High School Observation 1

I visited Braden Boss at Springville High School. I arrived in the middle of one of his upper-level video classes. They have lots of great video equipment and everyone has a fully-functioning computer to edit video on. This was a well-organized and well-respected classroom. I enjoyed the amount of freedom he gave to his students to think creatively about an assignment; he gave some inspiration, then guidance, and then time with each group to brainstorm and collaborate. After class let out, I had the opportunity to sit and talk with Braden for about half an hour during his prep period. He gave me materials from his class that he provides for his students and explained his teaching philosophy for his students. I really enjoyed learning about his perspective on teaching because he took it seriously. Teaching video was not something he put a good effort into. He put 100% into his teaching which meant that he was also willing to look past normal conventions in order to help his students learn and value the material they were learning. A few highlights that stuck out to me were:

• Don't whine, complain, or worry about the things you have no control over as a teacher (salary, politics, etc.)
• Fulfill the requirements placed on you as a teacher that don't get in the way of teaching effectively. (e.g. Braden had the "I can..." statements posted on the wall of his class because it was required, but he didn't mind because it didn't stop him from teaching the way he wanted.)
• Don't bother associating with bad teachers, especially those who whine and complain about their jobs. 
• There's "teachers" and then there are "teachers of _________". Teachers are people that just got jobs teaching because it was a job they felt they could do, while teachers of __________ are passionate about their subject of choice and find it important to hand down that passion to their students.

I admired his dedication to the welfare of his students and his desire to teach effectively regardless of what other's thought of him. He was a little overly angsty about all this though and he obviously had some baggage with the school administration he was not at peace with yet, but nonetheless, he is a teacher I would want as a student.