Four Mistakes From Fall 2015

Everyone makes mistakes. Recognizing that is a big deal, but if I’m not careful, I will end up dwelling on the recognition end of the equation and not looking at what I can do to remedy what I can control in each of my mistakes.

With that in mind, I want to share four mistakes I’ve made this semester and an idea or two about how I might correct them.

Call it accountability, call it sharing my learning, call it what you like. I’m sharing.

Four Mistakes From Fall 2015

POOR PLANNING
Over the summer, Jeremy Stewart (@J_Stew314) and I worked together to put a plan in place for a district Twitter chat. Out of a few conversations, #CSISDchat was born. It’s been a great experience, but I severely underestimated the time and energy it would take to start and maintain a weekly Twitter chat. Thankfully, the chat has meaningfully contributed to the lives of many both within and outside of College Station ISD, but I was surprised to see how much it took to do what it looked like was effortless for others to accomplish. It left me with respect for the many who lead chats I benefit from and with the reminder that for #CSISDchat to flourish and continue to support and challenge educators, this will take some intentional planning. Happily, that’s something I can do.

A BAD ATTITUDE
In August, we ran a program for a group of incoming 9th graders who we knew would benefit from a strengthened foundation of skills–both academic and behavioral. It was a great idea that served a group of students who needed the help and I had a bad attitude about giving up my time to help these students. I’ll spare you the details here and just say that the time was well spent, the relationships that started during that week in August have grown throughout the semester, and I will not discount the value of this sort of work again soon.

MISPLACED EXPECTATIONS
My experience blogging has been great. I’ve learned so much through both the topics I’ve explored and the process of sharing my writing. (I’d be a better English teacher now with this experience for sure… not sure why I never explored this while I was in the classroom.) But, for a long time, and at moments when I’m tired or don’t feel great about my performance at work, I worried far too much about how my blog posts would be received. I think that’s a typical issue that bloggers go through, but for me, the blog experience has brought to light the need to make sure this isn’t something I’m carrying over into other areas. I don’t want to go throughout my days worried about what others think, so I need to work on that.

FINDING BALANCE
If I only get one thing right next semester, this needs to be it. I didn’t plan my time well this year. That meant that time got wasted, I got behind, and the things I value most don’t get the time they deserve. In short, my wife and kids need to get first dibs on my time. I need to do a better job of making sure that happens and that even if they get a lot of time, it’s not what’s leftover after giving of myself at school or at church.

So, there it is. It’s been a great semester, but not one that’s free from mistakes. I’m excited about tackling these areas in which I have control to make some real improvements. Hopefully I’ll be able to see real growth in each of these areas over the next semester.

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This blog is post #17 in my 91 day winter blog challenge. I’m posting a blog each day. Check out other posts at #91winterblogs, or subscribe in the top right corner of this blog to receive these blogs as emails. Thanks for reading!