Lots of Opportunities

As the calendar changes from July to August, the warm air ushers in that feeling of a new beginning in my mind. The hot, sticky weather, the knowledge that summer is running out of time, and the amount of back-to-school Wal-Mart ads announce that another year of school is about to begin.

I feel that twinge of nervousness. I will have about forty new kids in my life in a few short weeks, forty new faces and names to learn, forty new personalities to adapt to, and forty new opportunities. Yes! Opportunities. The google definition of “opportunity” is stated as, “a set of circumstances that makes it possible to do something”. WOW! I will have 40 sets of circumstances that will make it possible to do something! Forty different packages of various talents and skills; some will be amazing at math, others will be strong readers, some will love to write stories or learn about the past. And some... will not be excited about reading, some won’t care about Social Studies or how communities work and change over time. Some will not like grammar, spelling or writing at all…but regardless, ALL; every single one of these, “sets of circumstances” will make it possible to do something.

My job will be to learn everything I can about each student in orders to tap into what makes them tick. I will teach them to love reading when I read aloud books like Charlotte’s Web and The Twits, and come up with crazy voices for the characters, with weird accents. They will learn to love writing when I learn what they enjoy doing, and then help them develop a narrative about that topic. Grammar will become a fun activity with the use of task cards and group challenges and games.

They will also learn how very important it is to “make mistakes”, so they can become better. In fact, they will learn that their teacher just might be the “queen of mistakes” J They will see that hard work and trying again and again is how you truly learn and make the most of the opportunities you are given.

Every child is an opportunity---a little set of circumstances that make it possible to do something. We will do so much! I hope they each leave my room in May knowing that they all have “opportunities” and “possibilities” in their lives and future. I hope above all they learn how to persevere and work hard, to never give up and to definitely make mistakes because if they can learn that…then any opportunity they have, big or small will far surpass their expectations in the same way I am sure each of them will far surpass mine!