About my educational biography

and my expectations in teaching

In these final practicums what I want is to learn the maximum in order to take the best learning for my future as a teacher. I have really high expectations about these practicums, as I am going to go to a school that works very different from what I am used to. What I know about that school is that they work by spaces, this is totally unknown for me, so I am very excited to discover what does it consist of and how is it applied.

I think that it is a great opportunity to learn a lot and widen my knowledge, because it is a very innovative school and it has some differences with the previous experiences that I have had during my educational path. That school is focused on student's interests, as they think that each child has to create their own knowledge and learning. So, the centre of learning is the student itself. Another thing that I want to see is how they work, I know the idea of working by spaces, but I am not aware about which are the implications and the organisation of the class, the students and the teachers. So, I want to observe how it is applied in reality, which role has each agent and how they relate between them.

A challenge that I have is that I do not have experience working by this methodology, I have experience working in an innovative school because of my practicum II and I thought that the way of working would be similar, but I have realized that the two schools are very different, as one works by projects and the other by spaces. In addition, as I said before I am very excited to observe how it works, but at the same time I am a bit anxious due to covid19. I do not know how the school is going to adapt spaces to the new situation and it saddens me because I will not be able to observe how the school works and is organised in a normal situation. I think that I will find a very different school from what it really is. Hopefully we can develop these two practicums with the greatest possible normality and in the best way. In addition, as I do not have experience working by spaces, I think that it will suppose a challenge for me, but it will be a very rewarding experience.

About my previous experience, first of all I am going to talk about the school in which I studied primary education. That school was very traditional, we worked following the usual timetable organised by subjects and we used a book that was the route of learning. The process followed was very automatic and without thinking about what we were doing and why. Personally, with that system I don't see the connections that has that learning with the real world and how this can be useful or necessary for my future.

Another experience that has been very significant for me and that has been a before and an after in my way of seeing education, is the practicum II that I made last year. The school works by projects and that practicum for me supposed a huge learning, as it gave me a lot of resources, tools and supports that I am going to use for sure in my future. Thanks to that school, I have been able to see a different way of teaching. When I compare it with the way in which I have learned, I realize that children can learn the same things and the same contents as me but in a way that is much more focused on children's interests, making them more motivated in their process of learning. Thanks to the methodology used in school, children had a great desire of learning new things and how the world works, so learning really occur by themselves. In addition, in that practicum I had a very active and participatory role that helped me to know myself better and to be able to analyse which are my strengths and weaknesses. I finished the practicum knowing myself more and also having a clear idea of how I wanted to be in my future as a teacher and how to define and develop my identity.

In my future as a teacher, I want my students to be the centre of their learning. For that, I am going to dedicate classroom time to give space to conversations. I think that it is very important to make children interact between them, as it is a way to make them share their knowledge and, from that point, start reflecting and creating knowledge. Another thing that I consider important is to take into account students' families, I think that it is necessary to establish a bond between the school and families, in order to make them participants about their children's learning process.

I want to break with the traditional methodologies, being aware that each child is different and identify their needs, as each has different ways and rhythms of learning. I want to promote their autonomy and their critical thinking, making them be active in classroom. I consider essential to start learning from real and significant situations for them, in order to be able to make a connection between the real world and the school, considering both as interrelated spaces and not as an independent one. My role will be acting as a model, as a guide in their learning process, not as a corrector. Focusing on the way that I see mistakes, what I will teach to my students is that they can make mistakes because they are something natural and good, as we can see what we can improve.

In conclusion, I see education as something global and general that goes beyond the classroom walls. What I want is to integrate the real world into the classroom, as those children are citizens, and it is there where they will apply the knowledge learned in school.