Te Whare Tapa Whā

So True isn't it?!? 

Are we making sure we fill up regularly? 

Are we filling up twice as often to make up for the times we pour out? (or spill) 😜

OR...

 is it the other way around?

My cup runneth over. What comes out of the cup is for everyone else but what is in the cup is mine. It is important to keep my cup full ( or as close to full as possible).

I find my self burning the candle at both ends and still I find myself falling short. The real problem... as if falling short wasn't enough, is that I feel incredibly guilty for taking a break. Things that I LOVE to do, I don't do as much anymore but it is all in the name of being better at my job so it is all worth it ...right??? 

I was reading an article that spoke about opportunity cost. It is an idea often illustrated with the quote:  

“There’s no such thing as a free lunch.”

Opportunity cost means that everything we do, no matter what it is, costs something, even if it occurs indirectly. When someone takes you out for a free, hour-long lunch. Despite gaining the value of the lunch during that hour, you are still giving up all of the other activities you could be doing instead. So for me,  I give up that time at the gym, that time watching tv programs that give me joy, that time that I used to spend catching up with friends, spending quality time with my family, those extra hours of needed sleep - because let's face it, we are ALL a little less cranky and a LOT more alert and happy when we have had an adequate amount of rest.

Society regularly praises those who do exceptional things but often the nature of those exceptional things comes at high opportunity costs. Anything that is considered to be truly great requires some sort of sacrifice that may or may not be obvious to us at the time.

There are so many things I would like to do however,  it is becoming more and more difficult to commit all of my time and energy to any one thing without feeling some form of remorse or regret. I can't even tweet without thinking: ' Oh no, what if someone sees that I'm tweeting instead of working tirelessly to show how committed I am to my job?!?... That time I just spent trying to edit my tweet to 140 characters could have been spent on me organising my folders, making a more effective lesson plan, or becoming the 'Penelope Garcia' of the teaching digital world!'

......aaaaaand insert guilt here

Learning to have 'me time' and not feel guilty is what I need. Yep...that's right...need. My students have been learning about te whare tapa whā - the four cornerstones (or sides) of Māori health.

With its strong foundations and four equal sides, the symbol of the wharenui illustrates the four dimensions of Māori well-being.

Should one of the four dimensions be missing or in some way damaged, a person, or a collective may become ‘unbalanced’ and subsequently unwell.

Taha tinana (physical health)

The capacity for physical growth and development.

Good physical health is required for optimal development.

Our physical ‘being’ supports our essence and shelters us from the external environment. For Māori the physical dimension is just one aspect of health and well-being and cannot be separated from the aspect of mind, spirit and family.

Taha wairua (spiritual health)

The capacity for faith and wider communication.

Health is related to unseen and unspoken energies.

The spiritual essence of a person is their life force. This determines us as individuals and as a collective, who and what we are, where we have come from and where we are going.

A traditional Māori analysis of physical manifestations of illness will focus on the wairua or spirit, to determine whether damage here could be a contributing factor.

Taha whānau (family health)

The capacity to belong, to care and to share where individuals are part of wider social systems.

Whānau provides us with the strength to be who we are. This is the link to our ancestors, our ties with the past, the present and the future.

Understanding the importance of whānau and how whānau (family) can contribute to illness and assist in curing illness is fundamental to understanding Māori health issues.

Taha hinengaro (mental health)

The capacity to communicate, to think and to feel mind and body are inseparable.

Thoughts, feelings and emotions are integral components of the body and soul.

This is about how we see ourselves in this universe, our interaction with that which is uniquely Māori and the perception that others have of us.

I cannot give what I do not have. I need to learn to make time for my overall health without feeling guilty. 

This week I started to take some time for myself. Yes, I am getting up at 5am in order to do it but it is something I am doing to help me be better in other areas that are important to me. 

At the moment,  this sums up how my brain feels. If you ever saw my laptop you would see that it is not just my brain with heaps of tabs open. 

Learning to give back to ourselves as much as we give out to other people or  other things is all a part of the process.

I am still learning...

Music is good for the soul

Get rhythm when you get the blues

Come on, get rhythm when you get the blues

It only cost a dime, just a nickel a shoe

Does a million dollars worth of good for you

Get rhythm, when you get the blues

      

RAD RHYTHM

 Whenever I hear the term Rad Rhythm, the track 'Get Rhythm' by Johnny Cash begins to play in my head hence why I started this post with one of the verses from this classic song. 

