Embracing Differences-Reflection 4

Being in a world of different cultures, races, and beliefs we are surrounded by diversity on a daily basis. My personal meaning of diversity is accepting one regardless of sexuality or gender providing them with a safe learning environment for success and achievement. As educators, we must embrace the differences in the lives of students no matter how they look or where they come from. We speak to people of different languages and viewpoints that change our mental thinking on how we see life. In order to be an effective teacher in this modern world, we must learn how to except people for who they are regardless of how we may seem them differently. As a future educator, we are going to have many diverse students in our class and we must know how to except them for who they are and put our personal feelings to the side. We are also going to hear different viewpoints on what we should do has educators and how we can be effective in our classrooms. If truth be told we have to gain our perspective and begin from there. Diversity is such a common word that has been used throughout my studies and is a characteristic we must pursue on a daily basis in the classroom setting. I have had many experiences that have prepared me for diversity and helped me become a better person. About five years ago, I met a friend and he was bi-sexual. In my personal beliefs, I do not believe that God intended for man and man or woman and woman to be joined in marriage, but I cannot allow what I believe to stop me from having a healthy relationship with this person. To be quite honest, it’s one of the best friendships I have encountered. Personally, I do not feel a person can be well-prepared for diversity, but one must be open-minded to things in life and the viewpoint of others. Even though being open-minded is something we must all be able to portray, we must also remember that our own values and beliefs is what influences our world and at the ending of the day we must have a sense of who we are as educators and what we personally believe. I have been in many classroom setting and have seen a wide variety of student’s whether Spanish or Creole, an effective teacher treats them all the same. In closing, we are going to experience many different things in our lives and we have to embrace diversity. Diversity is a wide community of things and people, race and gender and differences.