Out of this WORLD Science Teaching!

What kinds of teachers make a difference everyday? What kinds of teachers take chances for the betterment of their students? Below I will discuss some of the many qualities that makes teachers extraordinarily, exemplary.

Characteristics of Exemplary Teaching ~

  1. Instruction is meaningful and relevant to student’s lives – When teachers help bridge the gap between content and student’s lived experiences, students become much more engaged in their material because it is connected to their lives in some way.
    1. ***P.S This will also help teachers get to know their student’s more by allowing our student’s to put a personal twist on content 🙂

Exemplary teachers create a snowball effect of compounding students strengths when they engage their students in meaningful projects or assignments. A great way to provide meaningful learning to students is to allow them to see their positive impact in their community. This allows students to have first hand experience to show themselves that they are capable of contributing to society in a profound way.

2. Learning> > > Teaching – Exemplary teachers seek to foster authentic engagement of their students, versus having the students passively consume information spewed at them. This requires less teacher talk, and more student-centered collaboration. Take a look at the Ted Talk that really hits the nail on the head with this point:

  • 3. Exceptional teachers create a ‘space’ that fosters curiosity & wonder – In an exemplary science classroom, students are:
  • generating and answering challenging questions
  • proposing possible solutions
  • investigating and exploring those possible solutions through experimentation and investigation, and they
  • put their heads to together to explain, make sense, and construct knowledge of the world around them.
  • Students are able to use their unique toolbox of skill sets to offer alternative perspectives, suggestions, and thoughts to their peers which enriches everyones learning experience.

In order for students to actively BE CURIOUS and to actively WONDER about scientific phenomenon and our natural world, Exemplary teachers create opportunities for their students to explore and investigate by actively engaging them in the process of DOING science!

  • Exploring Nature’s classroom
  • Investigating a a question proposed by a student no one has an answer to, instead of leaving it for later
  • Small group and large group discussion
  • Cooperative learning strategies

4. Exemplary Science teachers genuinely care about their students – This should go without saying, but it is probably the most important quality of an exemplary teacher. Relating with students, and understanding their perspectives inside the science classroom and outside of it are important for fostering a welcoming environment. Exemplary teachers make it known that not only are student’s perspectives encouraged, they are also needed to support exemplary science teaching. Different experiences, prior knowledge, etc. shapes us into the people we are. Each student brings different academic and life skills with them, and when those skills are valued and respected in the classroom, authentic engagement and learning takes place.

5. Exemplary teachers instill confidence in their students while upholding community values – Exemplary teachers help to equip students with the necessary skills to be valuable members of a community and a larger society. They see so much greatness in their students, and they show them how remarkable achievements can come to fruition we put our heads together [just like what scientists do:)]

6 Comments

  1. I liked the being educational rockstar quote. Your page is really fantastic. The way you separate the information on your page makes it very interesting to read. It looks very professional. I think the only improvement is that you could come up with some examples of activities exemplary teachers provide for their students. Awesome job!

    • Anthony, Thank you so much for your kind words. Yes, I agree after I posted and saw other blogs, I quickly realized I should have included that in there. Thank you so much for your feedback.

  2. Hi Riley!
    I think you did an amazing job with this blog post. I think your insights and passion for student connection and learning is very evident. The section in which you specifically point discuss caring for your students was powerful. It is important to connect with your students and I do not think the importance is stressed enough. Genuine connection can sometimes make trying again at the hard problem because you know you are cared for in a class can make all of the difference. I particularly love what you wrote about instilling confidence to your students while upholding community values. This point in particular really spoke to me because I think that it really gets to the center of what education is supposed to be about. How do you think that you will introduce this greater connection to the community values within your classroom?

    • Colleen, Thank you very much for taking the time to read the blog and add in your perspectives. I really like that you said the importance of connecting with our students isn’t stressed enough. In times like a pandemic, I think it’s even more crucial we take the time to get know our students and any possible roadblocks to their success so we can work to reduce or eliminate those roadblocks. I think infusing community values into the science classroom can be taken in so many directions. For instance, one project could include having students research and collect data from a local lake or river (maybe figuring out the contents of the body of water), and deliver that data to people in the science community who can use that data in order to make environmentally smart and safe decisions; like creating groups that go pick up liter around a community lake, etc.

  3. Hi, Riley! I want to start off by saying your title is awesome – it definitely got my attention and encouraged me to read more. I like how you modeled the questions you were going to be answering in the very beginning because it allows your readers to understand what lies ahead. My favorite characteristic of exemplary teaching was 5. Exemplary teachers instill confidence in their students while upholding community values. This was my favorite because oftentimes teachers don’t focus on the confidence of their students and just push them to get higher grades. When teachers instill confidence in their students, the possibilities become endless. In your tweet, you mentioned monthly check-ins with students – how would an exemplary teacher go about performing these monthly check-ins?

    • Brooklyn,
      I loved what you had to add to my comment about instilling confidence in our students while upholding community values. I think the external motivators: grades, are the propelling force too many times, unfortunately. Also, thank you for your question! I would say, these monthly check-ins could go a variety of ways. Ranging from one-on-one conversations (if the student is willing) where we would be checking in with our students and working on building a quality student-teacher relationships, to group conversations about where group members are in a project.

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