Educate, Advocate & Inform

What is the role of a Home Economist?  Consider your role as an up and coming Home Economics teacher for discussion at the intensive course.  What are you most passionate about?  What will you bring to your students?  Develop a rough mind map, which you can add to throughout your Textiles journey.

In some way we're all economists - we study, develop and apply theories about social science areas and spot and analyse trends in the market. Home Economics is a specialized area in schools but one that is looking at all these areas by considering the action and impact of today's attitudes and actions on the choices to individuals, family and wider communities (local & global). When my mother went to school this was in terms of nutrition and sewing for the family but in reality today, it extends to a more broader understanding of what these concepts mean both in the family and now on a global scale with retail/culture and sustainability. Tim Costello, in his opening address to the 2014 HEIA (Home Economics Institute of Australia) emphasised the importance of family and that Home Economics was the perfect platform for "equipping and instilling skills to our families so our children FLOURISH".... nutrition, healthy living, healthy relationships, healthy self esteem, informed decision making, technical skill building, exploring and creativity.

This is a great place for learning. In food technology, there is something special about experiencing a "slow food movement" whereby we all work together to explore the unique qualities and characteristics of food and apply our creative planning and ideas to produce meal items. Not just grab something convenient or repeat the same-ol-same-ol. To replicate that at home as family come around the cooking pot provides opportunity to strengthen the family unit (however that may look). Informed decision making doesn't just mean what goes in our mouth or the impact on our budget but what is really in it and where did it come from. The same could be said for working in textiles. The creativity and knowledge comes from experimenting, testing, studying and spotting patterns and applying that to our designs.  I like this kind of teaching because its hands on, relationship building and becomes a learning journey together. Whether consciously or unconsciously we are using information and trends in the market as part of this journey and Home Economics is a great place to learn more knowledge to make informed decisions about these things that effect our day to day living. If I can equip students with this knowledge, provide a platform for exploration and learning and give them the confidence to make and be happy with their decisions then I want to keep teaching .... until .... I stop:)

My mind map would include the role of my philosophy on teaching, pedagogical practice, my beliefs/values of Home Economics and some strategies for fostering creativity. Here's a snapshot. It's not fixed rather a dynamic thought process that evolves through my teaching experiences.

Teaching philosophy

* All students are learners and teachers

* Discovering strengths of learners and supporting to grow /discover their abilities

* Teachers are learners

PASSIONS for teaching

* Helping students discover new things and learn about themselves

* Students feel confident and capable

* having lots of "aha" moments

* Passing on something significant

* More passionate about garden to kitchen learning/doing than hospitality

Values/Belief/Understanding of Home Ec

* "The belief that today’s actions and attitudes determine present and future well being is  central to Home Economics. Home Economics is concerned with the development of deep understandings about the reciprocal impacts that capabilities, choices and priorities of individual family , organisations and local & global communities have on  each others well being." Home Ec syllabus 2010

* Need informed choices about what we do, what we eat, how we live with a local & global community.

* Platform for  expressing creativity

* Platform for designing - critical inquiry of responding to needs, problems 

* Creating opportunities 

* platform for learning life skills

* Platform for discovering more about ourselves

* Exploring significance of community and our role in working together

* Opportunity for learning new ways

Teaching Pedagogy (Much of mine is based around Marzano)

* Establishing rules & routines

* Teaching content - information, deepening knowledge with  an inquiry based learning approach

* Support students in textile learning through the design process:

* Student reflection and  critical thinking on learning. Making adjustments to products/processes

* Fostering research skills to inform decision making

* Opportunities for exploring, testing, trialling

* Reflecting on own practice & professional development (Marzano questions great for this)

* Engaging all learners & strategies to bring back into the learning moment and provide a supportive    learning environment.

* Use of resources and ICT in learning and teaching
* Time management for teacher and student

(Useful websites:
https://www.teachingchannel.org/blog/2015/09/04/new-tch-laureate-team/?utm_source=newsletter20150905/ (see clips of others implementing teaching ideas)
https://www.spectronics.com.au/ (apps/ICT for anything you teach in the classroom)
http://learninginhand.com/ (evaluating apps for teaching)
Marzano Teacher Evaluation Model in sidebar on Educational links

Fostering creativity

* Discovering the  uniqueness in us as individuals (thinking, producing, ways of doing, being)

* Intentional learning opportunities

* Opportunities for  incidental learning and discovering

* Opening opportunities for cross curriculum learning - taking  skills to new areas/different areas



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I think the biggest asset I would bring to my Home Economics classroom is a shared journey of learning. In my lifetime, I have never stopped learning. I'm no expert on parenting, but I have some good wisdom to offer on relationships in families, teenagers, age appropriate play/development...... and in recent years text talk and music. I have plenty of experiential learning mistakes too!!
As a teacher, I'm not perfect but I can be flexible and know  understanding your learners and how they learn helps make planning and delivery in the classroom more successful.
In my own textile journey, I discovered my structured personality, showed through in my designs but as I learn more about working with textiles and through experimenting and trying new things, I am having opportunity to step outside of my own box and discover some of my own creativity with textiles.