Important to Me

Be it personal or professional, the course through which ideas flow between people is an expected, and complicated performance. The internet has compounded this into a reasoning that makes bits and pieces of the message puzzle all that much more to sort through.  Blogs are only one way in which the world is reaching out.

My little blip starts here within this one.

The very title of this blog, The Horse's Mouth, begins to place that first puzzle piece to my picture. I am a college student here at Edinboro University not just on my first run through, but my second. With a BS in Art Education it was no surprise that I graduated loving what I do and seeking that first classroom all of my own. As any graduate quickly finds, a balance of persistence and patience is the only way to hit the ground running after graduation. That, and experience.

Many things changed with the application of that one word. I quickly found that as much as you think you can handle in student teaching, your first few days as a substitute in a new school district, or even a familiar one, will offer a rude awakening. Ideas change and spiral. Doubts form, if briefly. Your former understanding shifts to create new theories, new rules you take with you as personal policy, and others you learn not to ever adopt into your own style. Things change rapidly, and you realize how much you do not know.

However, that does not change the things you do. The very foundation of your goals is what you hold the most dear. That set of ideals becomes your challenge as well as your inspiration. It becomes what you value, and what you find the most important.

The video above speaks volumes in my personal reach to  portray that. For me the most important goal is to inspire a grasp at opportunity in every way I can by making available every venue and resource I am able to provide physically in the classroom both with materials, and by instilling a drive to use them to their fullest potential.

To be competitive a student must have the ability to access many forms of information and training long before they have reached the workforce today. This not only includes an integration of current technology and software, but critical thinking; access to outside experts and people in the field; and a general understanding that not one subject stands on its own, including in the art classroom. Making this possible is a short reach into a supportive administration, budget, and "selling yourself" as a teacher. I was once told by a colleague that no matter what your subject, if your approach as a teacher isn't like a salesman trying to spur enthusiasm about a product, no amount of planning will ever make the students interested.

I have yet to find a better piece of advice to work its change so immediately in the classroom. I am still sorting out the puzzle pieces of my own, but the experience of this placing together this picture is one I look forward to with just as much fervor as the day I began.

- heyyou -