Today our music specialist Caleb Strickland explained the basics behind the Rad Rhythm course. 

The Rad Rhythm course is a program that:

1. Enables teachers without musical skills to teach music.
2. Offers schools an affordable and effective music program.
3. Provides an online, relevant and highly interactive learning platform that is in line with what the children of today expect and deserve.
4. Teaches children the fundamentals of music and encourages them to think outside of the box.

I had some experience with the program last year. The kids LOVED it. Yes, it was loud but the kids were engaged. Rad Rhythm has both a theoretical and practical component to it. 

I will do most of the lessons with my students. I will take this on as another way to bond with them as we both learn.

Music has a funny way of bringing people together 😊 🎶

Never stop learning because life never stops teaching

   This is my first time teaching at the beginning of the school year.  One of the requirements for me as a teacher is to increase my digital knowledge so I can be more effective as a teacher which will not only benefit me but it will also benefit the students in my class. 

There is SO much that I need to learn to the point that I feel like this while my brain currently looks like this!  One word for trying to learn how to use all of the tools that are necessary while learning how to plan appropriately and get organised would be:  overwhelming.

"Welcome to teacher life" ... "Things will get better"... "There will always be things to do"... "Don't worry, you will get there"... 

Those are just a few of the things that I have been told that come to mind at the moment.  While I try to take a deep breath...ok... MANY deep breaths, I wonder if the day will ever come when I look back on how I am feeling now and think ' Ahh yes, I remember when I used to feel like this and things did indeed get better' 

Until that day comes, I talk to other teachers. I try to get feedback on what they do to organise themselves and how they go about doing it.  I get frustrated when I know that I am a part of a team where we are to work collaboratively but instead I feel like I am benefitting from others while they aren't benefitting from me seeing as I am overwhelmed and not giving anything back...at least not at the level that I feel I'm supposed to.

So...what do I do?

STEP 1:

I met with my mentor teacher where I discussed the 2 teacher goals I thought I needed to work on in order to improve my practice.

This was my first goal...

Since having my meeting with my mentor teacher I have spent time going to toolkit PD,  watching various youtube tutorials on the different tools that I will need to learn how to use, as well as meeting with other teachers to ask them questions on things I have been trying to learn.

This was my second goal...

How long is 'too long' to be planning? 

I have no idea. What I do know is that I plan for most of my evening, most of my weekends and that absolutely contributes to my frustration.  

A part of that absolutely has to do with the time that it takes to learn my way around the different digital tools while I am planning and another huge part is looking for resources when planning appropriately for my students. 

Just like my learners, there are some that will understand concepts and learn how to do things straight away, while other learners will either need more time or have things scaffolded to a level that they can understand.  I wish I got this straight away. There is the old saying of  'Fake it till you make it'. The only problem will that is no one can help you if you are faking it.

As teachers, we ask our students to let us know when they don't understand something or if they have any questions.  On a deeper level I realise why students may be reluctant to say they are struggling. 

Onwards and upwards.

I am still learning...

The First Step Towards Change Is Awareness

Today I went to a toolkit PD on Google Sites. Everything seems so simple when things are being explained. There is a lot of information and I KNOW that when it comes to me sitting down to my site, I am going to forget how to do everything... argh! It is so frustrating.

As I look around, I feel as though everyone is aware of what to do except for me. There are lots of short cuts on how to do things but I am not even familiar on the proper way of how to do things. Now there are short cuts and I feel quite overwhelmed with needing to learn how to do this in order for the students to have a site up and running so they can get the most out of their learning while I plan and meet the various other deadlines required of me.

As I sit here, I begin to to wonder how many other people in this toolkit feel as I do?
Who feels as lost as I am?

It makes me think about the learners in my class who are trying their best to listen to what I am saying but end up feeling lost. Those who seem disinterested might not have anything to do with them not wanting to learn but more about the way that things are being taught isn't in a way that they can relate to.  Even the speed that something is being taught might be at a pace where they haven't fully processed what was just said and already the teacher has moved on to the next thought.
This has made me more aware of how I need to be with my learners.

It is so important to remember that everyone doesn't learn at the same rate. Yes it can be frustrating at times if someone learns something in 2 minutes vs someone else who has yet to learn that same concept. In a perfect world, we would all learn things the moment we are exposed to them and it would stick. That isn't always the case.

I am still learning...