What are your visions and values?

Revise visions and values.

I stared at the list of visions and values given to us in class and thought what are my visions and values? What visions and values do I want to pass on to my future students someday? What if my students don’t have the same visions and values for themselves as I have for them? What if they fight me every step of the way?

After a lot of reflection, I’ve come to the conclusion that my list of visions and values for myself as a future teacher and lifelong learner is probably going to change a million times over and I am going to have to have a list of visions and values for each and every one of my students someday. Some students are going to have different needs than others. Not only am I going to have to have a list of my own for them, but I am going to want them to have their own lists.

Of course there is going to be an overall list that applies to all of my students, much like the one we were given in class, but I believe that getting to know each and every one of your students to figure out exactly what they need in your classroom is so important.

I know that I want all of my students to be reading and writing everyday. I want them to read things that they are interested in and things that they can relate to. Something that will move them in a way that most assigned readings don’t do. I want them to write in order to express their feelings and reflect their thoughts on something meaningful to them, not just because I told them to write. I want them to tap into their creative thinking and write stories and poems that they didn’t think they were capable of writing.

The best experience I had when it came to fictional writing was a writing prompt given to me in high school my freshman year: Write about a bad experience, but add fictional aspects to make it more dramatic. I wrote about a time when my dad and one of his girlfriends fought, but I blew it way out of proportion and it turned into a really interesting story, but it seemed believable and like it wasn’t forced. I was really proud of that piece of writing and I never thought I could write a fictional story.

I want my students to achieve literate lives that they continue to live even after they graduate.

The list of vision
s and values that I have for myself and my students is endless. It is a little overwhelming and scary, but I want to challenge myself and my students to be the best readers and writers that they are capable of being.