As a school psychologist, my role has centered on determining which students to assess for special education services, determining which students qualify for special education services, and consulting with teachers to ensure the quality of their educational programming. As I transition back to teaching in the classroom, the macro lens I wore as a psychologist will help me navigate systems for the students in my classroom and on my caseload. It also impacts my educational philosophy.

Throughout my time in education, I have observed that the quality of a student’s special education experience is explicitly tied to the caliber and beliefs of their teacher. If a teacher holds high standards and strives to be engaging and dynamic, disabled students have positive experiences and high educational outcomes. However, I have also observed the opposite to be true: if a teacher does not want to engage their students and instead “coast” through the school year, there is often little accountability to prevent it, so learning outcomes and student morale are low.

Relationships are at the heart of high-quality schools. Trusting relationships between students and staff, among staff, and between staff and administrators lead to school environments where students are held to high standards and are comfortable with challenging academic and social material. Without these strong relationships, students often lack the connective tissue with their teachers that enables them to feel safe engaging in complex learning and problem-solving.

As a school psychologist, I advocated for a set of basic educational standards for each special education program, especially in our center-based spaces, where students did not transition to multiple spaces or teachers throughout the school day. I firmly believe that all students deserve high standards and quality education, regardless of their disability or the accommodations they need in the classroom. Upon reflection, this expectation is an aspect of Essentialist teaching philosophies. 

My experience advocating with and for students with disabilities also directly impacts my personal philosophies around social justice and equity in both schools and society. I believe that students of all backgrounds and abilities must be included in discussions of our society’s challenges and opportunities and not left out due to their different support needs in the classroom setting. I see myself incorporating social reconstructionism ideas in our classroom discussions, especially in terms of self-advocacy and community advocacy. 

As I have watched the American political system lead to increasing strife and less balance, I have thought a lot about the power of education in our democracy. I value Progressivism’s teaching approaches grounded in democratic ideals and real-world applications. As a special education teacher, my role will partially be to prepare students with disabilities (specifically, students with Autism Spectrum Disorder) for a world that is not designed for their comfort or ease. I want to include real-world applications for learning so students understand how society’s expectations will impact their functioning and help them find strategies to navigate their communities confidently and grow to become citizens who participate in America’s democracy.

After reading John Dewey’s Experience & Education, I considered the role of a teacher in a classroom and how I would like to present my role. I don’t believe in a rigid, authoritarian role like the Essentialists; instead, when I’m at my best, I hope to be closer to Dewey’s “teacher as a guide” model, where the teacher guides a community of learners in classroom norms and understands each learner, their past experiences, and what they bring to the educational setting. I believe in highly structured environments with designated space and time for children to read, explore, and experiment with classroom materials.

As previously mentioned, I strongly believe in the power of relationships between teachers, staff, students, and families. I will work hard at the beginning of each school year to establish trusting relationships with parents, guardians, and other staff in my classroom. Understanding what each student brings to school depends on each family feeling comfortable with the adults spending the school day with their children. Dewey discussed in Experience & Education that understanding the past experiences of each student and using that knowledge to shape the curriculum is one of a teacher's most critical and challenging roles. I expect to bring this Progressive model into my educational strategy and will invest significant time in this pursuit.

I am provided with a reading and math curriculum in my current school district. In some districts, I’ve seen little in the area of special education curriculum, so I understand this may shift over the course of my career. I hope to use these provided curricula as a foundation for learning; I will meet the minimum requirements for our standards with the curriculum and go beyond the foundation with texts, discussions, and projects grounded in real-world issues, student passions, and social injustices.

I would love to see my autistic students working on projects that build on their special interests, incorporating educational standards and real-world applications. For example, if a student is interested in a particular video game, they could do project-based learning on the history of video games, the social issues surrounding their use, the programming roles that built the game, and math calculations related to the game's various characters and other unique aspects. The academic expectations for the project would be the same for all students in our class, but each student would have the option to choose the project's subject and work with me to ensure the minimum standards are met.

We will also incorporate real-world learning as we navigate community resources, interact with strangers in stores, and discover strategies for social interaction that are less comfortable for autistic people. Through hands-on, trial-based learning, my students will grow in confidence as they enter adulthood. I believe this is especially important for students on the autism spectrum. At the same time, I do not want to push allistic social standards and/or social masking on my students; I want them to understand the power of code-switching and find ways to fit their preferred communication styles into those of others in their communities.

As a special education teacher, a large part of my role will be assessment and data collection for students’ IEP goals. I do not intend to have many tests in my classroom. Instead, our classroom team will collect data once per week on each student’s academic progress to adjust teaching strategies and set future goals. Ongoing data collection in a special education classroom allows all educators to understand student needs, progress, and outcomes. The philosophy of ongoing data collection overall is rather Essentialist. However, the lack of formalized testing in the classroom means each weekly low-stakes assessment is personalized to each student, similar to Progressivism’s focus on individual experience in the school.

Outside of the classroom, I view the role of an educator as an advocate for all students. At the district level, I will promote educational policies that value inclusion and high expectations for special education students, combining Essentialist philosophies of standards with real-world experiences from Social Reconstructionism and Progressivism. 

I look forward to growing and evolving as a teacher throughout my career. At this moment, my educational philosophy is an amalgamation of a handful of established philosophies. I want to see high standards and a core set of academic skills taught by competent teachers across the public education system, and I will work to ensure those standards are met in my classroom. I want to ensure my curriculum goes beyond the basics and incorporates core themes of democracy, social justice, and experiential learning so my students can grow in their competencies as they enter adulthood.