Teach Like A Pirate Book Study–Chapter 1

I am participating in the “Teach Like a Pirate” book study with Third Grade Tidbits and Rowdy in First Grade.

I LOVE this book!  I have to admit that I have lost a little…okay more than a little…passion for my job this year.  I have heard so many people say that the current climate has turned our profession into a job.  It almost makes me cry to think that a profession I have and still love so much is in such a sorry state right now.  I am hoping this book will help me to see the positives in what I love to do!  It is so needed right now!

Some things that resonated with me:

Content Passion – I love teaching literacy!  I have always loved it, especially reaching.  Writing, while I love it, has always been so challenging for me.  I love teaching social studies.  Math and science – not so much. However, I can make the connections and create passion for what I am teaching. 

I have been participating in book studies and reading a lot about areas outside my expertise – particularly math.  This was the wonderful benefit of having a yearly review system where we were observed every three years and on the off years, we set goals and built a "*small* portfolio to show our work.  This provided me with a wonderful year to study writing and another to study math. 

Now we need to be fantastic at everything and I can tell you, I at least, am stretched so thin that I don’t believe I have truly grown professional this year.  Unless you count playing to rubrics and teaching students how to fill out bubble sheets

Professional Passion – I love education!  I have come to that conclusion over a few not-so-easy years of teaching.  I love what I do, even though it is becoming a different type of challenge.  Teaching is no longer a challenge that helps you grow as a professional, it seems some days to be the same type of challenge as hitting your head on a cinderblock wall – nothing but frustrating.

I have found that returning to school has renewed my professional passion. It is not directly connected to my teaching, but it helps me to find perspective and renew my personal goals and philosophy that became lost somewhere along the way.

*I love the idea of focusing on LCLs (Life Changing Lessons) when the content is not one of your personal teaching passions.

Personal Passion – I often make connections to my personal life and the things I enjoy doing.  I think this may be a difference that pops up when reading this book because it was written by a high school teacher.  Primary/elementary teachers tend to share a lot more of themselves. My students know about my pets, that I love to read, garden, and quilt.  They know my plans for the summer and I know theirs because we talk about all this.  It is unavoidable with little ones.

I really love this idea of finding ways to become more passionate about what we do.  In these times, I think we are having a lot of that passion squeezed out of us and it is easy to become disheartened with the issues in our classroom, testing, and political issues.  I think this book may be a great way to refocus ourselves and think about what is really important and why we really love what we do. 

Join in this wonderful book study and link up!