I started teaching 13 years ago, and when I took my first teaching job I told myself I was only doing this until we relocated to an area where I could do something else, something that I wanted to do. Teaching was never in my plan for a career. It was probably the last thing that I ever wanted to do.
As I took up the daunting task of attempting to study for an actuarial exam this summer, I realized that every summer since I began teaching I have been looking for a different career opportunity. Initially I didn't think much of this realization. This episode of "career searching" is a path I have been down many times. It wasn't until about a week into studying that I had yet another realization.
Having taught mathematics all these years now, I have the ability to discern whether a child will struggle in mathematics approximately 4 to 6 weeks after observing their mathematical ability within my classroom. I do not need to look at past scores, it just becomes obvious. There are various techniques I use to help the child depending on the content to be mastered. I have also developed the ability to dis-aggregate data, evaluate curriculum, and vertically align grade levels of mathematics. I have spent years studying how curriculum is developed, how children learn mathematics, along with a multitude of other topics about teaching.
Here I sat forcing myself to learn new material for an actuarial exam when merely two weeks before I had easily produced multiple curriculum documents for the year. Why had I not seen it all these years? I am not meant to do applied mathematics. I have always favored pure mathematics over applied. And where else can I express this fondness of pure mathematics, but in the classroom? Teaching mathematics is what I was meant to do. All these years I have been denying it, and there the fact stood staring me stone cold in the face. I was meant to teach math.
It's funny how sometimes it takes years for us to realize things, and to understand some battles should never be fought.
1 comment:
I have always thought that you were one of the most natural teachers I knew! I mean, seriously, you taught this old dog lots of new stuff!!!
This is a marvelous realization that you have had. I think it just take us years to discover what we're meant to do. Hooray!
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