Why are interested in teaching at Neosho School district

I am interested in Neosho School District because I want to be a part of a culture that is similar
to what I came from at Northwest Missouri State. In addition, I was able to check on how the
boy’s basketball team has been doing in the last couple years and noticed that the team has
only had one winning season. I want to come in and change the culture of the team to a
winning culture that will help them succeed in life after high school. I am looking for a district
that is looking for a winner and needs new leadership in the boy’s basketball team and in the
physical education department.

Reflect on a time when you had to acclimate to a new environment or experience. What challenges did you face How did
you overcome these challenges? What did you learn from the experience? *

The challenges that I faced were trying to connect with individuals who I didn't know and try to
make impression on them. I overcame this challenge by going over my fears and stretching
myself to really learn about the other person before myself. I learned to be able to go up to
people by truly caring about the other person and trying to get to know the other person
before yourself. Once the person is able to find out that you care about them as a person and
not just trying to get a “connection” is when people open up.

How will you measure your own success as a teacher? What kind of impact do you want to have in a year? How do you
determine if you have reached this goal? *

I will measure my success as a teacher when the students that I teach are able to extend the
qualities in my classroom to other areas of their lives. This include in other classrooms. For
example, if I am able to instill hard work qualities and perseverance qualities in my gym and the
kids are able to use these on a test in the math class then I think that is pretty successful. The
kind of impact that I want to have is to be able to have kids love PE and love the environment
that it entails. I also want to see student’s physical fitness expand to areas that they didn't think
of. I can determine these goals by seeing if everyone is participating in the lesson and if the
students are having fun. I also can do fitness pre and post tests to be able to test how the
students have improved.

Tell me about a specific lesson you felt you were really successful at. What was the objective? What were the
activities/how did you teach the lesson? How do you know it was so successful? What would you do differently if you had
to teach it again? Why was that lesson important? *

A specific lesson that I was successful at was when I taught the class basketball and the basics
of basketball. The objective was to teach the students the ability to play basketball with only
the basics. The activities were very basic activities with slapping the basketball, with going
around your head, waist, and knees, and then moving on to some more difficult activities like
dribbling the basketball full court with both hands. Other activities included teaching the class a
way to shoot the basketball because there are many ways the basketball can successfully be
shot. We were able to stand across from their partners that I put together and shoot the
basketball back and forth to one another. I knew it was successful because the students were
well behaved with no dead time between activities. This means there were no disciplinary
issues, and also the kids were very excited to learn basketball from me because I was a
basketball coach and it was something different from their current teacher. If I had to do it
again with this class I would translate between activities much quicker and go to harder aspects
of the sport of basketball because the kids were getting the hang of it. The lesson was
important because the students or anyone for that matter need to be able to master the basics
of any sport before they can go to on to harder things. The moves that players that are playing
professional make are from countless hours of doing the basics that we went over in class.

Tell me about a lesson that didn't go so well. Why did it fail? What would you do differently if you had to teach it
again? *

I did a lesson of badminton to about six kids in my high school class for this hour. The class
failed because the kids were not participating in my drills because they thought that the
badminton was “stupid”. These things were my fault to begin with because I failed in getting
the kids to a level that they needed to be able to participate in the activities. In addition, the
activities that I have the students do had some lines, which got the kids off topic and into some
disciplinary issues that went along with dead time between activities. If I could do this
differently, I would have to play a different sport than badminton with 6 kids. But, we would
have a proper warmup that the kids like to do which was hitting the birdie back and forth. After
that, we would go into more drills that I have taught to be able to do the class. I have found
that if you are able to do some drills that the kids like and its drills that do push their limits on
how to play the game better, then to do the drills first and work from there to try some new
drills.

How are you going to teach students at all ability levels in your class?

Well the first thing that I would do is to create an environment where all the kids are able to
truly be themselves and you can do this in certain ways. I feel like at the beginning of school, if
you are able to have an assignment where the kids work on that is not physical education then
you can really get the kids attention and stress to them how the things we work on are
important. This assignment would be to get kids together that usually do not hang out with one
another and to do a poster board with one another on words that they would like to hear said
to them in moments of failure. Another group / class would do a poster board project on
encouraging words that they would say to one another as well. We would then put these poster
boards on the wall of the class to make sure that the students can see these words and be more
able to say them to one another. From that project hopefully, we have more of an environment
that is caring and all about improvement and the process and not the results. This would lead to
encouraging one another.

How do you know that your students mastered an objective? What do you do if they didn't? *
I would have the students right out their objectives for the new sport that we are about to play,
or the objectives that I have laid out for them. We would then do peer check towards the end
of the lesson at the skills that were taught to them at the beginning of the lessons. There will be
incentive at achieving their goals during the lessons for extra points. It would be like this
because we want to establish to the students of setting goals that might be too big for them to
get achieve but still wanting to the student to shoot for the stars. This will help the students
because if they hit their objective that they set out for themselves that would’ve been too big
for them then they would be better than they were and if they don’t hit their objective then
they will still be achieving something that they thought wouldn’t.

