Claire Palermo-Re

1/1/2017
Prof. Lauro
PDP Portfolio

Reflective Essay
Personalized Education Program
Creating a personalized educational program that would help me achieve my professional
goals was fairly simple for me. My professional goal is to be an Elementary School Teacher.
Ever since I could remember I have loved working with kids. I have been a babysitter, a lacrosse
coach, a swim coach and have even worked in a preschool with a wide range of kids including
infants, toddlers and children up to five years old. Deciding on a major when I got to
Bridgewater College was never a difficult decision for me. I knew what I wanted my major to be
long before I got to Bridgewater or even thought about where I wanted to go to college. To make
sure I would achieve my goal of becoming a teacher I looked up the requirements to be admitted
into the Bridgewater College Teacher Education Program (TEP). I learned what classes I had to
take and what grades I had to get in them. I also learned about what I had to do for my
application as well as for my interview to admit me into the program. I created my class schedule
around the classes needed for the Teacher Education Program as well as the general education
classes that I needed to graduate from Bridgewater College. I checked with my advisor to make
sure that I was taking the classes necessary to become a teacher.
Along with taking classes at school I also had to take tests so that when I graduate I
would be a licensed teacher. I had to take the RVE, the Praxis II and VCLA. Most of my classes
at Bridgewater went along with these tests. My professors were really good at telling myself and
my classmates when we should take the tests depending on what classes we were taking.

All of my classes from the Teacher Education Program have helped prepare me for my
professional goal of being a teacher. They have all taught me something very important about
being a teacher. I might not have realized it when I first took the class, but I definitely do now.
My very first Education class was Educ 140. In this class we talked a lot about ourselves. We
talked about our backgrounds and what made us who we are. We also read books about
education. The books we read were all written about teachers about their experience teaching.
Some of the stories were funny and some of the stories were heart breaking. They showed the
good and the bad parts about being a teacher.
The next class I took was educational psychology. In this class we talked about different
child development theorists. We really focused on how students learned. We had to write a paper
discussing how we learned as well as how someone else of our choosing learned. Out of
everything in this class that we discussed I think the thing that really stuck with me was
Maslows hierarchy of needs. According to Maslows hierarchy of needs, all of your needs at the
first level need to be met before you can move onto the next level and so on. The first level is
physiological needs such as food and water. This mean kids need to have slept the night before
and have eaten and had water and be in warm clothes in order to learn. I always thought this
level was a given. I never realized exactly how necessary this level is until I student taught. I saw
the effect of these needs not being met on almost a daily basis. It was so interesting for me to see
information I had learned my sophomore year being useful my senior year. For some of the kids
whose basic needs were not met, I could give them a snack or get them a sweatshirt from the
nurses office. However, at the beginning of the year I thought these kids were just difficult. I did
not understand that there was a reason they were acting out. My knowledge from Educational
Psychology as well as my student teaching experience taught me to make sure all my students

basic needs were met before getting upset with them for acting out. I know that when I get
hungry I am not always the nicest person so there is no way a hungry elementary school child is
going to be a good mood and working hard.
My sophomore year I took book buddies. Up until this point all of my education classes
had been fairly easy. I had to put forth effort of course, but the material made sense to me so it
was easy to learn. This changed when I took book buddies. In this class we worked on breaking
down words. We learned about the different kinds of things that could be going on in words such
as diagraphs or blends. The part that was the hardest for me was phonemic awareness and
phonological awareness. Phonemic awareness includes phoneme isolation, phoneme identity,
phoneme categorization, phoneme blending, phoneme deletion, phoneme addition and phoneme
substitution. Phonological awareness includes phonemic awareness, rhyme, rime, onset and
syllables. Phonemic awareness is a part of phonological awareness which always confused me.
Along with those terms we also learned about the five pillars of reading instruction. Those five
pillars are phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary and comprehension. As a part of
this class we went to Mountain View Elementary School and worked with a first grader on
reading. When I worked with my book buddy the material made sense. I knew how to go over
the tricky words and talk about what we had read and so on. However, when we were in class
remembering all the specific terms was always tricky for me. My professor went over the
material in a variety of ways and eventually through repetition I understood the material and
passed the class. This class taught me the importance of teaching tricky material in a variety of
ways. I never want my students to feel as frustrated as I felt at points during that class. I
remember being so upset that some of my classmates just immediately understood the material
while I felt like I had no idea what was going on. I might not be able to prevent them from being

