Ina B. Bouker
Alaska Teacher of the Year
Dillingham City Schools, Dillingham
Grade 1

My teaching philosophy
Years back, when I was a young student, I would read over and over again the Dick and Jane stories. I was very good at reading the words, but if you had asked me what I was reading, I probably wouldn’t answer the question. Why wouldn’t I answer? Because even though I was reading fluently, I had no idea what a farm was, or even why the dog was living inside the house with the strange-looking yellow-haired people or what the cat was. No clue! As I got older, I would imagine myself living inside these stories, for I began to know the meaning of a farm, how it felt to pet a dog for the purpose of companionship and even saw a cat for the first time upon my insistence that my teacher, Mrs. Page, bring one to the village.

That is why it is of utmost importance to me that, as a teacher, I explain things the best I can to children who may not understand what I am talking about whether I am teaching reading, writing, math, social sciences, art or the different languages that I pass on to the children.

It is also important for me to have available a variety of hands-on materials, in hopes that the manipulative experiences will meet the various learning styles and intelligences of my students.

Then there are those children who need to be observed before you find the right instructional method that works for them. It pays to observe and listen as they communicate both verbally and nonverbally.

Teaching my students requires more than an optimistic personality, for I must continually grow, adapt, and modify how I teach. My skills as a teacher need the same nurturing as those of the students. My work is never done - that is why I spend so much time at the school.

My philosophy in action
It is fun to creatively integrate curriculum with art, music, drama, languages, and cultures – especially my culture that I grew up with - the Eskimo Yup’ik culture.

I believe that it is up to the teacher to foster the students for success. My favorite way to begin is by starting a relationship with students and loving them for who they are. Show that you care and guess what the students will do for you – anything! That’s right, it has worked for me!

Above all, have fun and love what you are doing. In order for me to achieve what I do with children is to do what I believe is best for children. That best, to me, is success. Therefore, I continually ask myself this question - what is best for the children?

My greatest teaching accomplishment
I love what I do, and most of all, I have fun teaching. I have fun implementing developmentally appropriate activities into instructional strategies to support student learning in reading, writing, and math. While teaching a Spring unit on insects, I expanded it by looking at one fish in our Alaskan water system, the northern pike. A pike eats insects, but its source of food is primarily other fish. I fish for pikes and then dissect a pike with the kids to see what is in its stomach. We have seen a mouse, a small bird, and even other pike, along with insects, in the belly! I demonstrate how a pike is cut to be dried and later eaten. The students participate in making a pike into fish akutaq with wild low bush cranberries that our class had picked in the fall. Akutaq is a prized Alaskan berry dish served at celebrations in our Yup’ik Eskimo culture. I instruct as I use the Internet to share information on pike. We create an art project of a pike in its environment or habitat. We write about the pike, glue the writing project onto the art and display the project for the whole school to see. We add the fish we drew and make up story problems about who drew more – the boys or the girls? We read books on pike. I tell them a traditional oral story of how the pike got its long skinny head. We make a pike fish print for a Father’s Day present. I demonstrate, through this unit and others, that learning is fun, just as it should be!

The most critical issues facing educators today
Children are being raised without many of the social skills we would expect, because of changes in our families and society over the last few generations. Many of the children lack the ability to cooperate with their parents, teachers, and peers. One change is that many extended and immediate families do not live in close proximity to each other. Children are affected by divorce and living between two households, frequently thousands of miles apart. Many children are living in foster care or with relatives. Many parents lack the ability to teach positive social behaviors to their own children. They themselves did not learn the skills and therefore are not teaching the positive social skills. Another change is excessive television watching and the availability of many small or large video games. These technologically advanced gadgets have deprived children of time they could spend learning positive social skills, through play activity. Our children are spending way too much time unaccompanied or in solitude.

Ways to resolve this issue
We want children to develop into productive members of our society. Children without positive social skills grow up with problems developing meaningful relationships, as well as behaviors that may lead to alcohol, drugs, violence, jail, and even death. Children need creative play activity to learn how to set limits, negotiate, compromise, and learn each other’s rights. They have not spent enough time learning how to get along with others through play on their own. Our youth need planning and decision-making skills. Gaining these skills helps students to plan ahead and to make responsible choices. Our children need guidance with interpersonal skills. Knowing empathy, sensitivity, and friendship skills helps students to communicate effectively. Our diverse students need advice or counseling in cultural competence. Cultural competence involves knowledge of and being comfortable with people of different cultural, racial, and ethnic backgrounds. Our students need training in resistance skills. Those include being able to defy negative peer pressure and dangerous community influences. Our learners need direction or leadership in supervising peaceful conflict resolutions. From early stages, being able to seek and to resolve conflict without violence is something in which our country needs more practice. Ultimately, we want our children to be raised with basic human values. We want children to celebrate each success as they accomplish goals and learn self-discipline to create an orderly way of life.

One thought to inspire teachers to succeed
As a classroom teacher, I help children learn positive social skills by teaching them how to communicate and work with adults in a cooperative atmosphere. I model how they need to associate with our schoolteachers, instructional aides, janitors, bus drivers, and kitchen staff. I allow practice on how to talk to each other and what getting along with their peers looks like. On a daily basis, I ask students how they should look and sound when they are studying. I instruct self-discipline and give ideas on how to control their anger when upset. I give choices on what they can do when they get themselves in those situations. I explain the purpose of rules and what happens when they break rules. To teach about empathy, I read books on other cultures. I invite people of all cultures, as well as people with disabilities, to be guest speakers to help students become aware of cultural diversity and people with disabilities.

One lesson every student should learn
Frequently, I tell my students of the elders who came into my school when I was in elementary school. They told us that we must be cautious ALWAYS of how we want to be. Elders would tell us over and over of how we should set forth thinking of how things might end up. They would tell us how we should be careful of our decisions, because making decisions is a lifelong skill. I can still hear the elders saying to us that we must learn how to make decisions! They would repeat over and over, time and time again, that in order for us to do this, we must first learn to listen, follow directions, and learn to follow the rules. They would say, “No matter where we go there will always be rules. There is no way out of rules but the wrong way.”

I remind myself daily that children are independent human beings who should be treated with respect. In return, students learn to respect. If I listen to them, they learn to listen. If I value our youth just as much as I value community adults, I show them resiliency. In general, I do not believe that I must control children, either by conditioning them with rewards and punishments or by meeting all of their “needs.” I deal with discipline by asking questions in a quiet, courteous, respectful tone. If the student is willing to answer the questions, then the questions act as a teaching guide. He learns to think through the conflict with which he is dealing and tries to come up with ways to achieve his goals without violating the rights of others. In this way, a student also perceives me as non-critical and non-controlling. As my students consider the unintended consequences of their actions, they learn to make plans such that, whatever they decide to do, their actions carry with them the intent to respect the rights of others.

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