Statement of Purpose
As an adjunct faculty member, I have had lengthy discussions with educators about additional strategies or literature to locate and implement research-based methodologies in their classrooms, explicitly addressing diverse learners. In my conversations with educators, some expressed anxiety and fear and felt unprepared to meet the needs of these students. As I listened to their feedback and responses, I was called to reflect on providing tailored approaches for educators in graduate courses to meet diverse learners’ needs, including Students with Limited or Interrupted Formal Education or SLIFE. I became a sounding board for these educators. I aim to gather data through a thematic content analysis on current teachers’ perceptions of their lack of preparedness to support these students in their classrooms. Focusing on what teachers feel they need to teach efficiently to meet all students’ needs, I will offer additional tools and resources in the course to help their understanding of methodologies to support students identified as SLIFE.
Furthermore, I will coalesce resources to create an outline as a foundation for developing a specialized SLIFE course for teachers and future teachers. This information will also be used to supplement current class curricula for teachers. I hope educators can implement this information in their respective schools and encourage them to become change agents or advocates in their districts to support students identified as SLIFE. Thus, empowering these educators to lead training at their schools or districts and request technical and strategic professional development and continued support from their districts.
This reflection explores how future or current teachers unfamiliar with diverse students can approach students labeled as Students with Limited or Interrupted Formal Education (SLIFE). As a graduate instructor, many current or future teachers in my courses must prepare to meet the challenges they may face when they begin teaching students identified as SLIFE. There needs to be more research on approaches to support Students with Limited or Interrupted Formal Education (SLIFE) and more research-based professional development opportunities for teachers. However, since COVID, there has been a renewed focus on preparing teachers to support students with limited or formal interrupted education in the classroom, considering many students missed two years of strategic teaching. More than one or two courses in a university setting may be needed to support future or current educators. So, I reflected on faculty instructor impact on enhancing these courses with instructional strategies or resources for educators who teach SLIFE. Thus, the purpose is to uncover teachers’ perceptions of their unpreparedness to teach these students. The outcome is constructing three to five critical components to supplement these courses using faculty research and experience to aid in closing teacher gaps where SLIFE is concerned. More importantly, during my classes, my additional research-based resources, instructional feedback, and responses to students would support teachers' instruction with SLIFE in real time and help them become change agents in their districts.