Blog Post #9

Version 4 Post

In this blog What I learned This Year I found very helpful to my teaching future. Dr.McClung wrote a reflective post about his class after his first year of teaching. He received great feedback and since he enjoyed it so throughly, he decided to write one after every school year. In this particular post he really concentrates on his fourth year as a teacher. He focuses on two problems throughout his blog post. The first part of the blog called You Gotta Dance With Who You Brought to the Dance he was trying to define himself as a teacher and impress his peers that surrounded him. In this particular year he was worried about what his peers thought about him, rather than having fun and doing it the way he knew how to teach. He begins to have anxiety because he does not know what his peers think about him. This affected him im his classroom. He goes on to say that he does not need to change the way he does things just because how his peers perceive him. This post is a vary valuable lesson to me because I sometimes care to much about what people think and I try to please everyone. It teaches me really to stick to my roots and be true to myself. When it comes down to it, its not about my peers, teaching is about influencing those young kids and making sure they are having fun with the lesson.

His next point is called Challenge Yourself. In this post he talks about getting to comfortable and complacent. He taught the same two subjects for three years and he began to find himself getting lazy and losing his creativity. He began to use old lesson plans and his classes started to get boring. This next year Mr.McClung is assigned two new classes, which are pre-AP civics and American Government. He is very estatic about this because he is able to make new lesson plans and increase his creativity. He learns from this that you can never become to comfortable because that is when you lose students interest. Then, they begin not to learn as much in your class. I think this post is right on point because teachers these days get real comfortable and the classes ultimately get boring. As a teacher I never want a boring class. This teaches me that I have to bring it every day with a plan and I have to come prepared. When I was in high school, I had some teachers who do the same thing over and over again. Realistically, I got tired of going so i never was really interested in learning. So this blog teaches me a valuable lesson to try to be the best teacher I can possibly be and to challenge myself and my students everyday.

What I have Learned this Year (2008-2009)

In the blog What I have learned this Year was quite intersting and very helpful knowledge. This teacher has completed his first year as a elementary teacher and shared some very valuable tips. First, he talks about how he was so consumed with impressing his superiors that he was losing contact with his audience. He thought it was all about HIM. He also talks about how some teachers don't make the students the center of attention and they worry to much about how they are doing while dealivering the lesson. He then talks about teachers being flexible. He said that he was trying to give the perfect lesson plan, rather than just relaxing and having fun with it. This next points was one of my favorites which is Communicating. He goes on to say that communication is the easiest way to solve any problem. Building relationship with your students is very important. The students must be able to communicate as well so they do not fall behind.

As a teacher never have too high of an expectation. He says that children are going to be children and as a teacher you can get your hopes up. If expectations are too high then these students are set up for disappoinment and failure. Mr.McClung's says that if they do fail it is our job to pick them up and make sure they stay after it. Another point he touches on, is that teachers can not be afraid of technology. Technology is a very helpful tool. He also touches on Listening to your students. Another big point he touched on was to actually listen to your students. In order to gain respect you have to give it as well. Last but not least, he says you have to open to learn more as a teacher. Some teachers refuse to learn and they end up not becoming the best possible teacher they could be. He goes on to say that we live in a learning environment so why not soak it all in.

I thought this blog was very helpful and very easy to follow along with. He provided many great points that impact a classroom. As a future teacher I am going to incorporate those ideas in my classroom. He touches on many great points but there were a few that I really enjoyed. He talks about not caring what your superiors think because all you should care about as a teacher is thhe kids. The kids should be the only people a teacher should worry about. I also enjoyed the part about communication. To me communication is the key to success. For example, I play baseball at the University and since we are gone a lot, so I tend to miss a good bit of school. If i was not to communicate with the teacher my grade would suffer. Overall, I think Mr.McClung did a outstanding job with this blog. He really opened my eyes to some new ways to approach teaching.