frustrated, but I can do my best to help my future students figure out and try new ways to learn
tricky material.
My junior year in the fall I took three different Education classes. I took part two of book
buddies, Educ 332 Intermediate Lit, as well as Educ 316 teaching math and Educ 370 classroom
management. Basically my entire semester was spent learning and talking about being a teacher.
This was definitely one of my favorite semesters. In Educ 316, teaching math, my professor was
Dr. Hill. He taught us about ways to integrate technology into math. In this day and age
technology is everywhere. There is so many ways to use technology while teaching that can
make your lessons so much more exciting. We learned about all of the cool features on
smartboard and even created our own smartboard activity to help review a math concept. For
Educ 332, Intermediate Lit, I had Dr. Rogers again. After struggling in the first part of book
buddies I was a little worried about this class. However, this information seemed to make so
much more sense to me. The hardest part about this class was creating my STG (strategic
teaching guide). I had to pick a book and then create activities to review vocabulary as well as
comprehension based on the chapters. I used so many different activities to teach vocabulary
such as a vocab cluster, cloze procedure and frayer model to name a few. I also used many
different comprehension activities such as a RAFT, having students create a timeline of events or
a semantic map. At the time this project took up a lot of my time, but now I have a book filled
with different vocabulary and comprehension activities that I could adapt to whatever I am
teaching. The last Education class I took this semester was Education 370, classroom
management, with Dr. Hawk. In this class we discussed different theorists and their classroom
management model. We also discussed anything that had to do with classroom management such
as parent teacher conferences. We came up with the craziest scenarios and talked about ways to

handle it which definitely helped me out during student teaching when I observed parent teacher
conferences. I knew what to expect and how to tell parents what their student needed to work on
without saying it too negatively. All of these classes helped prepare me for my practicum.
I completed my practicum my junior year during interterm. I spent three straight weeks in
a third grade class. I was there the whole day and got to see everything. I even got the chance to
teach two lessons. My first lesson was a disaster. In hindsight it was not really as bad as I
thought, but at the time I thought it went horribly. Even though it did not go as I had planned it
showed me that my lessons would not always go perfectly and I needed to be able to learn from
them which is exactly what I did. My second lesson went so much better and I felt so much more
confident in myself teaching.
The spring of my junior year I took my last Education class before student teaching. I
took Education 406- Curriculum/Instruction. In this class out big project was to pick a SOL and
plan a whole unit. We had to pace it out, create a pre-test and post-test as well as all of the
lessons and activities. We had to try and use different activities that would appeal to all types of
learners. Then we had to teach a lesson to our classmates and record ourselves. Afterwards we
had to watch the recording and discuss what went well and what we could have fixed. I was
terrified for this. I thought I probably looked so awkward up there, but I was actually pleasantly
surprised with how my lesson went. In this class we also talked a lot about accommodations and
modifications. We talked about different ways we could alter a lesson plan or activity so it would
be appropriate for all of our students. This was really hard for me because we did not have any
real students to alter the lessons for. However, it was really good practice for student teaching.

