Someone once told me that, "The best part about being a teacher is knowing that the students will move on after a year. The worst part about being a teacher is knowing that the students will move on after a year." The Early Childhood Education program here at the University of Georgia aims to prepare us as future teachers for every aspect of the job as a K-5 teacher. There is no way to prepare for leaving a group of individuals that you have become attached to over the course of the a semester or a year.
This however, is a necessary evil for the career field that we have decided to enter. It is our immense responsibility as educators to prepare our students for life at the next level, whether that is the next grade level, the next school level, or for "life in the real world". We must equip our young people with the tools necessary for "success" in every definition of the word. This task can not be measured by a test taken at the end of a quarter or at the end of the year, but instead could only be measured with the total growth of each student, academically and socially, from the begining of the year until the end.
As I reflect on not only this last semester, but the last two years in the Early Childhood Education program, I find it imperative that I have an equal impact on the students in my actual classroom that they will have on me. We all remember those teachers who have the greatest impact on our lives, no matter what age we were or what grade we were in. My goal as a teacher is to have an even bigger impact on the lives of the children I teach in my classroom as the students have had on me these past few semesters.
It is great to walk through any school and to genuially be loved by the students. To know that the students want to be in your classroom when they reach your grade level is an amazing feeling. This shows that a teacher is having an effect on not only their students, but on the school as a whole. As I enter into the work force and start my life long journey. I take with me these three quotes:
"The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires." William Arthur Ward.
“None of us alone can save the nation or the world. But each of us can make a positive difference if we commit ourselves to do so." Cornel West
"Education is what remains after one has forgotten what one has learned in school." Albert Einstein
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