Joe McClung began teaching in 2009. Every year he has written a reflective blog post on what he has learned. His first year of teaching he learned to be flexible with his lesson plans. He states that the lesson you plan is never the one you teach. He stresses being a good communicator with your students and fellow educators. Also he says that we should be encouraging and not be so upset when students do not meet our high expectations. We have to remember we are dealing with children. Learning all we can about current technology is also important and we should push ourselves to just jump right in. We should listen to our students and develop good teacher-student relationships. Last of all we should be life long learners and soak up as much information as we can.
His most recent year he talks about how he had found a comfortable spot in teaching. He felt like he was becoming monotonous and rather than just sitting back and staying comfortable he saw his mistake a and decided to make a change. We should challenge ourselves to keep things interesting for our students and not get lazy.
All of what Mr. McClung had to say was relevant to being a great educator. I really liked that he has chosen to stay true to himself rather then worrying about what others think. He uses his own experiences with education (as a student himself) and tries to keep things interesting for his students. No one will learn if they do not like the class they are in. I think it is important that he keeps sight of that when he teaches.
I hope you will make annual reflections like Mr. McClung.
ReplyDeleteI agree we should never get comfortable with teaching things and kids change everyday. I also agree staying true to ones self is key. Keeping things fun and interesting and keeping the kids involved will help you and the kids grow.
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