Challenges and overcoming them.

Would you believe me if I told you that the draft of this original post decided to delete itself so I had to type it up all over again from memory? Typical technology or a bloody amazingly annoying coincidence considering the post is titled "Challenges and overcoming them"?

And breathe...
Anyway...
Short and sweet sentence to open this post right up.
There will be people (and situations; see above) you come across in your life that challenge you.

Here are a few personal examples of mine I will share with you in the hope that you will be able to relate and not feel alone especially if you are in a situation similar to these right now...

At my first ever job, as a waitress. The head chef, on a good day, would scream at you and put you down. Lets get a few things straight, this was my first ever experience in the workplace and I was 16 years old. People make mistakes, especially newbies! Especially, especially 16 year old newbies!! To every mistake I made while learning I received this response...

"Are you kidding me? Are you stupid?"

I'm sorry is that a trick question? 
Did I quit. No. Did I let this man bully me out of my first ever job? Hell no.
Yeah sometimes I went home crying or even cried while bringing peoples food to them (mmm extra salty) but I didn't let him win. 
I started giving sarcastic remarks back to his ridicule and didn't let it effect me anymore.
From this experience I've become a much stronger and more resilient person. 

The next experience of a challenging person in my life was a tutor for a course at uni. On the day of a big presentation he emailed my group and myself saying something along the lines of this...

"If you go ahead with what you have today you will receive a fail grade."

Excusez moi? You what?
We showed him our final product just less than a week prior to the presentation day and he decided to email us ON THE MORNING OF the presentation to say this! Not to mention when we showed him we specifically asked if it was all good to which he didn't have a single negative thing to say about it.
Anyways, with only hours to go we decided to go ahead with what we had.
And we passed.
After he told us "I wanted to challenge you".
Well buddy, you did that!
From this experience I've become more emotionally intelligent because even though at the time I wanted to SCREAM (I'm sure Emma and Annastasia did too!) I kept my cool and we aced it.

One final experience is one of the earliest I can remember. One day on a McDonald's playground a young boy was calling my little brother horrible names. So what did this 6 (7/8?) year old do? Punched the boy in the face and sent him crying to his mumma.
Okay, perhaps not the best example of how to overcome challenging people but I'm sure I taught that boy a lesson. You're welcome. 

The point of this post comes down to this. To these people who have challenged me, tried to put me down or have stabbed me in the back whilst twisting the knife, smiling and saying "I've got your back" I say...
Thank you.
Thank you for giving me these lessons that have allowed me to become a stronger more resilient person and to know what I know now about how real people can sometimes be and not to be naive to this. 

Bet you didn't think I would say that huh?

Brush it off. Deal with it. In my experience these type of people are insecure in themselves and very unsure of their own place. They are ususally very unhappy people.

If you are the type of person to give in to these people and to say "it's too hard, I give up", I'm sorry to tell you that if this is your mindset you will fail. They will win.
Don't worry that used to be me too! Until I started realizing that...

"Whether you think you can, or you think you can't--you're right.”

― Henry Ford

Whatever it is. I believe in you. 

Now all you need to do is believe in yourself.

Kirsten :)

Meeting Room 18, my classroom!

Exciting post yay! 
Today the deputy principal (DP) invited me to school to touch base about next terms plans as a kind of induction process.

This first part of the post is from me pre-induction. It's 9.20am this beautiful Monday morning and in about 10 minutes I'm off to my school to find out everything I need ready to go before Term 1. I'm guessing/hoping it will be a sort of "newbies guide to getting teacher organised". I'm very lucky to already know a lot about the school as I did my final teaching prac there.

Right now I would say I am feeling...

Excited (The kind of jumpy, jittering excitement where I just want to be in my car already on the way there but I know if I leave now I'll be 15-20 minutes early sitting outside the locked school door.)

Prepared (I am ready to go with all my paperwork filled out, notebook and pen in hand and my 2015 Innovative Teachers Companion Diary.)

Unprepared (I am not ready for this. Deep breathing in...1....2....3.)

Nauseous (Why oh why butter chicken, why?)

Okay, I'm ready (I just had my green tea with an extra scoop of cement, it's not like this is a job interview, I've already got the job! I'll be off now. Wish me luck!) 

.......

It's now 1.50pm and I've just had some lunch (left over butter chicken, please be nice to me) and I have lots to tell! 

I got to school and sat in the staff room with my peppermint tea waiting for the DP to be ready for me. Once ready we chatted for a while and she gave me some advice about Term 1 next year. First up I'll be setting up my classroom in "week zero". Woah buddy, week zero, hello. That's new. So cool, I get to go in the week before Term starts and set up everything. My classroom is Room 18! This classroom is in the same corridor as two of the greatest preservice teacher mentors I've ever met, including my own mentor!

So after having a chat with the DP I walked to Room 18. First impression thoughts...

"Holy crap there's no furniture!" 









There were student chairs and tables all stacked to one side and 4 student computers on desks against the wall. Behind the door is a built in cupboard and the Smartboard.  

My next thoughts were...

"Ummm where do I put my stuff? Handbag? Teacher notebooks? Where do I sit?"

There was no teachers desk!

 



I went next door and found the teacher who, while on prac, was another mentor for another preservice teacher (I hope you read my blog Tash!). I said my hello's and asked her "um, should room 18 have more stuff in it?".
She came with me to have a look and decided we should go check with the DP. We did that. The DP said my room was supposed to have all the furniture from Room 19, the room which connects with mine. 
So lucky for me, the other prac mentor helped me move tray cupboards, filing cabinets, shelves, a whiteboard on wheels and a teachers desk. 
Bam, my empty rooms looking more like a classroom!

