10.28.2012

Teacher Moments

Between waking up every morning at 5:45 and not getting in to bed until past midnight on certain nights I often find myself wondering how on earth I'm still functioning... but last week as I was driving from point A to point B it kind of clicked. 

Most everything I do right now is geared toward teaching, and because it is something I love I can do it for hours on end. 

This past week I had so many awesome teacher moments happen that it became somewhat easy to get up at 5:45. I realized that although I was physically and mentally exhausted every time one of those "teacher moments" happened I was revitalized! 

Teacher moments can happen in so many forms:

 - when you see the light bulb go off
- when a product is produced far beyond your expectations
- when a guarded child opens his/her heart to you
- when a retired teacher shares her still burning passion for teaching children

These are just a few moments that happened to me the past couple weeks that really inspired me to keep chugging along.

The most intense/emotional teacher moment of the past couple weeks, however, was during groups when we were discussing character traits. All the children were thinking of wonderful character traits to describe themselves except for one. I sat down with this student, who I'd recently learned had endured things that most human beings never go through their entire life, and asked he/she to try really hard to think about a personal character trait. The child thought really hard and looked up at me and finally said, "I think brave." WOW. 

I'll have you know that I tried very hard to hold my emotions in, as everyone knows I wear them on my sleeve most of the time. 

Not only did the child COMPLETELY understand the concept of character traits, which is every teacher's goal -- for students to understand the concept being taught, but we were able to have such a great moment. We ended up compiling a list including courageous, kind, and several other positive traits. 

This is why I get up at 5:45 every morning.

This is why I go without sleep most nights to prepare the best lessons and learn the most possible information to better myself.

This is why I am going to be a teacher. 

I want to be that person that helps a student realize how brave they are, or how much potential they truly have. 

With this week about to kick off I hope to experience many more "teacher moments"! 

What are some of your favorite teacher moments? 

5 comments :

  1. I get up 4:30 every day and am excited to get ready and go to school! It is amazing how loving your job makes such an impact on your life!

    I posted about this same thing last week!

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  2. That's so amazing. Glad you know in your bones what you're meant to be doing with your life and you're dedicating to reaching that goal :)

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  3. Elyse, I'll be sure to check out your post!

    Brittany, I so am... it is such a great feeling doing what you love everyday and I'm not even a teacher yet!

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  4. Favorite teacher moment this past week: Writing BAT acrostic poetry and one of my lovies using "Always use their echolocation to fly" for A. In first grade! Knocked my socks off for sure! This is why I love being a teacher!

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  5. Amanda, I love it! This morning we were talking about our vocabulary word, useful, and I asked kids what they thought some useful things were and one student said, "Vitamins and minerals in your food." ---- like what!? LOVE THEM!

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