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How will your teaching contribute to the end in mind?

When teaching, it is vital to consider how your teaching will contribute to the overall end

in mind. I believe teaching to the overall end in mind means teaching students the life skills

necessary for them to be successful in the workforce. Both general pedagogy and my content

area of special education play a role in this means to an end. In my personal point of view, I see

general pedagogy supporting the end in mind by teaching students how to communicate

effectively with their peers and how to be held personally responsible for their actions. These

two critical skills are essential for students to be successful in the workforce. In my content area

of special education, how I see it promoting the end in mind for students is by teaching students

functional skills in the classroom such as vocational skills. In this paper, I will focus on how

teaching these skills in general pedagogy and special education contribute to the overall end in

mind.

The first skill I plan on teaching to my students is communication skills. My future

classroom will have a huge emphasis on group work and collaboration to enforce this skill. In the

21st century, communication is a skill that is essential in everyday life as well as in the

workforce. According to Edward Wilczynski, A student who cant communicate effectively

cant compete in the modern world. This is why teaching effective communication skills must

serve as a cornerstone for any program preparing young people for the 21st century (20

November 2009). Communication in the world today is apparent everywhere you go. Teaching

my students how to communicate properly with others will prepare them for when they have to

go interview for their first job. This will also ensure their success at their job because without

proper communication, no one would be able to know how to do their job correctly. By teaching

my student this skill now, they will be well equipped for the workforce before they graduate.
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Another skill that I plan on teaching to my students is personal responsibility. How I will do

this is by explicitly telling my students that they are responsible for turning in their homework

assignments on time. I will also clearly explain to my students that not meeting their deadlines

will only hurt them because they will get points taken off on their assignments. I have seen a

huge emphasis on teaching students personal responsibility in a general education math

classroom at Winona Middle School. In my observation notes I wrote, The seventh grade math

teacher has the students correct their own homework and trusts that the students are honest in

telling her if they have completed their assignment or not (04 April 2017). This is a great way to

hold students personally accountable for completing their assignments. I plan on implementing

this in my future classroom. By holding students personally accountable for their work, this

prepares them for when they will have to meet deadlines at their work. For example, turning in

their paperwork on time or completing the cleaning list for the week. If you do not meet your

deadlines at your job, this could ultimately end up getting you fired. Therefore, teaching students

to be personally responsible in the classroom will teach them the good habits that they need for

when they obtain a job in their future.

The final skill I believe is one of the most important skills to teach students that falls under

the category of functional skills is vocational skills. These skills are important to teach in my

content area of special education because it is harder for students with disabilities to obtain a job

in the 21st century. Edward M. Levison and Eric J Palmer state, According to the Twenty-First

Annual Report to Congress on the Implementation of the Individuals with Disabilities Education

Act (US Department of Education 1999), only about one-fourth of students with disabilities

graduate high school with a diploma; however, these students were less likely to drop out of

school and more likely to be competitively employed if they received adequate vocational
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training (11-12). Hence why teaching vocational skills to students with disabilities is of the

upmost importance. How I will implement teaching vocational skills in my classroom to ensure

my students learn these skills is by teaching students how to follow directions, show up to class

on time, and how to interact with other people appropriately within the workplace. As a result,

my students will be sufficiently prepared for when they work at their first job.

Teaching students with the end in mind is essential if you want your students to be

successful in the 21st century. General pedagogy teaches students how to effectively

communicate with one another and how to be personally responsible. My content area of special

education teaches students functional skills such as vocational skills. By teaching these skills in

my future classroom I am contributing to the overall end in mind: ensuring the success of my

students before they enter the workforce.

When do you know you have achieved the purpose in education through your teaching?

In order to know if I have achieved the purpose in education through my teaching, I must

first examine what is the overall purpose of educating students in the 21st century. I believe the

overall purpose of education is to teach students life skills that prepare them for the workforce.

When I will know how I have achieved the purpose of education through my teaching all

depends upon when my students acquire the life skills that I teach them. I first have to evaluate if

my own teaching is working and how my students are responding to what I believe are the three

most critical life skills any teacher can teach.

The first life skill I deem to be important that any teacher should teach is how to properly

communicate effectively. At the Winona Middle School there is a major focus on group work

and working collaboratively together. However, one day when I was observing in the special

education classroom I noted in my notebook, The students were yelling at each other and
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calling each other names. The teacher ended up yelling at all of the students for not exhibiting

socially acceptable behavior (14 March 2017). Through observing this, I noticed how even

though the teacher was trying to teach the students how to communicate properly with one

another, the students had not acquired this life skill yet. Once the students do exhibit appropriate

behaviors without the teacher having to redirect them, that is when the teacher will know that the

students have acquired the skill of being able to communicate properly. This type of

communication the students were exhibiting would not be accepted by an employer at work.

More than likely if two co-workers were yelling at each other they both would be fired. This is

another way to know if student have acquired the life skills that are going to make them

successful at work. It is important to examine the skills they are working on and how they would

transfer over to a real life work situation.

Another life skill I deem to be crucial for students to learn is personal responsibility. On one

of my days at my field experience I saw a student first hand show personal responsibility. In my

observation notebook I wrote, The student told her teacher she was not going to be at school

tomorrow because of a family emergency. The student then asked for all her homework

assignments she was going to miss so she could still do them while she was gone (28 March

2017). With this student, I could tell that she had acquired the life skill of personal responsibility.

She made sure that even though she was going to be gone, that she still would be able to get her

work done. This is a skill that employers look for when hiring their employees, which will help

the student in the future when she is being interviewed for a job. From this, I could tell that the

special education teacher had achieved the purpose of education with this student because she

obtained the life skill of personal responsibility through her teaching.

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The final life skill that is essential to teach students with disabilities is vocational skills.

These are skills that students need to be successful in their job such as showing up to work on

time and how to act appropriately within the workplace. While observing in the special education

classroom throughout my field experience, I noted in my notebook, One student always is

showing up late every day. The teacher took the student outside of class and had a talk with him

(28 February 2017). Another day at my field placement I noted, This student has been on time

consecutively for the past month (28 March 2017). After noting this, I realized that the teacher

was trying to teach the student the vocational skill of showing up to work on time. This teacher

was successful in doing so, due to the fact that her student exhibited the behavior of showing up

on time after she had a talk with him. I then knew that this teacher had fulfilled the purpose of

education by teaching her student this life skill.

There are many ways to know when I have achieved the purpose of education through your

teaching. Different students are not all going to acquire the life skills I teach them at the same

time. However, when students do exhibit the life skills I have taught them such as how to

communicate properly, personal responsibility, and vocational skills, that is how I will know I

have achieved the purpose of education: students acquiring the life skills in order to be

successful in the workplace.

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Works Cited

Levison, Edward M., and Eric J. Palmer. Preparing Students With Disabilities for School-to-

Work Transition and Postschool Life. Counseling 101. April 2005, pp. 11-15. PDF

Observation. 04 April 2017.

Observation. 14 March 2017.

Observation. 28 March 2017.

Observation. 28 February 2017.

Wilczynski, Edward. Teaching Basic Communication Skills. SEEN Magazine SouthEast

Network. N.p., 20 November 2009. Web. 08 April 2017.