The fall of my senior year I completed my Student teaching. I was lucky enough to go to
most of the teacher workdays and help my teacher set up the classroom. I saw how much time
and effort went into getting a classroom ready. My teacher had just switch rooms and I was able
to help her figure out the best way to set up the room. I felt included in the whole process. The
first day of school all I did was observe, but I was still nervous. My cooperating teacher and I
gradually started switching roles. Each week I would take on more subjects and she would step
back more and more. The first day that I taught the whole day I was terrified. Not much had
changed from the week before, but I was still nervous. However, each day I slowly got more and
more confident in myself. At the beginning anytime something happened I was not expecting I
had to take a moment to gather myself and think of what to do. By the end of student teaching I
was able to just roll with whatever happened.
All of my classes helped prepare me for my professional goal of being a teacher, but my
student teaching experience helped me prove to myself that I could be a teacher. I have always
been good with kids, but I was definitely worried I would not be able to teach my kids what they
needed to know. As a part of student teaching we had to complete our SAPA or Student
Academic Progress Assessment (see SAPA). This assignment was similar to what I had done in
Education 406- Curriculum/Instruction. I had to pick an SOL and give my students a pre-test.
Then based on that information I had to plan out at least three lesson plans teaching them the
necessary information. Then I had to give them a post-test that was the same as the pre-test and
compare the results. Obviously the hope is that the students will all improve. I had to write a
paper explain the pre-test results and how they influenced my lesson plans as well as analyze the
results from the pre-test and the post-test. Seeing how my students had improved helped show

me that I was capable of teaching my students. This assignment helped me feel more confident in
my ability to be a teacher.
Throughout my student teaching experience I probably created hundreds of lessons. I was
worried my lessons would be boring or I would not be able to think of activities that my students
would enjoy and would help them learn at the same time. However, over time I slowly started to
think of more ideas on my own and rely less on help from my cooperating teacher. As I got to
know my students, I knew what activities they would like and what kind of activities would help
them learn better. All of these lesson plans helped me to learn how to combine fun interactive
activities with the information my students needed to learn (see lesson plans).
At this point I am one semester away from achieving my professional goal. I have passed
all of my education classes and most importantly have passed students teaching. All of these
classes have each taught me important lessons that will hopefully help me to be an amazing
teacher. They have also helped me grow from someone who wanted to be a teacher, but doubter
her ability to someone who knows I can be a great teacher and help my students learn as well as
have a positive impact in their lives.

Engagement with Diverse Perspectives

One of the classes that challenged me to think deeply the most was the interterm class I
took my sophomore year. I took PSCI 209 with Professor Josefson. In this class we discussed
various philosophers and their theories. We discussed how they influenced one another and how
they differed. We had readings to do most nights and then our class time mostly involved
discussing the readings. It was interesting to me to see how the entire class read the exact same

thing yet we all had different opinions and did not all agree on what the text was saying. There
was some days that a majority of us would agree and other days that we would all vary in our
opinions. It was interesting to see that some of us could agree one day and then the next day
think something completely different. Often times when we discussed our opinions and what we
thought, we would back up our opinions with evidence. Sometimes our evidence would be
something we read or saw or even experienced. It was interesting to see how all of our different
life events impacted our thoughts and interpretations of the texts that we read.
For our final exam paper we had to decide which aesthetical theory is better based on the
philosophers we read about (see PSCI 209 Final Exam Paper). I had a difficult time agreeing
with just one theory. I liked bits and pieces of certain philosophers theory. In the end I decided I
liked a combination of Hegel, Plato, and Shaftesbury. However, if I had to pick just one theory I
would go with Hegels theory. This paper also made me reflect on why these philosophers
thought this way. I tried to think of who had influenced them and what was going on in the world
around them to help me understand why their theory was what it was.
I liked that Hegel thought that what we thought was beautiful depended upon where we
were at in our human development. To Hegel something is beautiful if it represents a stage in the
historical context of human consciousness. This makes sense to me because everyone is at
different stages in their human development and have had different life experiences which affects
what we find beautiful. To him human development does not necessarily refer to age. Instead to
him we reach our final stage in the history of human development when we understand the
context. If someone has reached the end of their development they understand that their
consciousness is not their own. Throughout history art continues to change in what people find
beautiful because the world around them is changing which affects their human development.

