I was lucky enough to get feedback from both my project manager, Lauren van Vliet, and my teacher, Katie Lynch, they were able to see me teach multiple times and they always had something for me to get better at, they both wanted to see me succeed and grow in the environmental education field. During my first week when I was super nervous Katie was there and she told me afterwards to remember that not everyone has the same Spanish language skills as I do, that before a lesson I should always breathe in and breathe out to let out all the emotions and nerves so that I don’t rush through the lesson. During the after teaching debriefing I found myself always thinking above and beyond just the pluses and deltas but actually the reasoning behind my actions and that was all thanks to Lauren. Lauren during this whole project kept reminding me that we can do it, but we are also humans, she always remembered us that we grow from within, she noticed the change in my anxiety and stress levels before every lesson because we would always meet the whole team and she would do a daily check-in to see how each one of us was feeling. We talked consequently every week about how my classroom management was getting better every time and she was always validating the small steps that I was taking to achieve my main goal during my teaching experience.
Thank you both for guiding me to be the environmental educator I am now!