Introduction

          My name is Robert Stare, but I go by Bob.  I am 37 years old and was born and raised in York, Pennsylvania.  I graduated High School in 1995 and joined the Marine Corps immediately.  I have been in the Marine Corps working in the Heavy Equipment field for most of my time.  I also did a three year tour as a recruiter in Allentown, Pennsylvania.  I am getting ready to transition out of the Marine Corps and into teaching this year.  I have been married for 17 years and have two sons ages 14 and 12.  I am stationed at 29 Palms and own a home in Temecula.  My wife is currently a 6th grade teacher.

          I chose to pursue teaching because I want to be able to help guide students make good decisions.  I will be a positive role model for them and will be able to provide real world experience to the classroom.  I chose the content area of history because I find it interesting, and because I feel like I am part of history.  I have traveled around the world and have been to over 12 countries.  I think that my own experiences of coming through life and finishing college can be an inspiration for students to always work on improving themselves and  challenging themselves to achieve more.

Here is a picture that my wife took within the past few months.

My Personality and Teaching/Learning Style

The Team technology questionnaire I thought missed the mark for me.  The way the questions were paired up, I either agreed with both statements or felt that both statements were way off course.  This resulted in most of my answers being right down the middle.  Even with this it gave me a personality type of ESTP which I do think was fairly accurate.  I do think I am action oriented and I do enjoy solving problems.  I do not agree with the part about being in my element when dealing with a crisis.  I can deal with them fairly well, but I am not one that creates a crisis just to be in my element.  If everything is going well then there should not be a crisis. 

My personality effects my content area because I like having structure and feel that having a good plan to teach the events of history will work well for me.  I have been around the world and experienced many cultures, so I will be able to bring these things to the table.  I think students will find that I will lay out what is expected of them and they will be able to thrive in the environment I set forth.  I also like to get down to business so I am sure that I will be able to stay focused on the content and achieve the desired results of the plan.  The only flaw with this is I need to make sure I do spend enough time getting to know the students. 

Doing the teaching and learning styles questionnaire was much easier for me to find mark answers.  For active and reflective learners I was pretty well balanced slightly leaning toward active learning.  For sensing and intuitive learning I leaned very heavily toward sensing learning.  For Visual and Verbal I leaned on the visual side.  On sequential and global learners I leaned toward the sequential side.  I definitely agree on the indication of leaning heavily on the sensing learner side.  I think I can use this t0 my advantage in teaching history by making sure I supply facts, figures, and problem solving in my instruction.  I will make sure the students understand how the material relates to real world events and just bore them with facts and figure they think are useless.  Even though this is my strong suite, I must make sure I provide every opportunity for all students to achieve success in the class no matter what their preference is.