What kind of formative assessments will you use to gauge mastery of standards from day to day? How will you know you
have assessed learning or all students each day? *

The formative assessment that I will use is effort and if the students are able to be dressed out
every day ready to participate. With the students knowing that I am assessing everyday based
on effort and running from station to station or during the game and really trying hard. I will
know that I have assessed learning all students each day because its pretty black and white if
someone has gotten dressed or not, and you will be able to tell if someone is giving effort or
not.

How would you describe your classroom management style? What steps would you go through when dealing with a
disruptive student? 

My classroom management style would be very similar to Harry Wong and Rosemary
management styles where the students have certain routines that they go through every day
with getting ready and know what I expect of them. The steps that I would go through is to at
first get a good relationship with the students and to care for the students. If there are
problems with a disruptive student is usually because there is something going on with the
student that is making the student act out. I would sit the student out of the lesson calmly, and
then after class we would have a discussion of what is wrong and go with the solution of how to
fix it.

What might you do if you were having classroom management problems and your mentor wasn't available to help you?

I would get everyone quiet and might have to raise my voice. We would sit and not do anything
until everything is calmed down. Then I would talk to them about why we are sitting and what
we can do to not do this again.

Think of a time that someone gave you advice about something that didn't go so well. How did you respond to that? *

I responded really well. I love advice and hope to get as much of it as I can. The most important
thing about advice though is to take it and listening to it doesn’t mean you use it. I love input
from the people that I admire the most but it doesn’t mean that I am going to use their advice. I
think about advice to see if it applies to my personal self and then see if it applies to myself.
What do you find most frustrating in working with other people? What do they find most frustrating about you? *

I think what I find most frustrated in working in people is when people do not care about the
kids or working hard. That drives me insane because for me we are working for people outside
of our self and if we aren’t giving them the best of ourselves then we are doing those people a
disservice. I feel like people find most frustrating with myself is when I take stuff personally.
People joke around and might be sarcastic with people but sometimes I will take it personal
which is not meant too and get upset about the person.

What is your natural role in a group? 

It depends on the group, but my natural role is the leader of the group especially with
something that I am confident in leading. I am not usually not the smartest in any group but
where I excel is from my extreme work ethic and will out work anyone who tries to come up
against me.

What about your background makes you more/less likely to fit into this community? *

My background is from small towns with a lot of working class people. I feel that fits in to
Neosho. In addition, I have learned from my family about hard work through my grandfather
that is a self-made man in his business but also from my father who works a couple jobs and
also has his own business. It takes guts and confidence to be able to start your own business or
to start something on your own. My background and my family roots are from that. My
background roots are from a family that had to work hard and go through a lot of ups and
downs during their business early starts. But, as evidence from where their business is now,
shows how perseverance gets you to where you want to be. In comparison, I am ready and
wanting to start something and build something within this community. All I need is the start
and the administration to back me to make that happen.

Thinking back over your education or most recent teaching job, what are you most proud of? How could you have gotten
more out of the experience? Why are you proud of this accomplishment? How did you ensure you were successful? *

Thinking back to my last coaching job / teaching young student athletes, I was most proud of
working with a head coach that is very different in myself with personality and coaching
philosophy. I was able to work with this guy and to be able to have a good relationship even
though I didn’t agree with a lot of what this man stands for. I think if I would’ve spoken up more
I would have gotten a little more out of the experience, but it could have also backfired. I do
stand by my decision to not speak up more though as it wasn’t my spot to do so. I ensured that
I was successful by working hard and listening and doing the best that I can and getting out of
my comfort zone as much as I can.

How do you build relationships with teachers on your team? How do you build relationships with certified and classified
staff across all grade levels and throughout the building? How do you build relationships with parents and community
members? 
I think the best way to be able to build relationships with people is to truly care about people
and put your needs before theirs. The way that you can do this is to listen and hear out
everything about the person. To be kind to people, and to make sure that when you do criticize
people that you treat them as a human being and not getting upset. In addition, I feel like the
more level headed that you are with your emotions then the more comfortable people are
around you which makes them tell you things more likely that might have been uncomfortable
to. You build with parents and the community members the same ways. Except you have to
make sure that they see you at events and other things that go on with the town. You have to
be able to be seen and interactive within the community to be able to connect with them
because then you are able to connect with them on a more even level and as a peer that is
trying to get to know the community.

What does it mean to be a good teacher? 

What it means to be a good teacher is to be able to teach kids to get out of there comfort zones
in regard to learning and trying new things especially in high school. You also out successful if
you are to teach kids how to believe in themselves to accomplish new things and to try new
things. Notice how all these things are not subject based but are based on things that you do to
be able to ensure that they can be successful in relationships with their family, in starting a
family, to get over fear and to pursue things. These things are the basis of hard work and
perseverance in achieving your dreams. If you are able to at least have these kids learn these
things from you then I know that they will be a success in their lives. Which means you are a
good teacher.