I took the Team Technology personality test and it revealed that my personality relates closest to ISFP and INFP. An ISFP personality type means that I have deeply-held values, I more than likely am caring and sensitive towards others through my actions rather than direct statements and that I have a type of lifestyle that I enjoy and I want to maintain. An INFP personality type means that I have deeply-held values and I do not openly show my feelings.As far as the validity of these personalities tests, some of the assumptions are spot on, while others are not.
In relation to my teaching and my personality effecting my choice in content area, I do have a lifestyle that I want to maintain. Currently I am living abroad teaching English and while I will be returning to my hometown in March of next year, one of my reasons for choosing English (not my number one reason) is because of the opportunities it opens up for teaching abroad in other counties. I loving the excitement of living abroad and being an English teacher can help me maintain this lifestyle.
In relation to my relationship with my students, according to my personality tests I will be extremely caring and sensitive towards them but I may not show it through spoken words. Rather I will do things that are caring and sensitive. Being a teacher now, I can see some truthfulness to this. I am not the coddling teacher, My students and I have a very strong relationship, I am their teacher but they also know I am a person they can confide in. We can joke, but they know when it is time to work, we work.
I then took the NC State learning style test and it reveled that for 3 of the 4 scales I tested fairly well-balanced.On the active and reflective learning scale I tested a 1 closest to the active learning side. This means I slightly retain and understand information more by doing and practice the task. On the sensing and intuitive learning scale I tested a 3 closest to the sensing side. This mean I prefer to learn facts, like solving problems and I don't like courses that don't have any apparent connection to the real world. On the visual and verbal learners scale I tested a 3 toward verbal learner. This mean I get more out of words, written or spoken. On the sequential and global learners scale I tested a 5 towards sequential learner. This mean that I gain better understanding by learning sequential steps and I prefer to follow logical steps.
In relation to my teaching I think that my testing fairly well-balanced on most of the scales will prove to be very beneficial. I believe that being balanced in the way I learn will aid me in being balanced in the way I teach. I will be able to see things from the different learners points of view and present them with assignments, lectures and materials that they will be able to get the most out of.
Lastly, I took the Grasha-Riechmann teaching style survey I tested high on 3 of the 5 categories, formal authority, personal model and delegator. On the other 2 categories I tested moderate, expert and facilitator. I think that all of these are important characteristics to have in order for a classroom to be successful for me. All of these characteristics aid to the strongest points of my classrooms. The first is having a routine that is in place everyday. This gives them an understanding of what to expect from me and what I expect from them. The second is my relationship with my students. As mentioned my students and I have a great relationship but there is still the understanding that I am the teacher and they are the students and our main job is to get learning done!
