How have connections with other professionals improved your practice? Today's entry is from Kaitlin Wood, English Teacher and ASB Advisor at La Costa Canyon High School:
I've never blogged before. In order to make myself feel less cheesy and awkward about this story, I decided to incorporate some post-it comics and a really mathematical line graph, all of which are in pencil, because, duh, I'm a professional. Here goes nothin'.
I got hired a week before school started in 2009. I was THRILLED to have a job at a time when the economy was tanking and teachers were getting pink slipped across California. I had no delusions of grandeur about my teaching prowess-- I knew I had a LOT to learn, but I didn't know how to ask for help from my talented colleagues. As a brand new teacher, I felt this pressure to perform-- asking for help would have meant admitting defeat. Within the first few months, I had already been sick with every single cold or flu that my students brought in the classroom, was buried in grading, had reached the end of my "new and exciting" teaching strategies, and was barely surviving.
First-year-teacher Kaitlin was a sad case. I ate my lunch at my desk, hunched over my sad leftovers while responding to parent emails.
At some point at the end of year one I got over myself.
I started collaborating with my colleagues on a really informal basis. I have included the following graph to illustrate my point for my visual learners.
In fact, I'll be honest, most of the collaborating I do with my colleagues involves talking about our lives outside of the classroom, and our teaching somehow gets peppered in. We share ideas, strategies, and best of all, we're able to find out that we're not alone after all. Thank you to my lovely colleagues/friends/soul sisters/gurus I have here at LCC. You've made this job the best job in the world for me.