The small filing cabinet was extremely heavy to move so we opened it up and.....

 

TEACHER GOLD MINE...

BUTT LOADS OF STATIONERY AND BOOKS. YOU NAME IT BUDDY I GOT IT.

So that's cool.

The carpets are getting cleaned at the school this week so I can't start set-up as of yet. I don't need to go back until week zero next year before Term 1 commences.

Now to go buy a laminator and start my classroom preparations at home!

Thanks for reading!

Watch this space for more posts about preparations and setting up my classroom. If you're reading this post on your phone subscribe by entering your email address into the box below where it says Subscribe to Edumacate Me.

        Kirsten :)

You don't need to be an Incredible to be incredible

Short post ahead! In my experience of teaching as a preservice teacher only months ago, my mentor told me explicitly about an important skill to have when you are a teacher.

"You must be flexible."

Yes, I can totally do the splits (NOT). You don't need to bend yourself into the shape of a pretzel like Elastigirl (The Incredibles). 

What I mean is you must be open to changing your plans when things change suddenly. Sudden changes happen more often than not I have found (especially in a cat. 2 school). If you aren't flexible in your teaching it's not going to work in the best interest of not only your students but also your sanity. It's already happened so much in my short time as a relief teacher!

An example of things changing for me recently was my class next year going from a split level year ½ class to a straight year 1 class. Yes, it was only 3 days after finding out about my job offer in a ½ class that I found this out it was now a straight 1 class so no biggy, right? If you’re not flexible for the small stuff (practice makes perfect) then you won’t be able to stretch yourself to be flexible for when the big changes happen. P.s I did already have a folder with lots of teaching ideas marked “Year ½” that I had to change to "Year 1" (I know SO much effort). Also, I like to be organized (thank you Pinterest, you God). 

I already feel as though this valuable lesson in teacher flexibility has not only  helped me through my final year prac but also in preparation for real world teaching next year. I want to thank my amazing PER 4 mentor (I will call her AJ) for this helpful piece of advice. I am bucket loads of lucky to be working with her only down the hall from me next year.

Don't forget to subscribe to Edumacate Me by clicking Join this site on the right hand side of the screen or entering your email address under subscribe to Edumacate Me. Thank you for all the support I have received about this blog so far!

                                                                  Kirsten :)

The beginning...

Hello and welcome!

So this is the first post to my blog Edumacate Me. I am creating this blog as a kind of online journal of my personal journey as a beginning teacher. I'm not only a beginning teacher but also a beginner at blogging so I hope you enjoy and get through this first post!

Firstly the title of my blog is just a bit of fun as I am a fan of Homer Simpson and his discourse on education. If you don't know Homer Simpson he says to his daughter Lisa "Can you edumacate me in the ways of the saxamophone?". 

Upon looking up the word "edumacate" through my good friend Google I found one of Urban dictionaries definitions to be thought provoking:

3. Edumacate; An uneducated way people, including Redneck's, Hill-Billy's and Feral people use in place of the word Education to sound smarter than they may be. 

My golly.
It's this blatant categorization of people that motivates me to teach future generations that this is exactly the type of thing that happens in our society that needs to be eradicated. I understand that it's a natural part of human nature to want to categorize things for example food, colours, animals etc. I don't argue that some of these things need categorization, but to do this with people in our society, creates inequity and this means that not everyone gets the chances each and every person deserves! 
Let me give an example of catergorizing 
"Oh Harry comes from an uneducated family he won't know how to spell". UGH. No matter what your background or context you come from you are important and you can do anything if you believe in yourself!

I am about to embark on my journey as a beginning teacher in a challenging category 2 school in the Northern suburbs of Adelaide (category 2 according to the DECD Index of Educational Disadvantage 2014;category 1 being the most disadvantaged). Many of the students I am about to encounter could be classified by some as coming from "feral" families. Not in my eyes. I cannot wait to give them the opportunity to realize their full potentials, hope, dream and most of all learn.

I accepted the job 2 days ago and my reactions went in this order:

Excited (In my wildest dreams I never expected to get a teaching job first year out from uni)

Huggy (I hugged the deputy principal when she told me...don't worry I asked if I could hug her first)

Carefree (At the time of finding out about my new job I was relief teaching in the special unit of the school and they were the most challenging bunch of students in regards to behaviour e.g. when I greeted them in the morning "Hello, I'm Miss. Osborne your relief teacher today" to which I received a "Nuh, get f***ed we're not having YOU!" from 2 students who proceeded to walk away. However I didn't let this effect me and I greeted them warmly again once leadership encouraged the students to attend class. I ended up forming a really good bond with one of the boys and by the end of the day he hi-fived me before getting into his taxi to go home.)

Screamy (is that a word? I'm a teacher ha. I screamed with happiness...don't worry I waited until I was in my car)

Daunted (Hello reality and responsibility...Pinterest is officially my new best friend)

So here we are at the beginning of my teaching journey. I will blog about my triumphs, my failures, great resources I find and use and anything and everything I think is relevant to my teaching journey. 
The first couple of posts will most likely be to do with organizing myself for the school term and setting up my classroom (OH MY GOD I'M GOING TO HAVE A CLASSROOM). Please feel free to leave me comments and feedback on my posts I'd love to hear from you!

My name is Kirsten Osborne and I am a beginning teacher of a year 1 class in South Australia. 
Bring. It. On!

:)