In Shaftesburys aesthetical theory I really agree with his idea that beauty can be found in
nature. He thought that since nature was created by God it was the highest form of beauty.
Things in nature also have symmetry and proportions. I definitely agree with this idea and I think
a lot of people would as well. Doing something as simple as just watch the sun set or the sun rise
is in my opinion one of the most beautiful things you can see. It amazes me to see how much
changes in just a short amount of time. Or how beautiful all the different colors are. They are
almost impossible to recreate. Seeing a real sunrise or sunset and seeing a photograph of one
makes such a difference. Being in nature and experiencing it firsthand adds to the beauty. That
goes for anything in nature. None of the pictures I have taken while hiking have ever been able
to recreate the beauty of the view as well the actually being there and seeing the view with my
own two eyes.
The part I liked of Platos theory is that beauty is simple and in the middle. He thought
thing should not be too extravagant, but they also should not be too simple. I liked this part for
the extravagant part. I think things that are beautiful are things that are simpler. I do not think
things that are super flashy are beautiful. I think this ties in with Shaftesburys theory. To me
nature is simple and that is part of why it is beautiful.
All of these different philosophers and their theories as well as my classmates influenced
my thinking. I think if you had asked me before this class what is beautiful and had asked me on
the end my answer would have been very different. I think in the beginning I would not really
know how to answer. However, after this class my answer would be influenced by these theories.
This class also helped me think more critically and reflect on a text while reading it. Before this
class I had trouble explaining what I thought an author was trying to say. I preferred to just have
my professor or have someone else tell me what the author was saying. I have learned that they

might not even know what the author is trying to say. Instead I should think of what I think they
are trying to say and be able to back it up with proof. In class Professor Jofeson always had our
class discuss what the reading from the night before meant. We would have to be able to
articulate what we thought as well as why. We also would have to say whether or not we agreed
with a classmates thoughts and be able to explain why. It has also shown me how different
peoples views can be. Bridgewater might be a small school, but there is many varying opinions
and thoughts on campus. However, it is a good thing that we do not all think the same.
Citizenship, Ethics and Community Responsibility
The school I was placed at for student teaching was in Rockingham County. A
majority of the students I taught live below the poverty line. A majority of them qualify for free
or reduced lunch. Many of them eat breakfast at school because they do not have food at home
for breakfast. A few of them had bags of food sent home with them every Friday to ensure that
their family would have enough food to eat over the weekend. One of them spent part of my time
that I knew her living in a hotel or sleeping on the floor of a family friends house due to issues
in her own home. One of my students had her whole familys Christmas presents bought by the
school because her parents did not have enough money. Many of my students had difficult
family lives and did not have a stable home. They would rotate between houses. Many of my
kids had seen very traumatic events in their lives already at the age of six. One of my students
was born in a refugee camp and spent his whole life there until he was able to come to America.
Living in Northern Virginia these were not problems that I had ever faced firsthand. One
of the first days at my school the teacher I was placed with and I read all of the cumulative files
on all of the students. I was amazed at what these six year olds had dealt with and faced growing

up. Learning about poverty in class and hearing the statistics was one thing, but actually seeing
firsthand the effect poverty had on these kids was a whole other issue.
Growing up I always went to bed full, warm and safe. I had no experience with being
homeless, or not having enough food or not having a safe place to sleep at night. Most of my
classmates in high school were in the same situation as me. I am sure there were some that were
not, but I was not aware if they were not. Of course I had learned about these problems and had
even taken a class that discussed this. I took a class called Diversity in the Classroom where we
discussed many topics one of which was how being poor affected students performance in
school. I even had a placement that went along with this class. Most of the students in the
classroom I was placed were poor and English was not their first language. However, my
placement only required that I spend ten hours there so I did not get a good grasp on how issues
like homelessness and poverty truly affect people until the semester I student taught.
I took Diversity in the Classroom my sophomore year. One of my assignments was to
pick a topic and do research about it (see Diversity Essay). I decided to research and write about
how being a refugee affects a childs education. I never imagined that my senior year I would see
firsthand how being a refugee actually does affect that childs education. Sophomore year when I
wrote that paper all I could do was read articles and look at facts and make assumptions. In my
class for student teaching I only had one student who was a refugee, but he also had two other
brothers at the school. I am aware that not every childs experience is the same, but I was amazed
at how well this whole family adjusted.
The child in my class for student teaching lived in a small house with eight other people.
He had been born in a refugee camp and had lived there until he moved to America. He was from
Zambia and I can only imagine what he and his family had seen and experienced while living

