Why Teach?

Since I was a girl, I have always loved helping people. I grew up going back and forth about what I wanted to do with my life, dreaming about being a social worker, nurse, counselor, teacher, and pretty much anything else that involved making a difference. While I loved helping other people, I was never confident enough to ask for help myself. I struggled to keep up with math and science in school, but always excelled at reading and writing. After losing my dad to cancer in 7th grade, school became a daily chore for me to suffer through. I didn’t see the point in learning about the world when my world had been crushed.

The next year, my 8th grade English teacher was teaching a unit on poetry. I remember reading a poem that struck me so hard, it brought color back into my world again. At that moment, I decided to turn to writing and created a poem about my life and the mess that I was. When my teacher read it, she cried and asked if she could submit it to a writing contest. I was completely taken aback because in my head, “how could anything I write move people?” Ultimately I gave in and a month later I found out that I had won! From that moment on I began to believe in my academic abilities and saw hope for my future. By the time I got to high school, I was focused on becoming a healthcare worker, but my senior year psychology teacher completely changed my outlook on what I wanted to do with my life. In 8th grade, one teacher gave me hope by believing in me, but Mrs. Ward completely changed me as a person. The way she cared for me and the belief she had in the amazing things I would do in the future set me up to become who I am today. My school year with her made me realize that I want to support students in the same way that she supported me. 

When I got accepted into college, I was set on the fact that I wanted to teach kindergarten or first grade because those are the ages that I had become comfortable with because of my experience working in childcare. As I've continued to learn and gotten the opportunity to work with children of all ages, I've realized that I would love to teach older students. While I love working with younger kids, once I got the opportunity to work with kids in 3rd-5th grade, I realized that I am able to connect with those students in a way that I can’t with lower grades. I want to teach students all of the knowledge they need to succeed academically, but also support their socioemotional development so that they continue to love learning as they grow up. I am very passionate about social justice, positive encouragement, and developing meaningful relationships with students, parents, and my peers. As I continue to learn more about teaching and myself, I’ve seen my passion grow. I plan to take everything I’ve experienced and learned into my classroom so that students are ready and excited to continue their education journey.