This major of mine -- Elementary Education -- has me reflecting on different things related to teaching: my lessons taught, my lessons planned, my lessons written, other teachers' lessons taught/planned/written, and how I plan to manage my classroom next year. I think the past three years of education courses have taught me to reflect on more than simply teaching. I'm becoming more of a reflector on life. I now ask myself questions like, why did I react that way? Why am I hyper around these particular people? Who can I be myself around? Am I truly growing in Christ? What's holding me back from reaching my fullest potential as a servant? (etc...)
I do write a lot down...but being a senior in college, taking a full load and two extra classes + working at McAlister's + babysitting for families at church + teaching first grade Sunday School, 3-4 year olds Cubbies, & Apartment Ministry has me VERY busy... I do not take much time to rest and be still with just me and God.
I figured something though. As a high school and college student, I have been Miss Obsessive Compulsive, Perfectionist with my work. In turn, I have developed an anxiety-related heart condition, not to mention the eating disorder and migraines I developed senior year of high school. All of this for perfection.
I could keep it up, too. As a teacher, I could spend all night every night creating "perfect" lesson plans, thematic units, and projects for students to do. I could expect perfection from each student and become known for "creating perfect little students." This is a problem though. Life is not about being perfect. It is not about reputations, GPAs, MCT 2 scores, or anything of the like. Life is about living. The past several years, I have been living a life that is predictable and completely centered around senseless, temporary academic goals. None of this is going to lead me anywhere except possibly more anxiety-related illnesses. Oh, how I wish I could relive the past several years, just to experience being with people.
No wonder so many teachers end up on antidepressants of some type. Living life this way, expecting perfection in everyone, is no way to live. I should be living my life like this: Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding, in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will direct your paths, OR Be joyful always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. Teachers on anti-depressants may very well live their lives as growing Christians, but I think that there is still an expectation of perfectionism growing inside each of them.
My goal as a finishing-up college student and as a teacher is to avoid producing perfection out of my students. Instead, I will teach the students to grow in the interests they enjoy and realize the things that they appreciate in life. To enjoy life and its beauty seems to be a far greater concept learned in grade school than mere identifying fractions and writing the perfect cursive Q. If I could complete my first year of teaching knowing that I instilled LOVE rather than perfection in each of my students -- a love for other people, a love for their families, a love for each other, a love of learning new things and growing in intellect, and a love for the lives God's blessed them with -- I will have been a successful first year teacher.
Forget perfection, I'm aiming to teach my students about life & love. :) (and a few cursive Qs will be thrown in there, too, I'm sure.)
1 comment:
The last paragraph = part of your philosophy of education.
Post a Comment