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Sarah Stover TELL Step 2

Past
Ever since I was a little girl, I loved playing "teacher." I would convince my younger brother and sister to sit in our unfininshed basement on a rug while I stood at my chalkboard to teach them all sorts of things including math, art, or sometimes spelling. And ever since I was little, I've always thought about going to school to become a teacher. There were times when I thought I'd be something else, but I always came back to the idea of being a teacher. There was no one moment that I really knew that teaching was what I wanted to do, but I think my parents were really the ones who showed me that teaching was the perfect fit for me. My mom was a special education high school teacher and my dad is a math high school teacher. They came home everyday with stories about the good, bad, and silly things their students did that day. They would talk to one another about how proud they were of this student or ask each other about what they should do to help that student. They were dedicated, and they fought for their students. Many of my mom's students were from broken homes - some were abused, others were neglected, and many of them never thought they could go far because they had a learning disablilty. What was great about my mom was that she was a tough teacher. She expected them to do their best at all times, and I know for a fact that she changed the lives of her students. One time I met one of her students, one who had graduated from high school about ten years ago. He told me that my mom was probably the best teacher he ever had because she taught him to look beyond his disability. "And look at me now," he said, "I own my own business." That's what I want to do - change lives. And I know that may sound extremely cliche, but it's true. My parents have always shown me the importance of education and the importance of teaching. I can't imagine myself doing anything else.

Present
So here I am, at college, muddling my way through classes, late-night studying, THE PACKET, observations, and hours of homework to accomplish my goal of becoming a teacher. Some of the classes are painful, but for the most part, I'm having a good time. I love my education classes, and the packet's not as bad as I used to think it was. As part of the packet, we are required to do five days of observations at a high school, and I want to talk about some of my observations that I recorded over last Christmas break. I spent one day in a high school Life Skills class, observing and working with students who have mild to severe disabilities. I chose to do so because even though I'm not a special education major, there is a high probablity that I will have students with disabilities in my classroom. On the day I was there, the students were learning skills such as vocab words, how to count money, how to fill out a check, and how to manage a checking account. They also went to a shop classroom where they were making clay pots. I spent the day talking to the students, helping them with their math, and working with them on their pots, and I enjoyed every minute of it. The students were so happy to be at school and were having a great time (especially with the clay pots). They reminded me why I'm doing what I'm doing. Sometimes I feel like I get so wrapped up in classes and grades that I forget that I'm here at college so that I can make a difference to my students in the future. The teacher in the class I observed was an amazing woman. She was teaching students with severe disabilities skills that will make them successful in their future. That is my goal as a teacher, to help my students be successful for their futures.

Future
In the future, I imagine myself attending my students' graduation feeling proud of them and their accomplishments and excited for them to start the next step in their lives. I hope I will have made a difference in their lives or at least made an impression. I hope to see my students who had learning disabilities walk across that stage, knowing that they too have a bright future ahead of them, full of possibilities. Maybe a couple of students will come up to talk to me after graduation, thanking me for what I might have done. Or maybe, they'll email me from college, telling me that their math classes are so easy since they learned what they needed to know in my class. Maybe they'll come back to visit and update me on their lives. And maybe in twenty years I'll have their children sitting in my class, and I'll have a chance to inspire another generation of students.

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