One more round

I have been slacking with my blog writing, but this makes up for the other areas in my life which have been extremely busy, successful and future driven!! I thought I would give this blog writing ritual one more round and see how it goes.

My heart is racing, sweat is dripping down my face as my feet stick to my wooden floor. I have just returned from a run and am unwinding before I begin the last big assignments of my Masters in Special Education Degree. Gulp! After days and hours of holiday festivities, work and a good long procrastination (Call of Duty), I have sat my ass down to finish the haul. Once I begin, the words flow, the passion of my craft begins to surface and finally comes to light. Words written in APA format, 8 references on a word document, and it just looks as though it fits the perfect cliché for a college final. A 10 page literature review on academic instruction with students who have autism, or ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder). The topic interests me and fuels the fire I have for working with my kids, but the mental stress of writing a paper because it justify's meeting the requirements for college level courses (masters seeking students) seems a little un-called for. I learn more in the field than I do behind these articles to begin with. This does not however work with everything of course. Although, teaching is something that you will truly learn by doing and practicing. Just as a doctor practices medicine, or a lawyer practices law, a teacher practices education and implementation of that education.

I can't wait to begin my new adventure in the teaching world. Tomorrow is the first day I meet my co-operating teachers and get the lay of the land too!! The cliché of making a difference is EXACTLY what I want and plan on doing. I hope, along with my wonderful wife who is already an amazing teacher, to be an administrator who gets to structure school/classroom settings more distinctively and appropriately for the betterment of students' learning. I have waited too long for this moment to come and have traveled many roads to get here, but I am finally here and I finally made it. Well, as long as I get through this last week of the semester haha. The three things that I pursue full heartedly in this life is Education, Music and Muay Thai. Now it is time to get everything in order and fully pursue these fields of interest with my heart fully attributed.

Learning

As most of you know, I am in school to become a teacher. My focus is in Special Education. This field is very diverse and deals with a numerous amount of kids and adults with learning difficulties/disabilities, as well as physical, emotional, social and mental within its context. My goal upon becoming a teacher is to help students learn and find their potential as a human being as my teachers did for me. 

Education comes in all shapes, sizes and forms in life. Education through the American school system has been taught explicitly in one direction until the 21st century. Before this, the idea of education and school was to sit in class take notes, listen to the teacher, work with others and obtain a letter grade (based upon a percentage) that is set upon the state, then the districts academic curriculum. We now know this to be less effective than once thought, and could possibly steer students in the opposite direction of wanting to obtain more knowledge within education (Academia).  Research shows that intrinsic and extrinsic motivation plays a larger role in receiving letter grades than most would think. This notion of learning in a competitive environment within school and capitalistic society causes the majority to fall within the 'normal' range on the academic scale. Thus, causing others to perform exceptionally high and others exceptionally low on the scale. Teachers like myself want to find that intrinsic motivation for kids to WANT to learn, rather than forcing them to gather information that they could honestly care less about and then spill it back out again on a test, only to lose the information within months or weeks time. A lot of students, once they reach a certain level upon the grading scale, perceive themselves to be this letter in life. They self manifest their ways of life through this letter grade. Most of these are labeled as average and so they see themselves as the average person with average potential. Spreading like a disease, it takes over the mind of an individual who has yet to discover what he/she is interested in and wants to pursue. The notion of average or less than average is ingrained within them.   

The point is that we ALL learn differently. Some are visual and some are auditory, kinesthetic or tactile. It took me my entire life to figure out how I learn and obtain knowledge in any degree at my best possible coherency. It wasn't until college that I took that road on my own and figured out how I learn best and differently than most. 

This comes through with EVERY single method of knowledge and education!! Muay Thai, Jiu Jitsu, fighting as a whole, baseball, football and all sports! It also applies to relationships and working with others from a social aspect. Learning is a never ending process and can be pursued in a plethora of ways. Maybe a football player learns best by watching videos and then applying what he has watched/learned on the field. Maybe he runs a bunch of plays and learns best from his numerous times on the field (epistemology) through experience. We all learn from experience but NOT all have the same experience within the same context of understanding what is being processed or done. We must first SEE how each individual learns best and proceed with the facts and move forward. Collaboration is a way to test understanding and give that understanding, or lack there of, support from others in the same boat, but NOT ALL PEOPLE LEARN THE SAME!!!My fiancé Lyly is also a teacher for secondary social studies/history. We both have agreed that helping these kids learn is our main concern and what we originally signed up to do in the first place. Whether that is through any of these learning styles. 

                                  

Moving on Up in the World

It's getting to be that time in a man's life (my personal life and experience with 'things') where one must realize what he wants to do with his life from here on forward. Not just future, family, career, friends, likes, wants and all in between, but rather, where I make definitive choices in my life that will lead me to becoming the man I want to become and show the world as I am. Who I perceive myself to be and who the world perceives me to be. I am my own manifestation of myself amongst the rest. I possess the power to transform thought to action and discipline to practice. This notion of becoming a 'man' in pop culture and what a man's responsibilities are is bogus and blown out of proportion. A man takes care of his family AND friends and loved ones in his own way (how society has portrayed him to do so over many years) and a woman does the same. We do this because we love these people and the place they hold in our lives and are willing to do what it takes to comfort them, support them and trust/rely on them vice versa.
Just as my fiancé told me, a woman was going on about how a woman is supposed to take care of her man and give him things whenever he wants, asks or needs. A man provides for the family and woman and the woman does the rest. This has been placed in the traditional thought of many cultures around the world. Slavery was also a huge traditional and cultural essence among many cultures, but that too faded out over time. Soon the set gender roles of man and woman will do the same. Their is nothing wrong with these notions of gender and tradition, but the more we develop and transform psychologically, emotionally and socially as a species the more we discover about ourselves. We do this because we love these people and the place they hold in our lives and are willing to do what it takes to comfort them, support them and trust/rely on them vice versa.

I am moving up in the world, and it is better than I once amy have thought it would have been. Getting married to an amazing woman who will be the mother of my children, all the while moving into a new house with brand new everything is only the beginning of the rest of our lives. I could't be happier, but this is where the choices that make us into the people we want to become count!!