A New Challenge

A great dojo/twitter friend @jellison23 has been publishing a 500 word a day blog for some time now. I've read many of her posts and it has inspired me to do it myself, so here goes.

I've been wondering how teachers (including myself) survived before Pinterest and TPT existed. I believe these platforms, along with Twitter, are where the beginnings of the grass roots movement to change teaching began. If you are not on Twitter, watching and participating in this movement, you are missing out. 

For me it all started with Pinterest. There I found a post about Class Dojo, which led me to Twitter chats, which in turn connected me to teachers & people concerned with education issues around the world. That sounds dramatic. In a way it is. It is the chain of events that revolutionized the way I teach and my attitude towards it every day.

Let me back up. I have been teaching for 26 years now. I started out as a special education teacher, working with what Michigan calls Emotionally Impaired students. To some of you that may be the students called Behaviorally Disordered. Yup. I worked with THOSE kids. On purpose. For 20 years. It taught me many, many things, but mostly that it is all about relationships. There is no way to make any headway with kids who cannot handle their emotions until you have a relationship with them. 

Then things changed in my district and I moved to an elementary school. I went from team teaching 9th and 10th graders to teaching 1st grade. To say that was a shock is an understatement. It was also the best thing that could have happened to my career at the time when I needed it most. (Funny how that happens, huh?)

At the same time, my oldest wonderful daughter graduated from high school and went off to college. (My alma mater!) My youngest wonderful daughter was a sophomore and the shift in our household was obvious, but good. 

It was strange to be the 'new kid' in school, but I was honestly so overwhelmed with the little learners I was in charge of that I didn't have much time to feel awkward about it. Plus, the staff I was now a part of was (is) phenomenal and made it as seamless for me as they could. I remember being so worried that I would mess up those little kids. It was the first time in my career that I was really worried that I was not good enough for them. First grade is SO important! What did I know about kids that age? Well, it turns out I did know enough, barely, and what I didn't know I got good advice about. That is when I discovered Pinterest. And TPT. I think I spent more on TPT that year than I did on food. Thank you to all those creative teachers out there with the time to create those resources. 

So how DID teachers survive without those things? I did it by keeping EVERY SINGLE THING that I created or another generous teacher shared. Man am I glad those days are over.

~ Julie