"I believe that if nine-tenths of the energy at present directed towards making the child learn certain things, were spent in seeing to it that the child was forming proper images, the work of instruction would be indefinitely facilitated" John Dewey 

John Dewey presents an incredibly vivid and insightful view of education in "My Pedagogic Creed" that even 117 years after it was written, is still affecting educators worldwide. I was highly intrigued by the quote above because it is a bold statement to say that educators are devoting so much of their energy towards the wrong type of education. At first I did not understand what Dewey meant by "images," because it was clear to me that his view of this word was not image in the traditional sense. What I took away from his interpretation of an image was that it is the way in which a child understands how he/she is connected to the information and experiences that they encounter. These images are meaningful because the child is able to form his/her own opinions on the matters and they are unique since they embody how the child sees themselves in relation to these matters. Children have such powerful creativity, and it has been proven that they way in which we currently educate children, they start out with all this potential for ingenuity and when they end their education have lost the majority of this power. If we let student's have more of an influence on what they are taking away from education, maybe they would be able to harness more of their creative abilities and go out and change the world.

However, I do not think that just because Dewey did not believe in the way students were being educated that he thought teachers were irrelevant. In fact, I believe he saw teachers as powerful tools in the process of educating youth. He understood that "purely discovery approach was insufficient... the teacher's role is rather to provide students the correct guidance through the process of learning" (Rich, Reeves, 2006, pg. 55). I am a firm believer in this form of teaching. If the teacher assumes the role as a guide on this journey in the path of gaining understanding, they are able to play a part as learners just as much as the students are. In the vein of Freire's "Pedagogy of the Oppressed" I am firmly against the "banking approach" to education and feel that student's will learn more if they understand that their teachers are not there to bestow knowledge upon them but instead help facilitate learning in a more authentic way.

The way that I see my future classroom, I do not see technology as a prime method for students to obtain information. I do see technology as a useful tool as it allows access to a world of knowledge and images. I think that student's also need to know how to utilize technology as it is an integral part of most occupations. Although I am not entirely set in my opinion, I think I am leaning against the concept of "BYOD" (Bring Your Own Device). As Gary Stager states in his argument against BYOD, it "allows more affluent students to continue having an unfair advantage over their classmates" (2012, pg. 6). Effective teachers strive for equity in their classrooms and it seems that allowing student's to use their own technology perpetuates the inequity that plagues the education system currently. If all student's had access to equal technology, then having them bring their own devices could function, however, this is simply not a reality. As a Spanish teacher in a world where some schools are eliminating language teacher's in place of solely virtual classrooms, I do not want to view technology as the enemy. Technology opens up possibilities in the classroom that were not available in the past and I hope to be able to utilize it. However, I would like to do so in a way that does not give some student's the continued boost they are allowed by their socio-economic privilege.