Perception

The school year is coming to an end, as well as my first month and a half of teaching! I have been reflecting on how things have been going the past few weeks. When I think about how short of time I've been here, it makes me feel better about how I'm doing. Teaching here has gotten so much easier and better the more days that I'm here which gives me hope for next year!

It's weird when I think back on my good students and my bad students. There are some students that have driven me crazy the past month. They seemed miserable in my class and were so difficult for me to motivate. A few of these students that I deemed impossible to impact have come up to me, thanking me for helping them finish off the year and thanking me for making english fun for them. I even had some of these students say I was there favorite teacher, which made me feel bad for complaining about them to Clayton haha. Although these interactions were a good thing, they definitely made me feel a little guilty.

It's interesting that my perception of their experiences can be so inaccurate to how they actually feel. It really opened my eyes to how little we actually know about what people are thinking and feeling. This has helped me to avoid feeling discouraged about students who I feel I am not getting through to. I really want to make sure I am impacting these kids positively as I continue teaching at this school. There are a lot of students who have terrible home situations with absent parents. There have been multiple students who have been comfortable enough with me to tell me this, and it has made me feel guilty about how I've treated them. Not saying I've been super mean to any students, but I definitely would've acted differently if I knew what was going on. 

So here are my final thoughts as I've finished my first little chunk of teaching:

- Be kind to every student because they're definitely going through more than I know. 

- Never feel bad for pushing students to be academically successful. 

- Trust my instincts about what lessons I think students will enjoy. 

- Always put in the effort to get to know every student's life outside of the classroom. 

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