When I grow up...

This past weekend I have been thinking a lot about the Fridays events. I have especially thinking about the adults involved and their heroics. I feel proud to be heading toward a profession that produces people like Victoria Soto and Kaitlin Roig.

A couple of weeks ago one of my classmates asked everyone in the class to answer two questions so that she could compile them into a book. The questions were: what does teaching mean to you? and Why do you want to be a teacher? I would like to share my answers here so if you are interested in my reasons for choosing education, here are your answers... (It's a little long and if you decide not to read it I don't mind.)


What does teaching mean to you?

To me teaching means so many things that it is hard to classify: It means heartaches and new beginnings… It means that every year I will have to stay as my students move on but at the same time that I will always have something new to challenge me whether it be students or curricula.

It means hard work… I will constantly be working, there is no way that I can just forget my work at the end of the day when the work I am doing has an influence on multiple lives.

It means creative thinking… I can walk through the changing leaves in the fall or the flowers blooming in the spring and use those experiences to create a lesson that will have the students invested in the lesson the whole time!

It means variety… It means that I can laugh, cry, and love all in one day maybe even the space of one hour. I never know what a student might surprise me with but I know that I will hear what my students think and have good times as they share their ideas and opinions with me.

It means Challenges…It does not mean that every day will be easy or that every day will be hard. It means that I have the ability to help one student with their classwork while considering how to alter the next activity to the students’ needs.

It means that I am important… I will never go out of style because no technology can bring as much to the classroom than a teacher who loves his/her students. Students need to have at least one person to look to and I need to work to be that person.

Ultimately to me teaching means… I can make a difference in the life of someone else. If I can succeed in doing that for one person I will feel successful as a teacher.

Why do you want to be a teacher?

I want to be a teacher for many reasons: because I love seeing people learn new things, I love seeing the ‘light bulb’ come on as a difficult concept is understood, I love working with the students that are so excited about everything. But after considering everything I want to be a teacher because it helps me to better understand the Atonement. It is amazing to me how quickly I can fall in love with any group of students that I work with. I can just imagine how much Jesus Christ loves us and I can sense a portion of how he feel for us. I would do anything for my students and I want to give them all the skills they need to succeed. I want to share a scripture that perfectly explains what I am trying to say: Mosiah 28:3 “Now they were desirous that salvation should be declared to every creature, for they could not bear that any human soul should perish; yea, even the very thoughts that any soul should endure endless torment did cause them to quake and tremble.” I feel the same and I want to do anything I can to make a difference in my students’ lives.

When I grow up, I want to make a difference!

For those of you that made it through, here is a great clip!