Thank you, reflective teachers

I thought about trying to tweet this but I couldn’t do it in 140 characters.

Many of you are in the middle of the 30-day #reflectiveteacher challenge.  You’re blogging and reflecting on what makes you a teacher, what you’ve accomplished and where you can improve.  By subscribing to your blogs, I’ve been able to follow your journey, and I have you tell you I’m loving it!  And I’m hating it.

There are several reasons I’m not doing the #reflectiveteacher challenge.  One is that I’m buried in the final stages of the Cajas ebook (drowning is the word that comes to mind when you add family, homeschooling, curriculum work, three upcoming conferences – five separate sessions/workshops).  But the main reason is I simply can’t.  Because I’m not a teacher.

Did I just write that?  I take it back.  I most certainly am a teacher, it’s just that I’m not teaching at the moment.  Well, Spanish, in a school, anyway.  So I can’t reflect on my classroom because I don’t have one.  I can’t reflect on my desk because I don’t have one.  I’m not going to have any teacher evaluations.  That’s why it’s sad for me.  I’m watching all of you go back to school and do such amazing things and for the first time since… well, since I was three years old, I’m not in a classroom.

And then you reflected about, of all things, me.  Allison wrote about me on her day 7 reflection and then Andrea wrote about me on her day 9 reflection.  Chalk it up to a whole lot of sleep deprivation huddled over Cajas de cartón or whatever, but your thank-yous brought tears to my eyes, because in a year when I’m not teaching, you made me feel what I know, that I am still a teacher.