Who am I as a Leader?

When I think about who I am as a leader, I think about myself as a leader in my classroom and a teacher-leader within my grade-level team. This is actually only my third year teaching, but I am currently mentoring a new first grade teacher. We are the only two members of our team and so this year I have worked hard to create year-long plans with critical standards, essential questions, enduring understandings and learning targets (something my school did not have previously at the first grade level). This work took a lot of time, but long-term organization and student success was at the forefront of my planning. By establishing clear timelines for teaching certain units, I was able to identify multiple assessment opportunities and more easily identify students who are in need of additional support. With this work, I am also better equipped to help my mentee identify students who are in need of additional support. When it comes to effective systems, I am always one to take the time to set up something that will work year-after-year.

I am a leader in my classroom. Within my classroom, I make conscious decisions each day to model the behavior that I want my students to mirror. When dealing with difficult, and at times violent behavior, it can be hard to respond calmly and empathetically; considering the child's feelings at the time of the incident. For my students, I model taking a deep breath, remaining calm and treating each child with respect. In this way, I can teach children how we treat each other within the classroom and outside of the classroom. Students are always looking to their teachers to see how they will respond, I choose to respond with kindness, empathy and respect - I think this is the work of any effective leader. George Courous talked about how he really only started blogging to understand it as a tool before he asked students and others to use it as well. When I choose to model kindness, calmness and empathy, I am following the same model or guidelines that George Courous set out. I am doing what I am expecting my students to do. An effective leader models the behaviors, routines and expectations that he or she expects others to follow.

When I started at Cambridge Elementary School three years ago, I remember feeling overwhelmed. There were so many new systems, policies and procedures that were different from my previous job and I always felt as though I was unprepared. It was the little things that added up quickly... how to make copies, emergency procedures, how to enter purchase orders, the processes for getting academic or behavioral support, the procedure for communicating with families, arrival and dismissal routines, etc... After the first several weeks my head was spinning and I felt as if I'd never learn how things worked. At the time, my mentor teacher had been teaching for six years and told me that I would get the hang of things, but it didn't feel like it at the time. Flash forward three years and she was absolutely right. I did master entering grades, exporting score reports, entering purchase orders and filling out EST referral forms, but I never forgot this sense of chaos that led me to believe education was wrong for me.

When my mentee started out this fall, I made a point of taking these procedural steps together. I would introduce her to several new things per day/week and support her during planning time and after school in completing administrative work. Not that teaching is a cake-walk, but I can remember feeling overwhelmed by all that was new and unexpected. As a mentor and grade-level team leader, I try to plan ahead and anticipate new tasks and routines that she may need additional help with. I believe by taking the time to show her how and then watch and assist in her completing the work with her students is beneficial in her gaining confidence and independence with some of the work that stressed me out the most. As a leader, I try to think about setting my mentee up for success in the long term. I share progress monitoring tools, scope and sequence documents for the curriculum and my knowledge of procedural routines. I think it is easy to feel overwhelmed as a brand new teacher and providing scaffolding with school-specific and grade-level specific expectations is a good way to lessen stress and increase the focus on academics and students' success.