My luggage

A teacher's suitcase contains everything that he or she has learned throughout the journey of becoming an educator. This suitcase tends to be big and quite heavy, because we not only bring with us theories, but also memories, experiences, ideas, materials, colleagues and friends, resources, and the smile of each child that we have impacted.

My suitcase gets bigger with time, everywhere I go I acquire something new. Most of the time it is knowledge, this requires little space, but helps the most. With it you learn how to do things, what not to do, what to repeat and what you should adapt and how you can do it. To this we add experience; each time we teach we encounter new environments, new challenges and learn how to deal with it. Experience will be one of the keys to knowledge.

Due to the diversity of students and school administration, teachers go through a lot of change and challenges. However, something that should never change is the motivation implemented in every class and the motivation to continue within our profession with pride and passion. Kids need this, they need to feel loved, celebrated, and enthusiastic and need to be pushed to their maximum capacities. Students are able to do their best when the teacher uses all of his or her luggage.

The College of Education of the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras Campus has prepared me to interact in any classroom with a diverse group of students. I feel prepared to create classes in which students acquire a great deal of knowledge while having fun. The curriculum I followed throughout the BA. counted with various classes about material creation, student evaluation, educational philosophy, integration of technology, children’s development, language arts and a great lab experience in the field of education. All of these courses and many prior experiences have formed me into a great teacher.

I consider that I am completely ready to teach! I can mostly confirm this after my Teaching Practicum and after 2 years of working in an educational center. My practicum was done at the UPR Elementary School, which is a practice unit of the College of Education, UPR-RP. It is the only elementary school laboratory in Puerto Rico. As a practice center, during each semester, approximately 350 people, including students and professionals related to teaching, perform some professional or academic development experience in the school. It is accredited by the Middle State Association and is an active member of the National Association of Laboratory Schools (NALS), and its curricular model is based on socio-critical and cultural interpretative models. In harmony with the vision and mission of the College of Education, this school provides an innovative and excellent education to its students, as well as being centers for preparation, observation, practice, research and innovation of the educators in training at the undergraduate and graduate level of the College of Education. They are situated as scenarios for the creation, research and modeling of the best educational practices whose aims are to improve and transform the processes of teaching-learning and integration of emerging technologies. These experiences involve the team work of the teachers and students of the laboratory schools, the College of Education and the Campus, as well as other learning communities.

On the other hand, my job as an English instructor has been in Niños de Nueva Esperanza, in Toa Baja, Puerto Rico, which is a non-profit institution that serves as an educational and social center for young people in the community. The participants receive lessons (English, Math, Spanish and Science), art classes, theater and photography workshops, among other subjects with the aim of fighting laziness in adolescents and keeping them away from negative influences. The academic area is divided in four multi-grade groups. Each group receives the English class once a day; within the class they cover the material planned for the day and receive help for their school assignments. In the class, I must integrate subjects, social aspects of the community and technology, while making the class and these concepts pertinent to the students. (https://nneenglishclass.weebly.com/teachers-corner.html)

Both of these environments are very diverse. The first has many resources, a collaborating community, proficient students and many faculty members. The second must work hard to receive resources for their participants, collaborates to hep the community improve and grow day by day, receives all types of students with many different socio-economic and academic backgrounds, and does as much as it can with a much smaller faculty. I've interacted in both communities with ease, learning everyday, helping, teaching, providing to the centers and making learning fun, interactive, and worthwhile.

With my experience I have acquired a mastery of lesson planning, creating curricular maps and unit plans with the students’ needs and talents in mind. I have created patience and love towards the students and the profession; each step has been a pillar to reach complete mastery (which is actually never complete because we are in constant development and evolution). In pedagogy, the greatest weapon is experience and professional development. I’ve made sure to enhance my knowledge with every provided opportunity, to use my time wisely during lab experiences to actually impact my students in a dynamic way and motivate them day by day to do a better job and be better people.

My students, my mentors, professors, colleagues and parents of students encourage me to believe that I have grown within my profession and that I have done a good job and will do a great job as a ESL teacher in whichever community life takes me teach in.

Our entire learning process travels with us throughout life, everything is applied, sometimes even without noticing. This is why we must be careful with what we bring with us, we must bring what is necessary and what will make an impact. Our suitcase will help us make a difference in the world.