Tuesday Tea Time with Claire

Perceptive Creatures

Far too often, I catch myself underestimating my students. They are some of the most perceptive creatures to walk the planet. I think kids have an innocence about them that allows them to easily determine how genuine humans are. It is truly remarkable what they pick up on. They are constantly taking in their surroundings and forming opinions about how others make them feel. As teachers, our everyday manners truly impact their perception of us as a teacher and a human being. We must be cognitive of...

the words we say...

the words we fail to say...

the words we regret saying...

the smiles we share...

the smiles we don’t make time to give...

the non-filtered cranky teacher looks we wear too often...

the sarcastic comments that accidentally slip out...

the way we listen to their words...

the way we interrupt their thoughts...

Tuesday Tea Time with Claire

Connection Chaos...

Sometimes I think our job title would be depicted more accurately if they titled us as “connectors” rather than teachers. It is beyond insane how many connections we attempt to make in a day, let alone an entire school year. The connection chaos begins the moment we start prepping for our lessons. We attempt to connect all of our material to our students’ world which inevitably means we must be in tune with their world. This means we must take the time to ponder and  connect their world to what our students believe is an archaic world. As if that isn’t exhausting enough, those connections are just the tip of the iceberg in the connection chaos we call teaching. On a daily basis we attempt to...

connect content to students...

     connect students to content...

          form the teacher and student connection...

     form the teacher, student, and parent connection...

connect with ourselves as human beings outside of the classroom...

     discover we live in connection chaos...

          accept that our job is officially being “master connectors”. 

Tuesday Tea Time with Claire

Quality Versus Quantity... 

Far too often, I’ve caught myself wrapped up feeling the undeniable pressure of trying to teach my students every single learning objective and skill they need to...

     pass the next test...

          pass my class...

               pass the state tests...

                    graduate...

                         end up becoming successful...

                              contributing members of society. 

I despise the days when the bell rings, the period is over, and I know I rushed through yet another lesson in an attempt to teach quantity over quality. I’m stricken with the guilt of knowing that I’m the one to blame for wasting a period and not the usual couple of culprit students for being off task and attempting to cause a ruckus to avoid learning. I know I need to admit to myself that I attempted to rush my students to reach a new level of understanding without giving them the scaffolding and framework they needed to truly get there. Those are the days when I feel I am my own worst enemy when it comes to teaching. 

Tuesday Tea Time with Claire

 “If you love what you do for a living, you will never work a day in your life...”

Growing up, my “Gido” (Ukrainian for grandfather) with a sparkle in his wise eyes would often say to me, “If you love what you do for a living, you will never work a day in your life.” With each passing day of being a special education teacher, those words of wisdom carry a heavier and deeper meaning. 

How could anyone stick with being a teacher unless they truly love it?  

It’s far too easy to get wrapped up in all the obstacles that are put in front of us on a daily basis as educators. The true challenge is allowing ourselves to keep the joy of teaching our priority to enable us to let those nagging obstacles fade away. Every day we expect our students to be resilient creatures that can persevere under all conditions. Everyday we must show them how to become resilient human beings so they can have the chance to find what they love to do in this world because as the insightful tea bag states, “joy is the essence of success”. 

Take a few moments to relax and enjoy your tea. You deserve it.

Why Chaos to Clarity?

Let’s be utterly honest with ourselves fellow teachers... Isn’t our job description taking a whole lot of chaos and magically turning it into some form of clarity?!

The words “chaos to clarity” symbolizes so many aspects of who I am as a teacher and a human being. It represents the overwhelming feeling I have each time my students and I are working together to reach the next level of understanding a concept that seems impossible to master. Each time we break through the seemingly impossible invisible wall of understanding, through a lot of time and energy, we conquer it together and we reach the all mighty level of clarity (aka the students each have their own “ah ha” moment!).

“I’m five years old and I could be a better teacher...”

Being a younger sister, I couldn’t wait to finally be able to go to kindergarten. I had heard countless tales of how magical school was because supposedly your teachers take you on amazing adventures all day. The rumor was you spend the day learning, playing, laughing, and making new friends. What could be better? Who wouldn’t want to go? I was pumped. The anticipation was over, I was finally about to be a real kindergartener! 

Lies. All lies.