The #oneword for the year that I chose was experience, and as a word or an ideal it still resonates with me. I had a fulfilling and meaningful experience in my 491 classroom and I am still planning to experience the rest of my year as fully as possible even with the limiting restrictions of this global pandemic on hand. I think that this was an excellent choice for me personally and my goal to leave a lasting impression on the teachers, school, and students of my final practicum was both an achievable and meaningful goal which I believe I successfully filled.
I am still in contact with one of my students who has since moved back to Japan and my coaching teacher and I have promised to stay in touch. I had many students express how much they enjoyed my teaching and lessons and I hope that they will carry the experience that I provided to them in their memories as they moved forward with their own learning journeys.
As I focused on my #oneword in my teaching it provided a valuable reminder that each mistake was a learning opportunity and to be fully present in the moment that I was, and as such it helped me forge those meaningful relationships with those around me, especially my students. This was a strength for me, my ability to forge relationships, however it also created unexpected difficulties as I began to rely on my familiarity with the students to get them to listen rather than expected structures and routines. Due to this, as I started my practicum, classroom management became a problem because you can only focus on giving one student your full attention at a time so if there are class wide transitions multiple and multiple students begin to stray it became hard for me to create that connection I needed to get them to listen.
Reflecting on my #oneword experience, I knew that I needed more of it in classroom routine and discipline, and my coaching teacher was amazingly supportive and let me take the time I needed to establish my own routines that I needed to ensure the class could stay on a productive learning journey together.
As I pushed through this challenge my teaching certainly became stronger and I was living my #oneword! It was an incredibly satisfying and rewarding process to have unfold before me. As an educator I learned that creating and establishing not only relationships, but structure and routine is key and essential to the success of the whole class, and that in doing so the class begins to create a cohesive unit in which student can help other students so that everyone can achieve success! It also helped me remember that learning takes place through experience, so if I as a teacher, want my class to learn something I need to create an experience around that topic that will stick in their memories for years to come.
If given the choice to change my #oneword I would not, I think that I chose the perfect word for my learning journey both professionally and personally and I will continue to try and experience all the learning opportunities the world has to offer me in the rest of the coming year.