3/2/09

"Dalton Sherman Speaks" was so amazing.  This young boy walks out to the stage at what I assume is a teacher convention and speaks to them about believing.  Believing in the students, their coworkers, and themselves.  I hate to admit it but I honestly started crying because it was just so awesome.  When he said "You better not give up on us.  No, you better not.  Because I do know in some cases, you are all we've got.  You're the ones who feed us, who wipe our tears, who hold our hands, or hug us when we need it.  You're the ones who love us when sometimes it feels like no one else does; and when we need it the most."  That statement is sad, but like he said, in some cases, it is true.  He is one extraordinary young boy, and whoever helped him prepare for that speech did a good job!

I think if we trusted each and every student, school atmospheres would be a lot different.  I think the students would be more willing to learn and be well-behaved.  Sadly, this doesn't happen.  Students have reputations of bad behavior so at times teacher can automatically judge that and that is unfair.  A lot of students are struggling with believing in themselves and finding out who they are and what they are good at.  They need someone to believe in them.

Response to Mr. Chambliss:

I appreciate that Mr. Chambliss came to talk to us.  I feel like I did take some things from his talk.  First of all, the past 40 years of his career I thought were very impressive.  I thought it was interesting that he started out as an elementary school teacher and became a superintendent.  I especially thought it was interesting that he got his masters only after teaching for one year.  I greatly appreciate his advice on getting a masters degree and to not do the same thing for 41 years.  I know I will definitely take that to heart when I am a teacher.

Another major thing that I took from his talk was that things are pretty crazy in the world we live in now.  As teachers, we need to help bring better adults into the 21 century.  We need to prepare students to know how to problem solve and do critical thinking.  We need a new model for teaching and our generation is the one that has to come up with it.  Which kind of scares me but at the same time I want to do my part.  I know that part of teaching is not just teaching a certain subject but also teaching the students how to be good citizens of the society around them.

I enjoyed his last words/advice for us.  He said "a life of service provides you lots of rewards".  Being a teacher will drain me at times, and I can't save everybody, but it is a rewarding career.  And that is something I am excited about, because I have already experienced a small part of the reward of teaching during my Ed 185 course.