The Kind of Teacher I Want To Be

I just had a really great conversation with another Reach teacher about the kind of teacher I want to be this year. It's really hard to face such a broad question, especially because I don't even know what kind of teacher I am right now after only four weeks of teaching experience.

I do have just three ideas for the teacher I want to be, based on who I am and what I've discovered in my time as a student and with TFA as a new teacher:

I want to inspire passion for academics in my students. I want to show my students that it is possible to get excited about what they're learning, whether or not it's their favorite subject. I want to teach with passion and help my students understand that the best learning happens when passion is involved. I also want my students to find their individual academic passions, from a single book they truly enjoyed reading to a type of writing they found particularly fun.

I want to be the kind of teacher who knows how to use a variety of resources and uses them well. I feel like I have been inundated with many kinds of resources in the past few weeks--my PD and coaches who provide individual support, all of my colleagues at Rocketship, websites full of lesson plans and classroom organization ideas, books, discipline systems... the list is endless. I want to be the kind of teacher who asks for help and utilizes these resources to make the best classroom environment possible. I don't want to keep up my stubborn attitude of "I can do it myself," however helpful that may be at times, so that I can gather information from a multitude of sources to best help my students.

I want to be myself. I know that the "teacher me" will be different from the "camp counselor me" or the "college me" that have developed over the past four years, but I need to find a way to incorporate my own personality into my teaching style even if I need to act strict, dress professionally, or do other things that just don't feel like me yet. I want my students to know who I am as a person and a teacher.