1. I will agree with Mr. Gillam in his assessment that high school is what one makes of it. Indeed, as with anything else in life, a person will only receive as much from an enterprise as he or she is willing to invest in it. Thus, the more effort a person invests in his or her high school education, the more he or she is apt to reap from that investment, and vice versa. However, the rest of Mr. Gillam’s statement is purely in error. Indeed, who a person becomes after college and entering a career are undeniably connected to the daily undertakings of that person in either of these pursuits, it is necessary to understand that in both cases the decisions to undertake those pursuits is directly connected to the experience one has while in high school. This is not a vague relationship. For instance, compare the “successful” high school student to an “unsuccessful” one. We will not define success on the basis of grade. Instead, let us use the measure to identify those students who leave high school ready to function in the outside world. Under this definition, a successful student would be the one who is prepared to face the challenges of the future, by learning how to interact with his or her environment and how to best tackle the problems that environment will present. Perhaps “success,” then, has its own component parts, such as the given student’s motivation, determination, or commitment to a given task. These characteristics are much more likely to develop earlier in life, as in high school, than they are later on, as in Mr. Gillam’s assessment in making a person. Thus, without the formative guidance a person receives in high school, it can be argued that he or she would not be able to as readily develop a true sense of self later on in life.
2. To make the most of a school experience, a student must garner every lesson applicable to life available from a given experience. To do this, schools must create environments in which this kind of learning is possible. It is not the case that a student will learn in a class only lessons applicable to the confines of that specific classroom; while dispensing useful facts about geometry, the teacher is also bound to make that information applicable to life. Even if a student does not plan to pursue further mathematical study, for instance, the lessons learned in his or her time in the high school geometry class would not be without merit, because hopefully the geometry teacher has done more than teach math. Hopefully, that teacher has helped the student learn how to think. If we must throw in the buzz phrase “critical thinking,” then so be it. This objective of teaching a student to think is more than just satisfying preset guidelines established to “pass” or “fail” the student to a subsequent level. Instead, learning to think, as with its predecessor, learning to learn, is the necessary beginning of preparing students for life outside school. Having the objective of a student “make the most” of his or her school experience being thus defined as preparing him or her to think, so as to interact fluidly with the intricacies of life, it is now necessary to understand how teachers can contribute to this goal. Teachers must know their students before they can begin training them. From this beginning, teachers will be better equipped to understand how their students work, and what works best for their students. If a class responds to a given subject better through hands on experience, then that would be the course of action to take for that specific group with that specific subject. If not, then another approach would be necessary. The key is for teachers to know their students and understand their learning strengths and weaknesses. Strengths should be played upon, so as to hone them, but as well as a means of empowering a student’s weaknesses. For example, if a student’s reading skills are sub par, but they respond well to visuals, an effort could be made to integrate visual signals with the reading. Generally, though, the way for a teacher to help a student make the most of their learning opportunities is to be open to alternative methods of instruction. The purpose of education is not for teachers to teach students. The purpose is for students to learn. To this end, teachers must be willing and able to employ whatever means are at their disposal, so long as the ultimate goal of learning takes place. With this being done, a student’s progress toward preparing for life will continue.
3. As I am aspiring to teach history at the collegiate level, my job of making the course relevant to students will have a potential difference than a teacher at a K-12 would face. Pre-collegiate teachers face the difficulty of making almost every course relevant to students, as in many cases students will wonder why it is necessary that they take this or that particular class. For me, though, I will frequently have the benefit of students motivated by their desire to learn that particular subject, as I will have history majors among the students of my classes. With these students I need not worry about making the class relevant, as they will inherently understand that their future depends upon advancing their knowledge of history. However, for all the non-history majors taking my classes, I will encounter the same problems as would a K-12 teacher, so it is upon them I will focus in responding to this question. History must be seen as an important subject before anyone is going to consider it relevant to their future. While many students will take many classes “only because I have to,” it is always possible that if the course is effective, the student will grow in the process of taking that class. The benefits of this are obvious. If a student enters a class undecided upon what future study they would like to follow, coming across a course which the instructor makes important, and thus relevant, has the potential to ignite a spark in that student’s mind as to a possible field of further study, or, conversely, that class might help the student cross another field off their list of potential studies. Whether or not I am able to convert any of my students to the continued study of history, it will be my task to at least make sure they can apply the material they learn in my class to some useful purpose. Let us suppose I am teaching a class on Revolutionary France (which I hope to do). What will I do with a student who does not care a whit about France, “because I’m not French?” I could elaborate the many ways in which the Revolution irrevocably impacted world history, or I could compare it to the American Revolution (because “you are American”), or I could do any other number of things. However, the important point would be that I somehow connect with that student to ensure he or she does not come away from the class without some appreciation of what I have taught. In my Philosophy I state, “it is essential that a student can be able to think, to interpret, to connect themes, and to grasp the larger picture.” In the process of accomplishing this, I believe I will be able to connect with my students by helping them to piece together the events of history and see how the panorama affects subsequent history and society. By linking the past with the present, I believe that history can be made relevant to my students.