One more reflexión

I think that my growth and understanding about being a reflective teacher through blogs has been very subtle. It is hard to be reflective and be public all at the same time.  I think that many of us at the beginning of the year in our cohort could hardly bring our selves to write enough about critical issues and to share with others what caused us frustration and joy.

Many times blogging also has been times of half thoughts, and fussy ideas emerging. Yet it has been nice to share with the cohort and other people my wonders. Like my wonders about students fascination for poetry (that I did not have at their age) or how exciting it is for a math unit to come together and see students understand. Often I have found that the responses are just what I need to push my thinking or to encourage me. However as one of us put in a blog last quarter, it is an interesting world that we enter, and the challenge might be to stay connected with so much happening.

I think that part of this growth being so public is that I have to push my thinking in ways I would not usually want to. There are ideas that I found myself grappling with such as how we want to develop our community or encourage students to participate. To articulate my thoughts and respond to others has been an interesting task. I have found however that educators are mostly going to give a helping hand and support that I would not have found, if I did not challenge myself to do so. I think that like Sonia Nieto said in her book What Keeps Teachers Going that, “To survive and grow, I have to find colleagues who share my anger, hopes, beliefs, and assumptions about students and teaching.” Blogging and tweeting are just another platform that I can continue to use to develop as educators and learners.

Education is Politics

While reading Sonia Nieto’s first chapters of What Keeps Teachers Going? I have all this thoughts that are going through my head. I cannot believe how much of her own curiosities as a young teacher, I can relate to.

So far I am a little scared about what I already know is true and what I need to work on, which is collaboration. Sonia Nieteo (2003) argues that, if we want to make a difference it will have to be in “combination of personal, collective, and institutional action.” It is more than I am ready to think about at this point nonetheless it is something for me to think about.

I am also wondering about this idea that “education is politics”. She quotes Paulo Freire and say, “”education is politics!” And he added, “[T]he teacher has to ask, What kind of politics am I doing in the classroom? That is, in favor of whom am I being a teacher?”” (Nieto, 2003, pg.15). Nieto again seem like is talking about big ideas, but I wonder what is it that I must already be doing? I am curious also about what others are doing especially when I think of multicultural education.