Speaking Words of Wisdom, Let It Be

 

"Children benefit most from teachers who have the skills, knowledge, and judgment to make good decisions and are given the opportunity to use them." 

-Dr. Susan Bredekamp

It does little to have a teacher who is merely educated in the field of education. When there is no passion, no drive, no desire to help the future generations, then what is the point? School is not just about learning facts and equations, it is about fostering relationships and developing skills for the future. It is a teacher's job to foster these outlets and when they fail, the student fails.  

"...The unfortunate reality is that child care employment offers low wages, few job benefits, and limited opportunities for professional advancement." 

-Dr. Marcy Whitebrook

Books have been written, speeches said, and protests held for the wages that child care workers and teachers receive. Yet we still have these employees. That goes to show how much compassion people still hold and how the need to teach is so strong in so many individuals. Even with these negative factors that Dr. Whitebrook states, there are still those individuals that get out of bed at 5am, after having spent the night grading papers, who spend their money on supplies for their students and who go into work everyday with a smile on their face. 

"...My passion to create a safer more just world is there, and I suppose it will be there until the day I die – maybe even after…” 

-Dr. Louise Derman-Sparks

A legacy is something that an individual is remembered for, far past their lifespan. It is inspirational to think that the imprint we leave on these students and on the field of early childhood, may follow us well past our years. 

“I’m not here to save the world, I’m here just to make a difference in the community I’m working.” 

- Raymond Hernandez  

The smallest things make the biggest impact. By helping out even just a single student, we may make the biggest difference, if only in their own personal life. As early childhood employees, we have the greatest chance to make a difference in the years to come, we must accept and embrace this fact and treat everyday like it will make a difference for those around us.  

Personal Childhood Web

 My parents are a unit. They both have played such a vital role in my upbringing and ultimately my education. Having met, married, and reproduced at such a young age, they value the meaning of hard work and knowing what it takes to simply survive. I grew up knowing how education was my ticket to something greater and to never go for "average". Every assignment, summer reading, extracurricular activity, and beyond, was to be performed above average, but in a way that I still enjoyed doing it. I never once questioned my path to college nor my future beyond. Every opportunity and chance I was given, I made my own choices, but I knew I had their support no matter what. My father fostered my love of reading and writing from an early age, beginning with my first writing assignment in Kindergarten in which we had to create an alternate ending to a book we had read. We spent an entire weekend creating different outlines and illustrations before we finally settled on one to create for class. This became a weekly occurrence for most of my Elementary years and beyond. With his help and creative mind, I began a love of writing and creating stories to share with others. I credit him with my creative mind and my imagination for the impossible. 

My mother balanced me out with her logical mind and ability to take things step by step, or the reminder to at least read the instructions. Countless nights were spent with (both of us) crying over math homework, chemistry equations, and ultimately the dings these classes left in my GPA. Through those nights, however, I learned how important it was to balance my mind with the creative and the logical. It made focusing on tasks and ideas easier to manage and my mother helped clear my path to college and now graduate school. As she is now a teacher, I always know I can come to her with whatever problem I may have. And while she is the more logical of the two of us, I can always count on her to remind me to have some fun. Both of my parents are such strong individuals in my life and are incredibly important to me as an individual. 

 While it does not look like it from the picture, being the older sibling has influenced my life in more ways to count. My brother and sister have been my best friends since 1996 and 1998. While both my parents were either in school or working, I grew up quickly, learning how to take care of two young kids when I, myself, was only a child. There are countless memories of when we played 'school' and I would act as the teacher, reading to them, coloring with them, and creating lessons to teach them their ABCs, months of the year, and days of the week. I believe a huge aspect of my personality comes from being a big sister and my leadership skills developed from an early age. Even in school, I made a name for the Rethman kids and while they might have hated it at the time when they were known simply as "Emily's brother" or
"Emily's sister", I like to believe that their drive and determination in school developed from striving to live up to that name. All three of us have been through a lot more than your average siblings, and the relationship I have with each of them is indescribable. I will always be there for them and if our group text that has been going on since my sister got her first phone is any indication, they will always have my back as well. 

While he was not part of my childhood necessarily, my husband has played a HUGE part in my educational journey. We met the summer before my junior year of college and he played a vital part in me completing my undergraduate career a semester early while I also worked full time. He has been my shoulder to cry on, my personal chef, my paper checker, and the one to remind myself to take a break every now and then. He has also been an amazing dad to our two dogs and was the one to explain to them why mommy couldn't go with them to the dog park because of homework. My personal journey into the role I am in now would be next to impossible, if at all feasible, if not for him. Also, an honorable mention to my two fur-babies who spent many a night (right now in fact) sitting on my lap under my computer, or on my feet, supporting me through everything in their silent ways. I have been blessed beyond measure and will make it a point to remind each of these individuals how much they mean to me more often. 

Oh the Thinks You Can Think

Once upon a time, a girl was born to two teenage parents. She was born with a smile and a full head of hair, with an imagination that far exceeded her vocabulary. While she spent the majority of her adolescence lost in the pages of books, she spent an equal amount of time exploring the outside world as well. Through  the trust of her parents to walk along the flat beaches of Mississippi, the giant peaks of Mt. Rainer in Washington, desert trails in Arizona, and rolling hills in Georgia, this little girl grew up learning about the world around her and the individuals that accompanied it. With her imagination and the imagination built by mountains of books around her, she grew from a little girl into an adult with a love of adventure and a life of compassion.

“Every child is born a naturalist. His eyes are, by nature,
open to the glories of the stars, the beauty of the flowers,
and the mystery of life.” –  R. Search

I believe that human development relies on this primal urge to always keep searching, to always keep wondering, and to always keep learning. It is with this belief and with the above quote, that I begin my own personal journey into the educational world with emphasis in Early Childhood Education. As I begin my career as an Kindergarten teacher, I hope that I can instill the mystery of life in my students and to always have them wanting more. It would do us no good if we were to shut our eyes from the world around us, just to make money, pay bills, and pass peacefully at a ripe old age. It is what we do with the time from when we first open our eyes, to the time we last close them, that truly matters. I believe that this wanderlust begins in childhood and that is why I have made it my mission to become a professional in the field. By starting off teaching children who are so open to the world around them, by catching them early, I hope that I can be a source of supplied wonderment so that they may grow up always wanting more from life and have the knowledge to go out and get it.

Introduction

Hello All!

My name is Emily and I am 23 years old. I currently reside in Athens, Georgia where I graduated from the University of Georgia early in 2014 with a Sociology degree. After taking a year off to travel and work, I initially decided to pursue Walden's Master in the Art of Teaching degree to earn licensure as a teacher. However, while I was enrolled, I received an out of this world offer to be a Kindergarten teacher in San Antonio, Texas, parallel to earning my certification while working. I will be moving there in three weeks, so juggling this class, moving, and starting a new career will definitely be challenging, but I trust in myself and husband's cooking skills to make it through ;) . I am focusing on Teaching and Diversity as I will be a Kindergarten teacher for a public charter school that takes in a diverse group of students. I am finishing up my last two weeks working as a Preschool teacher and am thrilled at the prospect of working with kids who are potty-trained! I am excited to see what this new path brings me and how this class will help further my understanding of Early Childhood.