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Teaching - when your impact is recognized

Teaching is hard, college did not prepare us for what actually goes on in the classroom. They teach you how to write goals, align standards to curriculum and write unit lesson plans. It's safe to say, all of those college courses do not prepare you for the real thing. Until you have the authentic experience of managing a classroom, engaging students, teaching content, and dealing with difficult student behaviors; it can feel like you’re riding a bicycle that is on fire. Even after years of teaching experience, some days are just hard. Imagine this, you have worked your butt off, earned your dream job, and your impact is recognized. 



When I was teaching Middle School, the assistant varsity track coach position came open at the High School. Coaching track was something I have always wanted to do. It gave me the opportunity to work with high school students and have a more diverse experience. I worked closely with the relay teams and developed good rapport with the athletes. The following school year I went to work at the High School as a co-teacher and the activities coordinator. Anyone who has done it, will tell you starting a new teaching position is difficult and I was faced with many challenges that went along with my new responsibilities. One of my athletes, Caden, who I was responsible for as a student now played football. During football season, I would be on the sidelines with my husband and daughter taking pictures for the yearbook. Caden was injured and we would spend some time chatting during the games. My kid loves him and my husband always made a point to engage in conversation with him. To my family, we didn’t think much of it. 


As the school year and football season continued, my time teaching during the day was becoming extremely stressful. There were many days I questioned if it was worth it, and if I was meant to be. I will never forget this day, I was in first period, walking around the classroom I was co-teaching in when Caden came in the door with his football jersey on a hanger. He said he wanted to give it to me and he wrote me a letter. Since this was my first time at the High School, I didn’t really know what was going on. He told me every year the seniors honor a teacher and give them their jersey to wear that Friday. I can't express the feeling I had at that moment, the fact I hadn’t been working there long and I was chosen. 


In the letter, he said he picked me because of how I push him to be great and for letting him meet my family and always having time to talk to him. In that moment, I realized how important it is to your students to just take a few seconds out of the day to ask them how they are, ask about the extra curricular activity they are in, and tell them something about yourself. If you take a few seconds a day to get to know them and show some interest it can really have a positive influence on them. You can still be strictly professional, have expectations and boundaries with your students, but taking a few seconds to show them you are a human and you do care about them; it will help them become successful. That is our ultimate goal as educators, to send our students out into the real world to be successful adults. 


Teaching is hard, some days are harder than others, but at the end of the day, if you always put your students' best interest first, you will end up on the right path. No words can express how incredible rewarding moments with your students are.


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