I titled this post with a purpose...
This school year (2017-2018) isn't my 1st year teaching. It's actually my 4th. But in those first 3 years, I had a mixture of both supply teaching and long-term positions.
This year was my first full school year. One school. One job. September-June.
And it felt like my first year.
The first few months, I felt like I was swimming with my head just slightly above the water. I was new to the areas I was teaching in, and had so much to figure out & learn just to catch up to speed with everyone else. I spent many hours after school learning, reading, planning...and then went home and read documents, books, followed educators in my fields on twitter...
And I felt like the most unqualified person to be teaching my students. Angela Watson refers to it, "The Imposter Syndrome", in her blog. She asks, have you ever had any of these thoughts..."I have no idea what I'm doing...I'm clearly not experienced enough...I'm not knowledgeable enough"?
The thought that seemed to dominate in my head was: "There are SO many teachers in this school who are much more qualified to teach my students. Why am I doing this?" But...I decided to change that thought.
I changed it to: "There are so many teachers in this school who are much more qualified to teach my students. So...I need to go learn from them". And that's what I did. I asked for help. I asked for advice. I asked questions. A lot. And, those teachers I asked? They were happy to help. (... so was the office admin, and the custodian, and the librarian...) And I went from thinking "I'm not knowledgeable enough", to consistently learning something new and being able to apply it to my teaching and classroom.
I have read so many of those "Dear first year teacher" blogs, posts, articles...and a lot of times I see the same piece of advice: don't be afraid to ask for help. Seriously, don't. I know it can be hard, it's hard to say "I don't know" sometimes. But I knew if I didn't ask (...if I couldn't figure it out myself), it wasn't helping me, my students, or the teams I worked with. I needed to put any ego aside if I wanted to grow.
AND to add, don't be afraid to offer help. For example, many educators in my school discovered I knew a lot about Google and had taken the courses. I had staff coming to ask questions, wanting to know more about Google Keep, Google Forms, how to work Google Drive...and I was just as happy to help.
As the year begins to end (we're almost there), I've started to reflect & look back on everything I've learned, things I want to learn more about, and things I'd like to change or implement more in my teaching. I've seen that I learn best when I get to apply it, do it, figure it out. I look back to September, when the entire school year was ahead of me, when I wondered... how was I going to do this?! And the answer was - one day at a time. One question at a time. One decision at a time. One lesson at a time.
Do I still feel like an imposter? Yep, that feeling still happens! But I know that I am reflecting and learning to improve, both for myself as an educator and for my students.
My core belief for my students is that, I believe they need to know that I, as their teacher, care about them. And they do. I may feel like an imposter at times, but I know that, from September until now, that relationship has been formed. My students know they matter. That I care about them.
Watson writes, "Anyone who is analyzing their work and striving to be better is going to feel like an imposter at times". I encourage you...Keep learning. Keep growing. Keep sharing.
This school year (2017-2018) isn't my 1st year teaching. It's actually my 4th. But in those first 3 years, I had a mixture of both supply teaching and long-term positions.
This year was my first full school year. One school. One job. September-June.
And it felt like my first year.
The first few months, I felt like I was swimming with my head just slightly above the water. I was new to the areas I was teaching in, and had so much to figure out & learn just to catch up to speed with everyone else. I spent many hours after school learning, reading, planning...and then went home and read documents, books, followed educators in my fields on twitter...
And I felt like the most unqualified person to be teaching my students. Angela Watson refers to it, "The Imposter Syndrome", in her blog. She asks, have you ever had any of these thoughts..."I have no idea what I'm doing...I'm clearly not experienced enough...I'm not knowledgeable enough"?
The thought that seemed to dominate in my head was: "There are SO many teachers in this school who are much more qualified to teach my students. Why am I doing this?" But...I decided to change that thought.
I changed it to: "There are so many teachers in this school who are much more qualified to teach my students. So...I need to go learn from them". And that's what I did. I asked for help. I asked for advice. I asked questions. A lot. And, those teachers I asked? They were happy to help. (... so was the office admin, and the custodian, and the librarian...) And I went from thinking "I'm not knowledgeable enough", to consistently learning something new and being able to apply it to my teaching and classroom.
I have read so many of those "Dear first year teacher" blogs, posts, articles...and a lot of times I see the same piece of advice: don't be afraid to ask for help. Seriously, don't. I know it can be hard, it's hard to say "I don't know" sometimes. But I knew if I didn't ask (...if I couldn't figure it out myself), it wasn't helping me, my students, or the teams I worked with. I needed to put any ego aside if I wanted to grow.
AND to add, don't be afraid to offer help. For example, many educators in my school discovered I knew a lot about Google and had taken the courses. I had staff coming to ask questions, wanting to know more about Google Keep, Google Forms, how to work Google Drive...and I was just as happy to help.
As the year begins to end (we're almost there), I've started to reflect & look back on everything I've learned, things I want to learn more about, and things I'd like to change or implement more in my teaching. I've seen that I learn best when I get to apply it, do it, figure it out. I look back to September, when the entire school year was ahead of me, when I wondered... how was I going to do this?! And the answer was - one day at a time. One question at a time. One decision at a time. One lesson at a time.
Do I still feel like an imposter? Yep, that feeling still happens! But I know that I am reflecting and learning to improve, both for myself as an educator and for my students.
My core belief for my students is that, I believe they need to know that I, as their teacher, care about them. And they do. I may feel like an imposter at times, but I know that, from September until now, that relationship has been formed. My students know they matter. That I care about them.
Watson writes, "Anyone who is analyzing their work and striving to be better is going to feel like an imposter at times". I encourage you...Keep learning. Keep growing. Keep sharing.
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