{"id":64,"date":"2021-01-02T14:17:37","date_gmt":"2021-01-02T19:17:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/monicarand\/?p=64"},"modified":"2021-01-02T14:17:37","modified_gmt":"2021-01-02T19:17:37","slug":"2021-brace-yourself","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/monicarand\/2021\/01\/02\/2021-brace-yourself\/","title":{"rendered":"2021: Brace Yourself"},"content":{"rendered":"

Do you ever stop to think about how you ended up where you are now? What drew you to teaching as a career? For me, the main draw to teaching is relationships. I\u2019m a firm believer that significant learning is far more likely to occur with significant relationships, and I like to think this comes across in my practice through the connections I often have with students.\u00a0<\/span>
\n<\/span>
\n<\/span>I think this is why hearing that we will have to teach online again starting in January devastated me so much. (I know devastated sounds dramatic, but 2020 was a tough year for our little school by the lake and that\u2019s honestly the best word I can use to describe my initial reaction.) Online teaching in the spring was fine, but I found myself longing for that authentic interaction with students that is hard to foster in an online setting. Sitting at my kitchen table talking to a screen of students with their videos off was draining – my jokes feel far less funny when I\u2019m the only one laughing at them! So being back in person with these kids in September really made me appreciate what I do and how great it is to be able to watch them grow, learn, and just be kids. <\/span>
\n<\/span>
\n<\/span>Then the news came – starting next week, I have 4 weeks to teach a grade 12 physics course, <\/span>now with at least one of those weeks online.<\/span><\/i> I\u2019ve been trying to remain positive about this situation, dreaming up all the exciting learning opportunities that might come with having the same group of students all day. But there\u2019s always this creeping thought that I can\u2019t deny – this is going to be hard. How am I going to cover all the essentials of the curriculum in such a compressed time period? How will I ensure lasting and meaningful learning? How am I going to build relationships and a sense of community in our class in just 4 weeks\/online? How am I going to make this class awesome? As the thoughts of these challenges creep into my mind, I often find myself questioning my negativity. \u201cRemember gratitude Mon. Gratitude. Look on the bright side.\u201d<\/span>
\n<\/span>
\n<\/span>Heck, I like to think I spend a lot of time practicing gratitude and positivity – so why am I <\/span>still <\/i><\/b>feeling so unprepared and overwhelmed about the term ahead?!<\/span>
\n<\/span>
\n<\/span>A book I\u2019ve been re\"\"<\/a>ading over the break, How Bad Do You Want It?<\/em> has helped to bring me some clarity about my “negativity”. It talks a lot about the mental strength of endurance athletes – which might seem totally irrelevant to teaching…but stay with me. <\/span>
\n<\/span>
\n<\/span>The book quotes a 2011 paper published in the <\/span>Journal of Experimental Psychology<\/span><\/i> that says, \u201cpeople often choose to expect the worst of an upcoming experience in hopes of creating a more favorable contrast between their expectations and reality.\u201d It goes on to say, \u201cin the context of endurance competition, this favourable contrast can enhance performance. The more discomfort an athlete expects, the more she can tolerate, and the more discomfort she can tolerate, the faster she can go\u2026.Bracing yourself- always expecting your next race to be your hardest yet- is a mature and effective way to prepare mentally for competition.\u201d <\/span>
\n<\/span>
\n<\/span>I think this applies to more than just endurance sports. I\u2019ve realized that acknowledging the challenges that I\u2019m going to face isn\u2019t necessarily being negative. It\u2019s a coping mechanism, and one that I think is actually relatively effective for me personally. While I\u2019m by no means a superstar athlete, I enjoy the personal challenges of swimming, biking and running and competing in triathlons for fun. In 2019 I signed up for my first triathlon – an Ironman 70.3 – and told myself I\u2019d train lots for it and be in the best shape of my life. As I think is often the case, I trained far less than I had planned, and suddenly it was the day before race day \u2026.and I remember thinking \u201cThis is going to hurt.\u201d But accepting that I would be challenged and uncomfortable helped me cope. I knew it would be hard, but I also knew that I can do hard things. <\/span>
\n<\/span>
\n<\/span>After taking some time to write down all the challenges I expect for this upcoming term, I feel far more liberated to proactively plan on how to overcome these challenges. I feel optimistic. I feel okay. I feel like I can do this. I like to remind myself that I’ve rarely encountered a challenge that didn’t result in some sort of growth. I\u2019m not going to try and sugar coat it and pretend it won\u2019t be hard – but I can do hard things. We all can.<\/span>
\n<\/span>
\n<\/span>It\u2019s okay to not be sunshine and rainbows all the time. It\u2019s okay to acknowledge that sometimes, you\u2019re dealt a bad hand. We can be grateful and realistic at the same time. Let\u2019s face it, this school year probably feels like more of a marathon than a sprint for a lot of us – and marathons aren\u2019t easy. So while I remain optimistic about the future, and thankful for all the good in my life, I\u2019m bracing myself for the semester ahead.\u00a0<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Do you ever stop to think about how you ended up where you are now? What drew you to teaching as a career? For me, the main draw to teaching is relationships. I\u2019m a firm believer that significant learning is far more likely to occur with significant relationships, and I like to think this comes … Continue reading “2021: Brace Yourself”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":350,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-64","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-face-2-face-sessions"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/monicarand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/monicarand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/monicarand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/monicarand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/350"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/monicarand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/monicarand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":66,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/monicarand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64\/revisions\/66"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/monicarand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/monicarand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/monicarand\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}