Inspired by Master Teachers

This past week I had the privilege of attending research project presentations by nine of our elementary faculty members. These presentations were the culmination of their work toward masters degrees earned through the graduate program  for American/international school educators offered by SUNY, Buffalo State.

The level of research, analysis and reflection that they presented was amazing. The projects included:

• The Effect of Using Songs in Teaching Arabic as a Second Language
• The Effect of Eliminating the Raise Your Hand to Speak Rule During Problem-Solving Lessons on Student Performance and Confidence in Mathematics
• The Effect of Digital Book Making as Compared to Traditional Book Making on Student Performance and Engagement in the Kindergarten Classroom
• The Effect of Integrated Technology on the Ability and Confidence of Non-Arabic Students Learning Conversational Arabic Dialog

Impressive, right? Even more impressive was the excitement among these teachers as they shared their findings and talked about implications on their own teaching. Truly inspiring was their excitement about the implications on their students’ future learning.

While the presentations were open to all faculty across the school, K-12, there was a relatively small attendance. However, my fellow elementary administrators and I are looking forward to expanding the audience for this great work. We want to create opportunities for these master teachers to inspire their colleagues, and we’re thinking that in-service at the beginning of next school year might be just the right time. What an amazing place a school can be when it’s truly a community of learners.