My beliefs about children are 100% connected with challenges that I have faced throughout my education. I don’t think that this is a negative; we learn to be better people by overcoming challenges or by taking them on. We all face challenges, some of them purposefully, and others just find us at different states in our life. When I think about education for me, I can’t help but want to share that I am the first member of my immediate family including my parents to graduate from college Education was not something that was talked about in my family and unfortunately; I had 3 siblings who liked to keep my parents on their toes. College was not an expectation.
I look back on when I was younger and I honestly hated to read. I would ignore it, hide from it, and put it aside for as long as I could. I didn’t have books in the house growing up and don’t remember any of my siblings being into reading. For me, it was difficult. I would find myself frustrated as I would read a chapter and not be able to remember what it was about. I was not ever pulled aside and worked with because I got good grades in everything else. I think that my teachers just thought that I was lazy. I remember sitting with my English teachers and in order to get credit for reading a book, they would turn to a certain page, read a sentence and then ask me to tell them about what was happening. On many occasions, my teachers said that they did not think that I read the book. This was also done in front of other students during silent reading. This made me feel pretty dumb because I didn’t know what I was doing wrong, I didn’t know why others breezed through books so fast and I took forever. I often pretended to be done with a reading in class so that I would not be the last one turning the page. I would have that feeling o pressure and anxiety every time we had to read a few pages in class before moving on to the next assignment. I hated English.
I am now an English teacher and I know that it was my experiences that have lead me here. I have shared my experiences with my students so that they feel comfortable understanding that everyone learns at a different pace and we all have different strengths. They are completely shocked to hear that I used to hate to read but I then explain to them that I decided that I didn’t want students to feel the way I did. I believe that these experiences have taken me far. I talk to my students often about having goals and achieving those goals with hard work.
I think that many of my students can relate to my story of not having any family members who have graduated from college. We talk about how this could go one of two ways. Either they will want it for you and help to push you, or they wont understand the importance, or the dedication it takes to get there! I had one sibling who checked in with me about school. I knew that I was not going to have the proper environment to focus by staying at home so I decided to take a soccer scholarship for The University of Memphis just to live with her. Her and her husband were taking courses her and their while both working full time and raising their son. They understood my commitment. When I eventually moved back after realizing soccer was getting in the way, I came across some health challenges that slowed me down but did not stop me. It was at this time that I met my husband Donovan. He was a blessing who also understood the importance of my graduating from college. Even when we later started talking about marriage, it was clear that we would not become engaged until after graduation so that it did not take my mind off of a goal that meant so much to me. He took it so literal, he proposed to me at my college graduation party. He knew I wanted to graduate first! I have continued to push myself by creating new goals ever since I graduated.
I look back on when I was younger and I honestly hated to read. I would ignore it, hide from it, and put it aside for as long as I could. I didn’t have books in the house growing up and don’t remember any of my siblings being into reading. For me, it was difficult. I would find myself frustrated as I would read a chapter and not be able to remember what it was about. I was not ever pulled aside and worked with because I got good grades in everything else. I think that my teachers just thought that I was lazy. I remember sitting with my English teachers and in order to get credit for reading a book, they would turn to a certain page, read a sentence and then ask me to tell them about what was happening. On many occasions, my teachers said that they did not think that I read the book. This was also done in front of other students during silent reading. This made me feel pretty dumb because I didn’t know what I was doing wrong, I didn’t know why others breezed through books so fast and I took forever. I often pretended to be done with a reading in class so that I would not be the last one turning the page. I would have that feeling o pressure and anxiety every time we had to read a few pages in class before moving on to the next assignment. I hated English.
I am now an English teacher and I know that it was my experiences that have lead me here. I have shared my experiences with my students so that they feel comfortable understanding that everyone learns at a different pace and we all have different strengths. They are completely shocked to hear that I used to hate to read but I then explain to them that I decided that I didn’t want students to feel the way I did. I believe that these experiences have taken me far. I talk to my students often about having goals and achieving those goals with hard work.
I think that many of my students can relate to my story of not having any family members who have graduated from college. We talk about how this could go one of two ways. Either they will want it for you and help to push you, or they wont understand the importance, or the dedication it takes to get there! I had one sibling who checked in with me about school. I knew that I was not going to have the proper environment to focus by staying at home so I decided to take a soccer scholarship for The University of Memphis just to live with her. Her and her husband were taking courses her and their while both working full time and raising their son. They understood my commitment. When I eventually moved back after realizing soccer was getting in the way, I came across some health challenges that slowed me down but did not stop me. It was at this time that I met my husband Donovan. He was a blessing who also understood the importance of my graduating from college. Even when we later started talking about marriage, it was clear that we would not become engaged until after graduation so that it did not take my mind off of a goal that meant so much to me. He took it so literal, he proposed to me at my college graduation party. He knew I wanted to graduate first! I have continued to push myself by creating new goals ever since I graduated.
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