Standard #4 Teachers know how to teach.

1. Teachers know how to teach. 
2. The teacher understands and uses a variety of instructional strategies, including the use of technology, to encourage children's development of critical thinking, problem solving, and performance skills.
3. As an educator I will strive to find innovative ways to educate each lesson. I am dedicated to giving my students ownership over their learning, and instill an appreciation of theatre and the arts during their time with me. 
4. I am presenting a worksheet that I created for working on character development for a high school acting class, and a lesson plan for a middle school musical theatre class. 

Worksheet for Learning Segment 1

“The W Questions Definitions- for yourself”

In one sentence, create a summary of something interesting or funny that happened to you over Christmas break. 

_____________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Write the class definitions for the following questions

Who? _______________________________________________________________________________

What? _______________________________________________________________________________

Where? ______________________________________________________________________________

When? _______________________________________________________________________________

Why? ________________________________________________________________________________

Now… Write the answers to each of these questions. Apply the questions within the context of your story from the winter break. 

Who? (Don’t write name!) _____________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________

What? _______________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Where? ______________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________

When? _______________________________________________________________________________

Why? ________________________________________________________________________________

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Teaching statement

Education is a profession where you can change someone’s life every day through creativity, empowerment and joy. I want to use my time as an educator to enrich my student’s lives through the theater arts. I want to help students discover the best parts of themselves through theater games, learn empathy by understanding how it feels to look through a different person’s eyes by learning about acting and character development, and think critically about the world around them through text, media and play analysis. 

I want my classroom to be a place where anyone who walks through my door has the ability to succeed. Teaching theatre arts has that as a unique quality, because there are so many aspects of what goes into being a theatre artist. There is a place in the theater for literally everyone. My classroom will be a safe environment where each student will be asked to step out of their comfort zone, but also find individual talents they may not have known existed. This is where differentiation can thrive. I will use multiple techniques to engage, build content knowledge and assess, largely based on the Constructivism theory of education. I understand and embrace the fact that most of the students I will teach in my theatre classes will never work professionally in the entertainment industry. I want these students to think back on their time as a theatre student as when they learned how to be a more confident public speaker, be able to think quickly on their feet, or to empathize with a stranger. Theatre education can help enrich a student’s life in a multitude of ways, and I hope to be teaching skills that will impact them for decades into the future.  

Positivity is of the utmost importance to me as a teacher. Our students are overwhelmed with a scary, demanding and stressful world. I want to be a person who can uplift and encourage them to find their talents and gifts. I will also use positive reinforcement to try and encourage and reinforce the good behavior and habits of students. For classroom management, we will come up with rules for each class that all students agree to follow, and remind the students of those class rules as often as necessary. If further action is needed, I will use techniques like moving those who need extra reinforcement closer to me, or away from the other students that they are being distracting with. I will also speak to individuals after class if their behaviors are continually disruptive to try to bring it down to a personal level. There will also be a “respect” portion of their grade, and if they are not respecting themselves or the other students in the classroom they will not earn that portion of the grade. 

My classes will always be a place of inclusion, and allow for the principles of Universal Design for Learning to flourish. We will make a list of goals for the semester, and I will continually update and post goals relating to the lesson of the day or week. I will always allow for assignments to be individualized for the student, and try to give as many options as possible for assessment. My ideal classroom will be a flexible workspace, preferably a black box theater space, where students have a place to sit and do individual quiet work or get up and move on stage for physical exercises.  I will make sure to give students individual feedback throughout each unit, and assessment so they know how they are doing, and where they could possibly improve. I think it is important that students are not graded on “talent”, but rather on effort and participation. In my classroom, if you are trying to succeed, you have. And finally, I will provide many options for students to use digital media as a choice for learning as much as possible. These are the recommendations stated out in http://www.udlcenter.org/aboutudl/whatisudl for having a UDL classroom. 

I want my classes to be learning in ways that will directly benefit the makeup of the class, and not do the same lesson plan year after year. I want to get to know my students, and allow what we are doing in the classroom to be directly influenced by their needs as individuals. While the overall goals of the class with be similar year to year, I will allow the students to have some ownership over they type of assessment and style of learning that best suits their particular make up of students. 

My teaching style mainly focuses on inquiry-based learning, and I will take on a teaching position of a mixture of facilitator and delegator, as specified in https://teach.com/what/teachers-know/teaching-methods/. At the start of each new semester, I will take on more of a demonstrator role, starting each unit with a mixture of short lecture leading into demonstration. I strongly believe in “playing” with my students in class, and participating in the games and acting activities, especially to demonstrate as they are learning how to do an activity. It is important for the students to see as a theatre teacher I am willing to do the same things I am asking them to do. This allows me to open myself up to making mistakes and not being perfect when playing a game or doing an activity, but also to show my energy and passion for this subject as well. As the semester progresses, I will move into being more of a delegator, allowing the students to make their own decisions and mistakes as they are learning. I am a strong believer in asking questions in order to foster discussion between the students, because in many cases they have the same answers I do, they just may not realize it. If the students are not “correct” about a fact or something specific, I gently guide them to the correct answer. 

One of the great joys about being a theatre artist is that it is a life long way to constantly learn about things that you may have never known about before. I want to re-kindle the natural thirst for discovery that we all have as children through theater. In my classes, students will research the history of the shows we are studying, as well as research the characters they are playing. This will give them the opportunity to learn about who different people are, and how they see the world to help increase their empathy. In a 2012 study, researchers Thalia Goldstein and Ellen Winner assessed empathy levels in elementary and high school students who had received one year of either acting, or other arts training. They found that those who had studied acting for the year, and not another type of art, showed the most significant growth in empathy scores. http://howlround.com/the-play-s-the-thing-is-theatre-our-ideal-empathy-workout

I believe in having a balance between students reading and performing works that are written by contemporary and classic playwrights, as well as writing their own stories. Students should have an understanding about theatre history and the reason why famous playwrights were so important to the evolution of the art form. They should also be aware of popular current writers who are continuing to shape theatre today. I will build upon knowledge they are already learning in their English and History classes to scaffold the information related to theater. I will look for as many opportunities as possible to work with teachers in other disciplines to collaborate on theatrical projects and reinforce different aspects of the student’s education. I also believe in students learning how to write plays, both individually in a traditional playwriting setting and in group devised work. 

And finally, I believe in play. We are in a unique situation as theater teachers where we get to play, pretend, and make believe with our students regardless of their age. Theater is about imagination and fun, and I will use the games and imaginative play to help teach everything from self confidence to instant decision making. I often say to my students, “It’s called a play for a reason. Lets have some fun.”