I think the blog is supposed to be about this...

I believe we are supposed to blog about why we wanted to become teachers, so here it is. Otherwise, here is some extra info about me; I know you all were dying to know :)

When I was little I always loved pretend-played being a teacher, it was my absolute passion. So that always stuck with me, that passion to teach. Although now I don't have to do the whole make-believe part, I think that would make for some trips to the psychiatric ward. Anyways, I got on a tangent (as I always do), back to me being a kid. In elementary school and all the way up to freshman/sophomore year of high school, whenever asked what I wanted to be, it was always a teacher. Then the realization that teachers don't make a lot of money set in. At that point I was applying to colleges and decided that I wanted to live comfortably and not depend on any man so I needed to aspire to do something else other than teaching. I considered speech therapy, but when I went in to observe my aunt who worked with young children, I just ended up trying not to giggle at how cute and funny their little accents were (I know I am mean). After that, I looked into a wide range of jobs, like physical therapy, etc. and realized that they all centered on the idea of helping other people. In the meanwhile, my jobs during school always entailed myself working with kids. Finally, I decided I needed to love my job and I could never work in some cubicle, etc as a living, it was just not me. Money should not dictate my passion for working with kids, same with other people's opinions. I have gotten a lot of, “I could never do teaching, that is great you are doing that” but also I lot of negative criticism like “why don't you get a real job so you can actually make money.” In the end, I realized I should have just embraced my childhood dream, as idealistic as it was at the time, to teach. I know it is going to be a hard job, take a lot of time and effort, and people may even look down on me for being a teacher (oddly enough since I will be teaching some of the next generation of people). But, it will all be worth it. I am going to care about my students, make sure they are getting a good education (as best I know how to give them), collaborate with colleagues to have a more well-rounded curriculum, and feel like I am making a difference, even if it will only be one student out of all of them who I have a great positive effect on. Now I see the importance of critical thinking and want to give my students the tools (as much as I can in a year) to be good critical thinkers so that they can think for themselves and be more empowered. These are reasons why I want to be a teacher!