As we enter the month of Thanksgiving, I have been reflecting on events that have changed the course of my life. I was recently listening to the song “This by Darius Rucker. He sings about “every stoplight I didn't make, every chance I did or I didn't take,” all those things that could have happened but didn’t led him to where he is today. And he wouldn’t change a thing. That’s how I’ve been feeling.
When our daughter was born, my husband and I decided that I would stay at home with her so that one of us would be with her all of the time. So I began my life as a stay-at-home mom. I continued my stay-at-home duties when my son was born, and fell in love with my job as the teacher and care provider for my two young children. When they started “real” school, I followed them and became a classroom volunteer. I planned class parties, copied papers for teachers, put up bulletin boards, and sat in the cafeteria with my own children once a week for lunch. But just as I had vowed when I was in college I continued my belief that there was no way that I would ever become a teacher!
I shared school with my children at school and at home. When we sat at the table to do homework, we would talk about the other students in their classes and their teachers. It was great fun! I also volunteered with the Parent/Teacher association. I helped with fundraisers and organized events at the school. I enjoyed working with the teachers at my children’s school, but I knew that I would never become a teacher. I had vowed it would never happen.
But when my son entered middle school, he refused to allow me to be a parent volunteer. He said it wasn’t “cool.” So I began plotting. I know how he loved sports, so I told him that if he let me apply to be a substitute teacher at the middle school that I would buy Oriole season tickets with the money I made. He agreed and his agreeing changed my life.
About a year after I began substitute teaching, I received a telephone call from the foreign language curriculum specialist. She needed a long-term Spanish substitute and since I had a minor in Spanish, she wanted to know if I was interested. I discussed it with my husband and both children and we agreed to give it a try.
I fell in love with teaching! I woke up excited about going to work, and lay awake in bed at night trying to figure out new teaching strategies to help my students. I was playing school again, but this time the students were not my own children. That was in the spring of 1999 and I have been teaching ever since. I have grown professionally and as a human being. Being part of the lives of my students has given me a new outlook, and I do indeed touch the future.
Our mothers are our first teachers, and my children taught me that!
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