there. The teacher that I was placed with and I looked up pictures of the camps there and it was
heart breaking to see where he had grown up. We did research on the problems going on there
and what had made his family decide to move to America. He was one of my students with free
or reduced lunch, he ate breakfast at school most days and often times came in with clothes that
did not fit him. He would come in with shoes that were too small or not appropriate for the
weather. He would wear multiple shirts to make up for not having a heavy jacket. Sometimes his
pants would be too small and he would not able to button them up. However, this student would
come in every day with the biggest smile on his face. He was amazed by everything. His first
few days at school he would stand by the sink and just turn the water on and off and watch. The
simplest things amazed him. He loved to learn. Looking back on where he was at the start of the
school year to where he was on my last day in December was truly remarkable. I remember in
the very beginning he was so proud of himself for being able to say his ABCs. When he tried
writing them even if he was looking at the letter he sometimes wrote it upside down or sideways.
By the end of my time student teaching, I could make a sound and he could recognize what letter
it was. He even knew how to write some words all by himself. It was amazing to see how far he
came in only a few short months. I can only imagine how he is going to be doing by the end of
the year.
My experience student teaching taught me so much more than a research paper. My
research paper helped provide me with facts and information, but actually working with a student
who was a refugee made me understand so much more the struggles he faced. In my research
paper I discussed how teachers could help refugee students feel more comfortable and ways that
they could help them learn better. Students teaching gave me a chance to actually put those ideas
into effect. At first I was really nervous. This student spoke Swahili and very little English. I was

not sure how to teach him when we did not even speak the same language. However, my teacher
I was placed with and I tried many different ideas and quickly found what worked best.
As a teacher I know that I have a very good chance of having students in my class who
do not speak English. That is the reality now of being a teacher. I am so glad I had the chance to
experience this firsthand while student teaching. I now feel much more prepared to teach
students whose first language is not English.
Global Citizenship and Intercultural Competencies
My junior year I took comparative politics. It was really interesting to learn about all the
different governments that exist in the world. I have lived in America my whole life so I am used
to the government we have. Some of the countries we talked about amazed me at how different
their governments are compared to the United States. We talked about how the type of
government you have makes a huge effect on your country. The two countries we used for this
example was North Korea and South Korea. Both countries have the same geography however
their government is very different which makes all the difference. North Korea has an exclusive
government which basically means it only benefits some people like their high ranking officials.
Meanwhile South Korea has an inclusive government which means it benefits everyone.
We also learned about electoral threshold, the different kinds of coalitions that exist and
so many other factors of a government. We talked about how certain trends in governments can
be caused by where the country is located. For example proportional representation occurs
mostly in Western Europe and most of Latin America. We discussed the advantages and
disadvantages of all the different types of electoral systems to help learn why certain countries
chose the electoral system that they did.

As a part of this class my professor created an imaginary country who had just
overthrown its authoritarian leader. The country has four different ethnic identities. The previous
leader only allowed people from his ethnic identity to hold positions of power. He also forced
everyone to speak his ethnic groups language and forced many people to move to accommodate
his ethnic group. All of the other ethnic groups were oppressed. My professor assigned every
member of my class to an ethnic identity. My classmates and I had to come up with a new
constitution for this country that determined how the country would be set up.
The group that I was assigned to was the Takas. The Takas all used to live in one part of
the country until they were kicked out by the dictator. He gave the land that the Takas previously
lived on to his ethnic group the Randies. The Takas wanted their land back as a part of the new
constitution. They also believe that women should have a low status in the new country.
I personally do not agree with all of the viewpoints of the Takas, however I had to
pretend that I was. I had to decide what kind of government the country should have and why
and explain this in a paper (see Comparative Politics-Takas government paper). Then I had to be
able to argue my viewpoint to the rest of the class and get my fellow classmates to agree with
me. The goal of the assignment was try to get your ethnic group all or as many of the things they
want as possible.
This class taught me all the different aspects that go into a government. It also taught me
the effect some types of governments have on the citizens. I learned how inclusive governments
benefit the whole country while exclusive governments only benefit high ranking government
officials. I learned how electoral thresholds have an effect on how many political parties are
represented in congress. Which then has a direct effect on coalitions as well as how easily laws
are passed or how difficult it might be to pass laws.

