Presence

Post for 10/11

While presence seems like a concept that is an obvious topic to think about as a teacher or pre-service teacher, it has become a more mystifying topic for me from our class discussions. That is, I've become more confused about what presence is because I've been consciously working for the past few years to develop it intuitively and organically. So to me, the Presence we've talked about in class seems a little foreign and vague to me in relation to the presence I've developed professionally and personally over the past few years.

I was a very quiet and private kid for a very long time. When I was in school I felt as if I could relate to only a few people and never felt totally myself in social or school situations. But at some point I felt comfortable in my own skin and not only wanted to connect with other people, I really wanted to learn about other people. However, at this point, I found that I hadn't developed any skills of social interaction at all. At this point, I made a conscious decision to cultivate my own sense of presence. I put myself in situations I would have found uncomfortable before, began to empathize with people more and become aware of what I was actually saying and asking. I tried to avoid putting myself on social auto-pilot and grow more conscious of 'the moment.'

So why the personal digression? It's because I think I've done a lot of the hard work it takes to get to a level where I'm prepared to do this in a professional setting. I've worked as a long-term substitute before and taught one-on-one in ESL classes for close to a year where I've had success. I feel like I've created a scaffolded progression for myself as far as Presence goes.

I've made a lot of progress in this area so far and feel I've set myself up well to get better and improve as a teacher and as a person. I'm curious to see what this means and how it will play out at the Fieldwork level. That is, I'm a little anxious about my own level of comfort in a new classroom but I'm also really interested to observe my co-operating teacher's personality, style and manner in a practical setting. I just hope to learn more about what it takes to be a successful teacher in organization, dedication and persona.