All children can learn.  Not all children learn at the same pace or using the same methods, but every single child in the world is capable of learning and is entitled to a quality education in a caring and safe environment that promotes self-discovery and self-respect.  This is the foundation of my life as an educator.    

My classroom is a setting in which students from many different cultures gather to learn and grow as human beings.  I value and utilize their diversity in order to provide them with an education experience that is relevant, engaging, challenging, and fun.  It is my responsibility to examine and re-examine the needs of my students and to adjust my instruction to compliment students’ learning styles.  I am their guide and they are safe with me.  My classroom is a model of diversity, equity, and growth.  

I am a role model for young minds.  How I conduct myself is what they will embrace as acceptable for their own lives.  I lead by example and show students how to be good citizens of the world.  No bias is allowed to intrude upon the learning environment in my classroom, which is a microcosm of the cultures within the community, where we promote respect for all people and all things.

My instruction is always differentiated to meet the needs of every learner.  It is not the students’ responsibility to figure out how I want them to learn.  It is my responsibility to teach using strategies that make learning successful for each student, and to constantly reflect upon my teaching experiences.  I always have detailed lesson plans prepared, yet I am flexible in the way I use them. I am always examining student needs and outcomes to determine whether or not I am highly effective in guiding students to a higher level of cognitive development.

Collaboration with my peers and with my leadership is an essential part of my life as an educator.  This is an area of my career that I value immensely.  We all have strengths and weaknesses.  A strong alliance with my team, my willingness to share and receive knowledge skillfully and graciously, plays a huge role in how I will remain highly effective as an educator throughout my career.  I bring with me nearly two decades of experience in teaching and supporting adults through integrating a wide variety of computer technologies and life experiences.  I am a strong advocate of the appropriate use of technology in education, and have a wide array of advanced technology skills to share with my students and my colleagues. 

I am responsible for teaching to Indiana Academic Standards in support of district goals and benchmarks.  My highly effective instruction engages students and empowers them to be everything that they can be.  I serve as a role model to students, and help them to construct knowledge by allowing their natural curiosity to direct their learning.  I strive to make my lessons interactive and fun.  Students learn from me, but they also learn from each other.  With proper planning and careful guidance, my students can help to teach each other very valuable life skills.  Peer groups teach students how to work as part of a team, what it truly means to take turns and follow steps to accomplish a collective goal, how to interact with others visually and verbally, and how to take responsibility for your role and your choices.  I learn from them as I teach them.  As students interact with and rely upon each other, they learn that we are all human beings and we are all valuable.  In this process I am always a vigilant observer of the interactions, using what I learn in future lesson plans. 

I love teaching.  It is truly a calling for me.  Each year when I look at the photos of the teachers who were honored at the Senior Choice Banquet, I am reminded of the fact that it is almost impossible to answer the question “Why do you want to teach?”  Not because there aren’t great reasons, but because there are so many great reasons that cannot be explained with words.   I look at those who have come before me.  I watch as these 17 and 18 year old young people express their genuine affection and gratitude to teachers they had 10 + years ago, and I realize that there aren’t words to describe what it means to make that kind of difference in the life of child. 

I have come into this knowing full well that the world of education is not perfect; money is tight, and the constant flow of change can be very painful.  The job is often physically and emotionally difficult and messy, yet I embrace it as a life choice.  The time spent writing this has been an extremely valuable affirmation of the choice I’m making to have a second career, and for that career choice, that life choice, to be teaching.  As I have reflected upon the road behind me, I can see my path to becoming an educator so clearly now.  I have spent the recent years of my life working my way through college in my forties, while still raising my own children, and working as a Reading Instructor in a high poverty public school.  It has been an incredible edification in the practical aspects of daily life as an educator.  I have walked miles in all the different shoes and feel strongly that, perhaps for the first time in my life, I really know what I want to be.