My Life in Education

Teaching to me is a really eye opening profession. The amount of differences you are exposed to as a teacher are second to none, and to me, that is what makes it such a rewarding career. There really are no other jobs that expose individuals to the amount of different situations and different people that  teachers have to encounter everyday. At most jobs, the only people you ever have differences with are your colleagues. Teachers have to face those same differences with their colleagues; and on top of that, they also have to deal with all the differences they have with their students.

In my future career as a teacher, I expect to encounter a lot of differences. Nobody is exactly the same as someone else and differences are present in all professions. It would be naïve of me to think that I could go my whole career and not experience anyone different than me. When it comes to differences between the people I am working with, I expect to encounter these when lesson planning with other teachers in my department. I have certain ideals and morals when it comes to how to teach material to kids and how to asses them. They are a little more traditional and strict than most other teachers and I think that when differences emerge, if at all, it will be here.

Differences with students will be much more common. There are so many different students I will be in contact with; all of whom come from different backgrounds, half of my job will be dealing with differences. The best way that I, as a teacher, can identify and plan for these individual and cultural differences between my students is to make myself vulnerable. By making myself vulnerable, I hope to show my students that it is okay to be yourself and let your guard down. As we saw from the videos A Girl Like Me, Killing Us Softly, and Jane Elliot Brown Eyes vs Blue Eyes; as a society we tend to put too much emphasis on looks, skin color, and gender. We judge people on things that cannot be changed. In all classes, including physical education, this can be detrimental to a students’ success. If you are not able to be yourself and step out of your comfort zone, you will never achieve anything. I hope that my students will look at me and view my class as a class where going above and beyond and stepping outside your comfort zone is not looked down upon, but encouraged.

The one difference I might encounter the most in my future teaching experience has to do with the importance of physical education. More and more we see physical education being de-emphasized and a lot of children believe it is not important. I think I will have a lot of moral differences with my students over this topic. When this difference arises, I plan to show my students how important physical fitness is to them long term and by trying hard now will benefit them greatly down the road. I think this difference is the most important one to overcome because my students need to know how important the things that I am teaching are. If they think that it is irrelevant, they will not learn anything and I will not be doing my job.

I know that this video is long, but it does a great job at showing how a teacher is able to discover the individual differences of each and every one of her students. The teachers says in the video that, “by systematically studying the differences in background, abilities and needs of the children in her room via observation, accumulative records, behavior journals, discussion with other teachers, parent interviews and staff conferences, she can teach all the children well”.

https://youtu.be/laCG2E2iB3s

References:

Videos – Learning How to Know Your Students, A Girl Like Me, Killing Us Softly, and Jane Elliott Brown Eyes vs Blue Eyes