Experiential or Service Learning

One of my favorite parts of being in the Education Program is being able to go to local
elementary schools and help out. I already talked a lot about my student teaching experience and
how much I learned from that. However, I have learned something from all of my placements. I
might not have known it at the time, but I definitely know it now.
My junior year I took Educ 370 Classroom Management with Dr. Hawk. I think as a
teacher classroom management is the hardest part. It is easy to know the information and it is
easy to care for your students and want the best for them, however setting up the right classroom
environment can be difficult. You want your kids to feel safe and comfortable, but you also want
them to be respectful and follow the rules. Finding the balance between that can be difficult. In
Classroom Management we had to research different types of management models. Everyone in
the class had a different theorists. We took turns explaining the model as well as having a prop to
help our classmates understand (Management Theory Paper).
The theorist I chose was Lee and Marlene Canter. Their theory is called Assertive
Discipline. They saw how kids were starting to act up more and more in class and how it was
beginning to affect instructional time. According to the Canters, some characteristics an
effective teacher possess is a strong teacher voice, high expectations for student behavior, an
effective classroom discipline plan, policies and procedures taught at the beginning of the year,
the ability to motivate all students to quickly follow directions and to get and stay on task, the
ability to build trusting relationships with their students and the ability to gain support from
parents and administrators. I wrote a paper elaborating on their theory as well as created a prop
to help my classmates understand this theory. Lee and Marlene Canter believed every teacher

could be an effective teacher if they were willing to make a change and try to follow what
Assertive Discipline says.
At the end of the semester I had to write a paper for Classroom Management based on my
own management model (see Classroom Management Model). I had to discuss what I would like
to have in my own classroom and what management model I would use. In my paper I discussed
Assertive Discipline as well as another management theory, Win-Win Discipline which is by
Scott, Kagan and Kyle. They thought that when a student misbehaved it was because of one of
seven reasons. The seven reasons are attention seeking, avoiding embarrassment, anger venting,
control seeking, energetic, bored and uninformed. They thought that if you punished a child
without finding out why they misbehaved nothing will be solved. The student will continue to
misbehave.
Assertive Discipline and Win-Win Discipline both made sense to me and I really liked the
thought of being able to use them in my own classroom one day. Luckily through all of my field
experience placements, my practicum and student teaching I was able to see these theories in full
affect. All of the classrooms I was placed in had their classroom rules posted in their room which
goes along with Assertive Discipline. All of the students were aware of the rules. In my student
teaching classroom the principal actually went to every classroom in the school and went over
the rules with them. This also goes along with Assertive Discipline because it shows support
from administrators. I also saw aspects of Win-Win Discipline. Often times in all of the
classrooms I was placed in after a student misbehaved the teacher would redirect the whole class,
then when the other students were busy would talk to the student who misbehaved. They would
ask them if they were okay or if there was a reason they did what they had done. This gave the

teacher a chance to figure out why the student had misbehaved and gave the students a chance to
explain why they did what they did.
Through all the classrooms and all of the teachers I had the opportunity to observe. I got
the chance to see firsthand the theories I had learned about in classroom management. I am sure
many of the teachers did not know exactly what theory they were following and many of them
had a management model that encompassed many of the theories I had learned about. Which
showed me that in my own classroom I should take parts of the management models that I liked
and combine them to create my own management model for my own classroom.