FIAE Chapter Two

Mastery

For students to demonstrate mastery they do not just need to be able to fill in a blank or circle in a bubble on an exam, they must be able to explain concepts and apply knowledge to situations. The six facets of understanding are explanation, interpretations, application, perspective, empathy, and self-knowledge. All of these facets will play a role with the students in my classroom being able to prove to me they have mastered a topic. It is also important that I make sure I present information to students in such a way that they are not just memorizing information for the next exam, but they are storing so they can use it month later. School is not about memorization, or at least I don’t think it should be. That is why students don’t like school that much. I believe teachers should be presenting information to students so they can actually use it for present and future matters. Many times students are reluctant to be receptive to information because the teacher throws information at them that is not important to master. As a future teacher, we cannot just go through the textbook word for word and tell students everything is important. While all things are important to some level, some are far more important than others. I will go through the textbook and weed out information that I can briefly go over, and highlight information that is key to the course. Other things that I present in class don’t need to come from the textbook—they can be retrieved from online lessons or other sources.