Andrea Peterson
Washington Teacher of the Year
Monte Cristo Elementary, Granite Falls
Grades 1-6, Music

My teaching philosophy
Innately, every child and every adult is a musician. They may be performers, composers and/or listeners of music, but every human being has an inborn desire to participate in music. It is how we are made. My role, as a teacher of this amazing subject, is to facilitate this musical process. Teaching is an amazingly complex combination of science and art. Scientifically, teachers must know how to teach to students’ individual learning styles, breaking down the components of knowledge and skill into attainable pieces. Artistically, teachers must be able to inspire their students to excellence, showing them a world that is bigger than their own. An outstanding teacher balances the art and science of teaching.

My philosophy in action
As an elementary music specialist, I have the unique opportunity to reach students who are typically unsuccessful in regular classrooms. Much of the brain research done in recent years suggests that students with exceptional creative abilities process information very differently than average students. Their academic grades may be low, although they often surprise their teacher and classmates in informal discussion with the depth of their ideas. These students need to use patterns before they can understand them. As a result, these students often become frustrated in regular classrooms. They are asked to manipulate numbers and letters in complex patterns with little opportunity to experiment. Music is an amazing opportunity for children to experience pattern development. Melodic and rhythmic patterns are internalized actually creating connective pathways in a student’s brain. These pathways transfer to other subjects, enabling our children to achieve more complex patterns in math, reading and other subjects.

Music is an amazing tool to unlock students’ potential. The most visible benefit of students’ success in music is their increased confidence and self-esteem. However, I do not believe it is the only benefit, nor the most powerful. It is truly exciting to see how my music teaching can transfer back to other classrooms. An excellent example of this is a sixth grade student currently in my after-school chorus. When she entered our school in fourth grade, she was on a behavior IEP and was in a pull-out program for Math. However, she loved music and had quite a talent for it. I relish teaching her the subject that she loves, and, at the same time, helping her develop the discipline and the hard work ethic that now transfers over into every aspect of her school work. It has been scientifically proven that active music participation actually creates connective pathways in the brain, making a person more capable of achieving. I truly believe this is what has happened with Jessica. Her passion for music and consequent success has elevated her academic performance to the point where she is now receiving no special services and is consistently achieving honor roll. Students like Jessica are truly one of the most rewarding aspects of my job.

My greatest teaching accomplishment
“Everybody can be great... because anybody can serve. You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.” -Martin Luther King Jr. This message was impressed upon me at an early age by my father, a veteran teacher of thirty four years. Growing up, I was constantly aware of the powerful effect his service had on his students, their families and our community. From Physical Education teacher, to minister, to special education teacher, my dad’s life has been a constant model of creating community through service. He serves his community by teaching children how to succeed in life. These lessons come academically in the classroom, after school on the basketball court and informally in the countless hours he invests in his students outside of school. At times, his students have lived in our house, when they lost their own homes due to family tragedy. Through examples like these, my parents repeatedly taught me to choose a career in which I could serve others with a heart full of grace and a soul generated by love. My greatest teaching accomplishment has been in my service to the community of Granite Falls and more importantly, my ability to impart this attitude of service to my students. My best example of this service has been in the development of programs that honor veterans. Ten years ago, I met a teacher named Debra Howell, who I immediately felt was a kindred spirit. We both passionately believed that our community’s veterans were going unacknowledged for their service. We decided to bring attention to these brave soldiers by presenting performances that would enable our students to serve their community. From assemblies to parades to tracking down a veteran from a book (once a hero, now homeless in Colorado), our students have learned the value of service. They have experienced the power that music has to touch a soul that has been wounded by the horrors of war.

The most critical issues facing educators
In an increasingly competitive world market, our students are struggling to keep up. With test scores falling well below many countries’, we should all be devoted to raising achievement in the United States. There are many issues that cause our low national test scores; however, they all stem from the same basic issue. All too often, our society accepts mediocrity as satisfactory. In and out of school, we tell children that it is acceptable to do things incorrectly, as long as they feel good about themselves. The intrinsic problem, of course, is that human beings never feel good about themselves unless they are achieving. America’s students are frustrated because they know they are being short-changed; they know they are achieving below their true potential. We need to challenge students, instead of lowering our expectations so they can all achieve grade- level standards that are lower than they should be. We are doing a further disservice to the students because they are not learning that encountering difficulties is an opportunity for learning. We are simply removing any difficulties, thereby losing most true learning.

Ways to resolve this issue
There is no one solution to this problem. However, I do see some extremely promising developments in education that are truly making a difference and need to be implemented further. As teachers, we need to experience a real conceptual shift about who is responsible for teaching particular content areas. With all the content that is now required of students, we must make a conscious decision to include ALL interested adults, not just classroom teachers, in the teaching of reading, writing and math. As a music specialist, it is my responsibility to teach my students not only music, but reading, writing, math, social studies, science and anything else I can find a way to meld into the music curriculum. This needs to be the attitude of every teacher, every parent and every community member.

Children spend only 19% of their K-12 childhood in public education. This startling statistic highlights the need for all adults to be actively involved in education. Within the school itself, there are forms of professional development that can encourage all employees to adopt this shared responsibility for teaching. Japanese Lesson Study is a form of professional development (originating in Japan) that puts school employees into groups of three to five teachers, paraprofessionals, specialists and/or administrators (often of varying grade levels and content areas). The groups design a series of lessons that focuses on a particular assessable skill. One group member then teaches the designed lesson to a class. All members observe the lesson. Afterwards, they meet to discuss whether the goals were met and how they know that they were met based on the assessment. Revisions are made and another member of the team teaches the lesson again. This process is continued until the group has a series of lessons that have clear, attainable goals that can be truly assessed.

Through lesson studies done in my school, I have had the opportunity to teach symmetry, geometrical sense, inference and prediction. Some of these lessons have had nothing to do with music, but have had everything to do with teaching in a way that’s best for kids. This opportunity to talk about teaching (and actually teach) in content areas that I don’t usually teach has been a huge learning experience for me. Our staff has recognized that good teaching is good teaching, regardless of content area. This has been an enormous conceptual shift in our school, and has improved our teaching practice greatly. State test scores in all areas have steadily increased since instituting Lesson Study. We are realizing that the education of our students cannot be accomplished by one teacher sitting in a classroom with 25 students all day, every day. We need to involve the expertise of all adults to see all our students achieve.

One thought to inspire teachers to succeed
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” Aristotle

One lesson every student should learn
Often the only way to learn something is to make mistakes. IT IS GOOD TO MAKE THESE MISTAKES! Failure is nothing to be ashamed of. It brings us one step closer to the solution. There is a story about Thomas Edison that illustrates this beautifully. Edison had stayed up all night working on inventing the battery. Sometime the next morning, a visitor stopped by. Edison answered the door with an eager gleam in his eye. The visitor asked him what he was so excited about. Edison answered “I’ve just discovered the 1000th way that a storage battery will not work.” He understood that this might be the one failure that would lead him to success. Our students need to learn this lesson.

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