Why we're here: Looking Back and Looking Forward

​Every kid needs a champion--an adult who will never give up on them, who understands the power of connection, and insists that they become the best they can possibly be..."

These kind of inspirational videos can be very powerful--to ground us, to re-energize us, to help us remember why we have answered the call to teach and what it means to live up to that call every day. It can get so easy to lose track of these real reasons when officials and evaluations mandate the language, forms, and representation of our practice in highly technical ways. We can spend a lot of time--too much time-- using verbs like justify, clarify, explain, synthesize, specify, align, measure, assess and evaluate--that we lose sight of those "other" verbs--to love, to listen, to uplift, to share, to support, to mentor, to witness, to encourage, and sometimes just to be there for our students. 

On our last day of seminar for this semester, we took some time to consider the following--a healthy exercise for all of us to engage in:
--Why are you passionate about teaching?
--How has your passion guided and worked through you in your experiences this year?
--How will you nurture and recharge your passion to "keep it close" during the daily grind?