Hello!
Unit one was a week of reflection for me. I reflected on my goals, as well as who I want to become as a professional and an individual. What is my identity as a teacher going to look like? I don't know. I have never professionally taught a student before, the most I have done is help my family and friends with homework, or my Greek co-workers at work with spelling and grammar upon their request.
What do I know? I know that I want to help people learn, I enjoy it vastly. I also know that I want to be the kind of teacher that students aren't afraid to go to, that they'll never be afraid to ask me questions. I remember being afraid to ask questions in some of my classes over the fear that it was a dumb question, that I should know what is considered the obvious, but the obvious isn't the same for everyone. I'm hoping by the end of this course that I'll be able to have a clearer path in knowing what my teacher identity will look like.
Something that I found interesting this week was the idea of the teacher identity and how it evolves.
New teachers and more experienced teachers struggle with their teacher identities. The big question of "How do we describe our professional identity?", can be a daunting one, because we have to think of all the things that make us up professionally. Teacher identities are fluid and are affected by many things; people who we are around, the students we teach, and the professional development that teachers undertake. It is always evolving and never stays the same. It is shaped by what we do and the actions we take inside the classroom and outside of the classroom. It can be easy to get stuck inside your classroom and only describe yourself based off of that classroom and what is happening in it. We need to learn what came before us and what is possibly coming ahead. Developing our PLN's is important, this is because it helps expand our bubble of a classroom and helps us look at different perspectives from other teachers. How we might handle different issues, behaviours, skills, and systems in the classroom similarly or differently.
This idea of the teacher identity intrigues me because I need to develop one. It is something that I need to look closely at and over time I need to develop and evolve my own. I'll need to be able to answer who I am as a teacher, where I teach, who I teach, how I teach. These are all important things that make up a teacher's identity and more.
Current practices for developing your teacher identity is building up your PLN, because this is what is going to expand your world beyond the classroom and the place you work in. You will be able to connect with teacher's across the globe and share your experiences with one another. Using a PLN is also a good way to find new resources that might help your identity because you might learn a new approach that you can experiment with in your classroom.
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Seburn, Tyson. On Developing Identity Who Am I . YouTube, 2019, youtu.be/hEpXEyeAMOs.
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