Blog Post 9

What I have learned this year volume 4

Joe McClung began his teaching career in the fall of 2009. At the end of each year he writes a reflection post on his blog. He reflects on the lessons he has learned as a teacher. His end of the year reflection for 2011-2012 was different from the posts he had written in the previous years. Joe McClung's fourth end of the year reflection was entitled, What I Learned This Year Volume 4.
He begins by discussing how he struggled to define himself as a teacher. He worries about how his peers view him as an educator. After worrying for the majority of the school year over this matter, Mr. McClung finally comes to the realization that he can not be concerned with how his peers view him. The most important thing to consider is, are the students having fun, and are they learning.
I think it is human nature to worry about how our peers view us. No matter how hard we try, it is impossible to please everybody. As educators our worry should not be weather or not our fellow teachers like us. That doesn't define who we are or how well we are doing our job. What does matter is the kids; are they learning, are they enjoying what they are doing? If we can answer yes to those questions, then we should have no doubt weather or not we are doing a good job.
Next, Mr. McClung talks about challenging yourself. After three years of being at the same school and teaching the same subjects, he worries that he is loosing his creativity because he continues to revert to his old lesson plans. He goes on to say that this has taught him a lesson that when we become to comfortable, we can become lazy. Mr. McClung accepted an offer to teach a different subject and a different grade for the following school year.
I think it easy for us to get stuck in a monotonous routine. We can easily loose our creativity by repeating the same thing day after day and year after year. If we are board with the lessons we are presenting, how can we expect our students to stay engaged? If we don't get an opportunity to change grade levels like Mr. McClung, we must force ourselves to come up with new lessons so our students don't suffer.

What I have learned this year (2008-2009)

For the next part of this assignment I chose to read Joe McClung's first reflective blog post, What I've Learned This Year. Mr. McClung points out some interesting things that he learned in his first year of teaching. I think these are some important lessons to keep in mind when entering your first year of teaching. The First lesson was, How to read the crowd. Mr. McClung pointed out that he was so concerned with how his superiors saw him, that he wasn't focusing on how he was delivering his lessons to his students. The most important part of being an educator is getting through to your students. I think your superiors will respect you and see your abilities as long as you concentrate on the student and not worry about the way others are viewing you.
The next lesson he outlined was, be flexible. Mr. McClung admits that in the beginning of the school year he was concerned with presenting the "perfect" lesson. As a teacher you have to be in control, but you can not always control the way the lesson will go. Teaching is kind of like a play; it's a live performance, and while you may have a script, it's not always going to go the way you planned. And that's okay! We are learning too, and when something doesn't work, change it.
Third, communicate. It's important to build relationships with your coworker. Just as we are learning to collaborate in edm310, it's important to continue that practice when we enter the teaching field. We can learn new things from our fellow teachers as long as we open up the lines of communication.
The fourth lesson from Mr. McClung's post was, be reasonable. Teachers begin the year with high expectations for their students, and while it is important to have certain expectations from your students, you have to remember they are children. Keep your expectations responsible and when they fail to meet them, pick them up and help get them back on track.
Fifth, don't be afraid of technology. Technology shouldn't be something we fear. We should embrace it, use it, and learn from it. As a society we are often afraid of the unknown. Among adults, technology is one of those unknowns we tend to fear. It is important to remember that our students fear a world where technology doesn't exist. If we are using technology in our classroom, then we have created an environment that is friendly and familiar to our students.
Sixth, listen to your students. Mr. McClung gives an example of an answer he received from an end of the year survey he gave his students. When asked, "I know my teacher cares about me as a person when he", the student answered, " Listens to what I say". So many adults don't listen to what children say; they are really missing out too. Often children have significant things to say, and too many adults tune children out. Even if it's not very meaningful to us, it means something to them or they wouldn't say it. It's important for children to know somebody cares enough about them to listen to what they have to say.
Lastly, never stop learning. This could also possibly be the most important lesson. One thing that really stuck out to me that Mr. McClung said here was, "We work in a learning environment, so why not soak up as much as you can? We owe it to our students". We are educators and we should lead by example. Our students will be more open to continuing their learning experience if they see us continuing ours. We should never get to a point where we think we have learned all there is to know. We live in a world where technology and information is changing daily. There is always something new to learn or something we can expand on.