed for reflection, modification, and progression. As we journeyed through this course I created a meaningful portfolio that truly showcases the hard work I have put into both my teaching practice, and my graduate learning program.