Aug
23
2009
What I Look Forward To At The Beginning Of A School Year:
Posted by: awillis2 in ReflectionsIt is that time of year again when school begins. As I begin putting my classroom back together and writing up all of my plans, I reflect on what I am looking forward to when beginning my 13th year at FHCDS teaching elementary general music:
- The students! I cannot wait to see my students again! Since I left the 08-09 school year early to have a baby, I miss them even more at this time of year. Elementary students are sponges. They love to learn about music. When I structure my lessons so my students sing, play instruments, move, compose using music technology, record their own improvisations and more, my students eat it up.
- Professional Development. Each year I try to present at two conferences. When I am attending those conferences, I always make sure to attend at least one choral session, one instrumental session, at least two general music sessions, and numerous music tech sessions. I always feel rejuvenated when I return from a conference and I have new materials to immediately put forth in my classroom.
- Adding new items to my curriculum: At the beginning of each year, I look over my lesson plans from last year and try to improve on them.
- How parenthood will affect my teaching: A good friend recently told me that when you become a parent, you look at your students in a new way. You see them as someone’s child as well as a student. This in turn, will change the way you teach. I am looking forward to seeing how becoming a parent for the first time this past May, will affect my teaching this year.
- “A Ha! Moments:” To me, there is nothing better than when your student who was struggling with singing on pitch, finally does sing on pitch. Or the student who recognizes a rhythm pattern and claps it for you perfectly. And many more of those “A Ha!” moments.
These are just a few of the items that I am looking forward to this year. What are you looking forward to this school year?
Entries (RSS)
Powered by FireStats
August 24th, 2009 at 11:09 am
[…] What I Look Forward to at the Beginning of a School Year: A great post by Amy Burns about many of the things that “we” look forward to at the start of the school year. […]
August 30th, 2009 at 11:52 pm
Amy,
What a wonderful list of things to look forward to! I especially like the points about parenthood affecting your teaching, and professional development. In fact, I wrote a post about how to try to maintain the rejuvenating effects of conferences throughout the year that you might enjoy. Check it out at http://andyzweibel.com/2009/03/31/the-conference-effect/ and feel free to let me know what you think!
Good luck as the school year begins!
-Andy
September 1st, 2009 at 9:20 am
Wow, Amy! That’s a great post. I don’t know if this is merely coincidence; but, we practically have been looking forward to almost the same things: students, professional and curriculum development, and defining teaching and parenthood specifically. As music teachers, we grow together with our students; we teach and we also learn a lot. Keep up the good work, my friend. Just in case, you want to learn and adopt new music teaching tips from music teachers software and websites, please check them out on this page and take your music teaching experience to the next level. Music teaching is indeed a great experience and a very noble profession. Let’s enjoy each moment!
September 16th, 2009 at 5:48 am
I got emotional reading this. I’m also a music teacher and I love every moment of it. Especially those “a-ha!” moments you described!
September 16th, 2009 at 9:17 am
Thanks all! The “a ha” moments are the best!!!
Andy-thanks for the great post!
Amy:)