Wavin’ Flag (and teaching our students to do the same)

Dear Teacher,

Good Monday morning to you!  I know, Mondays can be hard, but it is a new week and time to get pumped up for it.  I think I found a good song to help you do that!

In case you are new to my Monday morning posts, click play and then read on.  It is time for your weekly theme song.  🙂

Teacher friend, we have the most amazing job in the world.  We teach.  Well, we do more than just teach, but that is all a part of what being a teacher means.

What we do can be difficult, but that makes it no less amazing.  I know that new weeks bring new challenges and stresses, but we can’t let that bring us down.  It is a new day and a new week, and we get to start over…no matter what last week or yesterday was like!  We need to find the joy in that!

It is a bright, sunny, new start!  Even if it is raining where you are.  We can lift our head up.  We can wave our flag.  We can find freedom in the newness of every day!

We need to.  We have to.  There is no way around it.  It is a part of our job as teachers!

A part of our job?  Really, DearTeacherLoveTeacher Guy?

Yes, it is a part of our job!

Why?

I am glad that you asked!  It is a part of our job because, as I said, being a teacher is more than just teaching.  A part of what we do is to model life for our students.  They look up to us.  They rely on us.  They see us as a model of how to “do life.”  If we do something, say something, or act in someway…they see it.  They absorb it.  They analyze it.  And they mirror it.

Are we helping them prepare for life as well-balanced adults?  What is the picture that we are giving them?  What is the model that we are putting in front of them to follow?  If they mimic us, what would we see?

How we react, how we act, how we cope, how we change, how we “do life” is constantly under the microscope of some of the most keen-eyed scientists in the world, our students.  They are watching.  They are waiting.  They want to see what we do and how we live.

We never truly know the environment that our students come from, and we do not know the models for life that they have at home.  They may need another way to think and react.  They may need a different view on life.  Are we showing that to our students?  Are we showing another option than what they see at home?

True, a lot of our students may get great visions of life at home…but not all of them.  Also, if they have great models at home, they are still watching you and others to see what it is like for other people.  We are being analyzed no matter what.

So, are you showing your students how to embrace each and every day as a new start with confidence and a sense of freedom?  Are we showing them how to start over?  Are we teaching them to hold up their heads and wave their flags?

I know that you are showing your students what they need to see.  I also know that if you have had some bad days with this that you will start fresh today and make some positive changes.  I know that you love and care for you students, and you will do all that you can to help them learn how to “do life” well!  You are awesome and amazing!  Keep on teaching, Teacher!

Love, Teacher

PS…by the way, I am running a sale in my DearTeacher/LoveTeacher Store on TeachersPayTeachers.  I have two new notes available.  The picture at the top is one of them, and the picture that follows is another.  The students and teachers at my school love getting and using these notes.  You just print, cut, and write on the backs of them.  Join me in spreading encouragement and causing a positive revolution!