Continued?

When I said in my last post that it was to be continued I didn't say how long it would  take me.  I suppose over a year is long enough. 
If my post on teaching sounds a bit sappy there's a reason.  That was the introduction to an essay I wrote with which I won a scholarship while I was in college. Sappy or not, every word of it was true. I've always wanted to be a teacher.
So here I am, nearly finished with my 2nd year of teaching.  One more to go and I'll be a level 2 teacher.  Was it worth?  Was it everything I expected? I guess you'll have to stay tuned to find out.

Teaching

My mother’s house was a fairly ordinary house except for one unique feature; an extra space on the lower back of her garage.  Rumor had it that the previous owners were undertakers and needed the space to park their hearse.  I don’t know about the hearse but I do know that it made a perfect kid hideaway.  The neighborhood kids and I used this space as our own.  My favorite game was school and my favorite role was teacher.  I would peruse my mother’s set of World Book Encyclopedias for something of interest to teach my friends.  I’m not sure how much fun my friends had (I had to pay them with candy to attend !) but I was in my element.  I’ve wanted to be a teacher for as long as I can remember.

            My love of teaching is founded in my love of learning, and particularly, of reading.  I have always been an avid reader.  I was fortunate enough to live across the street from Windsor Manor, a retirement home.  Every Thursday the Bookmobile would park out in front of my house.  It was a little bookworm’s dream come true.  The librarian took a special interest in me and helped to guide me in the books I was to read.  Besides the usual children books such as the Nancy Drew or Hardy Boys series, I spent summers reading classics like Moby Dick, Tom Sawyer, and the Wizard of Oz series. 

            So, why didn't I become a teacher sooner? I did attend college with the intention of majoring in history and eventually teaching.  I enjoyed college and I thought I had found my calling in life.  Instead, my life took another path as I married and began a family. (A blog for another day.)

            Having children is a blessing, a challenge, and a calling in and of itself. While I did not avail myself of a college education and a formal degree in teaching, parenthood is all about teaching.  It is neither possible nor desirable to teach children everything there is to know.  It's better to enhance and cultivate a child’s natural curiosity and endow them with the ability to seek after knowledge.   I always endeavored with my own children to ingnite that spark, that love of learning, with the hope that that love would endure for a lifetime.   

            To be continued...