Throughout the past three weeks of class, there has been one question that's came through to me each week. Why become a teacher? We discuss this very real question through movies, books, and each of our own experiences. As Professor Glassman noted today, there's been quite a few posts of students switching majors because they realized teaching isn't for them. We've all heard of plenty of reasons why not to become a teacher but for me, I want to focus on the reasons to become a teacher! Since I was a little girl I've always wanted to be a teacher; my grandma, aunt, and mom are all teachers. I guess you could say it runs in my blood. But, after these few classes of 'Education and Society' I've realized it is so so much more than that. After questioning if it's the teacher or the subject that gets a student interested I've thought back on my own experiences. In almost all cases the teacher is what gets me excited about the class and the information. Very rare can I remember falling in love with a class for the content and information alone. Personally, this fuels my fire for teaching even more! I want to be the person to interest students in ideas and facts that they once found boring and dull. I work to become that favorite teacher that we all remember having.
After doing a few searches online I found an article stating the "Top Seven Reasons to Become a Teacher". (http://k6educators.about.com/od/becomingateacher/tp/whyteach.htm)
The article obviously outlines seven great reasons to make teaching your career. However, for me those things are just icing on the cake. As a teacher you get to play such an important role in the lives of so many people. It's nice to have summers off and have job security (as stated in the article). But that should never be the reason someone thinks they are inclined to be a teacher. I could go on and on about the way I want to be a supporter, mentor, and educator all wrapped into one. Recently discussing putting 'joy' and 'fun' back in the classroom, I know that I want to become a teacher and instill that happiness and comfort to a child. Thanks to this class, I continue to discover more and more reasons to support teaching as not only my career, but my lifestyle.
Alyssa, I have been thinking along those same lines and I love this article because it really does just provide "icing on top of the cake" as you said. Teaching also runs in my family and my admiration for what teachers do for individual students daily grows each year when I watch their students learn and grow in and outside of the classroom. Teaching is about so much more than books and grammar and I think you outlined that idea perfectly here!
ReplyDeleteI love this post! I agree with it so much. I feel like this class talks a lot about the hardships of becoming a teacher, but for some of us that are truly passionate about the subject, this only pushes us more! Education runs in my family as well and I am totally drawn to being able to affect at least one student's life positively and though I am a little far from this goal, I cannot wait to put it into action.
ReplyDelete