My MEL Experiences

• Student/Teacher relationships: In my high school experience I had a couple of teachers who really developed good relationships with me. One teacher in particular had a great sense of humor, made class fun, and had a positive attitude. One thing that I still remember about him is that he pulled me aside one day in class to ask me about a condition that was listed on my file, and if there was anything that he could do to help me in class. My condition is not a severe one, but this was actually the first time that a teacher had asked me about it. I instantly felt comfortable in his classroom, and felt he cared about me and was willing to be flexible.

• Helping students succeed: I have had many experiences with teachers who were very willing to help students succeed, however I have also had a lot experiences with teachers who weren’t as willing to help. Specifically, I had a math teacher my junior year, who was quoted as saying he was proud of his failure rate. I’m sure you could guess how well this class went for me. He taught in one way, and one way only, and was not available to stay after school at all. It was clear that he was not willing to help students, and that he frankly did not care whether students passed or failed.

• Hands-on: My favorite class in high school was my sophomore Honors U.S. History class. Now that I look back at it my teacher had many different activities when it came to delivering info, review, and projects. When delivering info he would give us the printed out version of the powerpoint so that we could write on it and highlight it. He always did a jeopardy game to review at the end of each unit, and he always did a variety of different projects with us. For example, he had us make a World War I propaganda poster that we had to draw all on our own. He did not score this on artist ability, but rather on whether or not you understood the concept of propaganda, and if what you were trying to promote was clear. There was always a variety of hands on activities for us to do, which made learning a lot easier.

• Learning Styles: Another bad experience I had in high school was in my junior year Chemistry class. This teacher did not in anyway take learning styles into account. She was one of those teachers that presented the information to you through presentations, and then would leave you to do whatever worksheet she had assigned that day. This is how it went day after day, we did the same thing and in the same sequence. This was very difficult for students who didn’t learn this way, and it actually created a bad teacher/student relationship because we were afraid to ask her questions about what she had just gone over. However, we created a much stronger student/student relationship because we relied on each other for help/

• Context: Once again I’m going to go revert back to my Honors U.S. History class in high school. My teacher did a great job when it came to using metaphors and creating mental frameworks. He would incorporate people in the class into what he was teaching. For example, if talking about a conflict between two countries he would say if Hannah was x country, and Johnny was y country, how do you think Hannah would respond to Johnny doing x. He would incorporate humor into this so it made it enjoyable, and helped simplify the information in a way. He would also compare issues of today with issues in history, and really emphasize that this is why it is important to learn history, so hopefully we don’t repeat it.