And so it begins again.

It's that time again.  The start of school is upon us, and honestly, I'm kind of ready for it because this is the time of year when I get really excited about being a teacher.  I get a clean slate, a refresh button, a chance to start over.  I read teachery books and teachery blogs all summer in hopes of revamping my classroom and gaining more teachery wisdom from those who do it better.  I sift through endless grains of information, straining to find my gold.  What I read churns up new ideas, so by the time school starts, I'm brimming with awesome.  All summer I feel like I've been clicking my way up to the top of the roller coaster, gathering inspiration, preparing for the drop.  I feel ready to implement all my new teachery ideas and rock my students' worlds, and I'm such an idealist, a dreamer that I think all of these will flow uninhibited, flawlessly into my classroom, like a gentle breeze of revolution.   As I've learned from past experiences, though, after a couple weeks, I realize I'm not all that, and my classroom doesn't always resemble the well-oiled, pristine machine I'd visualized all summer.  And I'm becoming OK with that.

It's always difficult to process the feeling of not measuring up, which creeps to the forefront of my mind often.  There is always someone who does it better, which means I must be doing it wrong, right?  My brain gets gray and hazy with self-doubt sometimes, and I'm a little too hard on myself.  But I've been doing some soul-searching and reminiscing of past years in the classroom, and I've decided that I do some good things.  It's unrealistic for me to assume that I can adapt a hundred new strategies from Pinterest and completely restructure my classroom around others' ideas.  Where's the ownership in that?  I'm firm believer in kids taking ownership of their learning, but I wasn't taking ownership of my teaching.  I'm not saying I can't learn from people, but it was getting to the point where I was discrediting my own experiences, which is just not healthy.  I've realized that I need trust myself too.  There's no way I can possibly implement all the ideas that have crossed my eyes this summer:  1.) Everyone is different and runs their classroom accordingly.  2.) That's just too much multi-tasking, and I'm not that talented.  3.) The fun of teaching lies in the atmosphere I create.

I never want to get to a point where I feel like I know everything.  That's a like a tree willing itself not to grow.  I love learning and will continue to research ways to better myself, but learning to trust myself is an invaluable lesson too, one that I can't read on a teachery blog.  So, this year, I think I'll try a couple of new things in class as well as continue to build upon what I do already: build relationships to reach kids where they are.

I've still got A LOT of work to do before the year starts (seriously, I won't sleep next week), but as I nail down specifics of how my classroom will work, I wait at the top of this coaster for the last couple of clicks.  Then the only thing left will be to close my eyes, lift my hands, and drop.