What is the Best Teaching Style? What do All Teachers of the Year Have in Common?

#firstyearteacher
#classroommanagement
#teaching
What is the best strategy for teaching elementary school?
What is the best way to teach middle school students?
What is the best way to discipline high school students?
Kris Cole's Biographical Information:
SELECTED TEACHING & COACHING AWARDS
Envirothon - Wildlife Division - State Champions - 2012
Soils Division - State Champions - 2002 & 2004
Envirothon - State Finalists - 2002, 2003, 2004, 2010, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2020, & 2024
Became Winningest Envirothon Coach of All Time for Seminole County with 8th win - 2020
“Seniors’ Choice Award” out of over 200 faculty - 2010
Teacher of the Month - 2000 & 2009
Highest Advanced Placement Environmental Science pass rate in SCPS - 2001, 2003, & 2004
Disney Teacherrific Award - 2003
Selected by Phillips Petroleum to film a video about the Florida Scrub Jay that was distributed
to schools nationwide - 2003
Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers - 2000 & 2001
Awarded OEE “Program of Excellence” - state’s highest environmental education award - 2000
Seminole Soil & Water Conservation District - Teacher of the Year - 1999
Girls Basketball Assistant Coach - State Champions - 1999 & 2000
SELECTED SPEAKER APPEARANCES
Presenter - Everglades Foundation Literacy Conference - Integrating Civics and Environmental
Advocacy Into Your Curriculum - Case Study of the Florida Scrub-Jay for State Bird Campaign. (July 19, 2022)
Presenter - LEEF Annual Conference - Integrating Civics and Environmental Advocacy Into Your
Curriculum - Case Study of the Florida Scrub-Jay for State Bird Campaign. (April 2, 2022)
Presenter - Winter Springs High School - Amazing Animals. (December, 2002)
Presenter - Boy Scouts of America - Florida’s Reptiles. (2001)
Presenter - Learn & Serve Florida - Chuluota Wilderness. (February 5th, 2001)
Presenter - SEALS Conference - How to perform a Terrestrial Species Survey. (November 13 - 14
2000)
Presenter - SCPS District Wide Advanced Placement Pre-service Day - How to effectively analyze
& use data to increase AP Learning Results. (2000)
Presenter - District Pre-service Science Day - Florida Scrub-Jay - A Stately Bird? (August 4, 1999)
Presenter - Winter Springs High School - Amazing Animals. (April 23, 1998)
Presenter - SEALS Conference - How to Perform an Aquatic Species Survey. (November 5 - 7, 1997)
My Students & I:
• Made history by convincing the Seminole County Board of Commissioners to designate the Florida Scrub-Jay as the “official bird of Seminole County”. (2022)
• Presented the reasons to designate the Florida Scrub-Jay as Florida’s State Bird at the Center for Biological Diversity’s “Ales and Wild Tales” event to educate the public about the issue. (2022)
• Testified before the Florida Wildlife Commission in an attempt to earn FWC’s endorsement to designate the Florida Scrub-Jay as Florida’s State Bird. (2022)
• Founded the inaugural Seminole High School Wildlife Conservation Club. (2021)
• Completed species surveys at Lyonia Preserve. (1999 - 2003) & (2006 - 2009)
• Cleaned up Lake Monroe & filmed a Public Service Announcement as a joint project between the City of Sanford, Seminole High School, Keep Seminole Beautiful, & the Central Florida Zoo. (2007)
• Assisted Seminole County Natural Lands with species surveys in the Chuluota Wilderness Area, Geneva Wilderness Area, & the St. Johns River. (1998 - 2004)
• Educated elementary and middle school students about the importance of bats to the ecosystem in a presentation called “Going Batty”. This resulted in a Disney Teacherrific Award. (2003)
• Testified before the Florida House of Representatives' Water Resources Committee regarding the Florida Scrub-Jay bill. (2000)
• Participated in Jane Goodall's Roots and Shoots program at Disney's Animal Kingdom. (2000)
• Partnered with Seminole County Emergency Response to create Community Emergency Response Teams in the event of a natural disaster. (1999 & 2000)
• Participated in a SEALS (Summit of Environmental Action Learning Service) Conference at Wekiwa Springs State Park. (2000)
• Testified before the Florida Senate’s Governmental Oversight & Productivity Committee regarding the Florida Scrub-Jay bill. (1999)
• Worked with St. Johns River Water Management on testing water quality in Lake Jessup. (1997 - 1999)
• Stenciled “do not dump drains to lake” signs on storm drains. This was a joint project between St. Johns River Water Management District, the City of Winter Springs, and the Environmental Program at Winter Springs High School. (1999)
• Rebuilt a new Hydric Hammock Trail at the Environmental Center for the Seminole County’s 5th graders after tornadoes touched down. (1998)
• Made recycled art and displayed it across campus for Earth Day. (1998)
• Assisted St. Johns River Water Management District with their “Sock it to Lake Jesup” campaign by collecting over 1500 socks. (1998)

[@charlesreynes6376]

I am a teacher of the year, and I agree. There’s no best practice until it’s your own practice.

[@colestersclassroom-teachin105]

Perfectly stated!
Thank you for sharing!
Keep being a hero to our kids!
Have a great rest of the school year!
And congrats on your Teacher of the Year award!

[@guessitsme1123]

This is a great subject, thanks for sharing
But I have a problem In differentiating between teaching style and teaching philosophy.
Could be please explain to me the difference?

[@colestersclassroom-teachin105]

Thank you for watching. And thank you for the compliment. Great comment.
The two are intertwined to some degree, but if I was to separate them, I would say the following. A teaching philosophy is the teacher’s pedagogy. I simple terms, the teachers belief in which strategies & philosophies are most effective in the classroom. For instance, I believe learning needs to be relevant. I’m a strong believer in cooperative learning. And when I use cooperative learning I like to pair students together who are at very different levels academically. The goal is to have a student who is strong in a particular skill teach a student who may be struggling. Both benefit. The struggling student may learn something better when presented by a peer. The strong student has to really take a deeper dive into the subject to understand it well enough to teach another. Another philosophy is “hands on learning” is effective. Teaching Philosophy Statements are often written documents shared with others as well. When applying for jobs in education, you may be asked to write a Teaching Philosophy Statement. There is a lot of information posted on the internet explaining what is involved with that.
When I discuss teaching style, basically I’m sharing my opinion in regard to how to execute your teaching philosophy. In the example above, you can execute cooperative learning as both an extroverted and an introverted teacher. You can execute that strategy as both a strict teacher or a laissez-faire teacher. Where they become intertwined is the adaptations the teacher needs to make to adjust her/his personality and style into the teaching strategy. A introverted strict teacher is probably going to want to execute cooperative learning differently than a laissez-faire extroverted teacher. Both can use the strategy effectively, but it will look a lot different in each classroom.
I hope that helps clarify. Thanks for watching! And keep being a hero to the future of America!