Praxis - Leadership "One Word"

patient
caring
committed
courage
supportive
peaceful
considerate
grateful
relaxed
purposeful
decisive
calm
collected
diligent
appreciative


My one word is:  appreciative

I chose this word because I want to be more appreciative of my life, my work, my students, my coworkers, and my family. I am very appreciative of all of these things, but sometimes I can take them for granted. I want people to see me as calm and peaceful. I don't want them to see me as stressed. This all applies to appreciating where I am at in my life and in my teaching. I need to appreciate what I am capable of doing. This does not mean that I won't keep trying to improve myself, but I won't beat myself up when things don't go right or when I am feeling overwhelmed by everything I need to do.

January 27 -
I'm trying to be appreciative of the cold days and no school, but it's hard when I feel like I keep getting more and more behind with the schedule in my classes. Having the end-of-year exams looming over my head makes me feel stressed out when I can't be in the classroom teaching. On the other hand, it has been nice staying home with my own boys and spending time with them. I appreciate the time that I get with them and the chance to play games with them. Right now, my middle son is making chocolate chip cookies and my youngest son is curled up on the couch taking a nap by the fire. He is 10 and hasn't taken a nap in years. It's cute to see him relax and look all cozy.

I'm hoping we have school tomorrow . . .

February 13 -
Being appreciative can be a stretch for me some days, but for the most part, I am very appreciative of my life, family, and teaching. For the past two weeks, my civil engineering & architecture students have been working on a water project. They worked in groups of 3 to learn a water topic using resources I provided, they had to create a presentation, example problem, notes sheet, worksheet, and answers and then teach two other groups. After one of my students finished presenting, he came up to me and said "Wow! This teaching thing is hard". That made me smile and feel very appreciated and appreciative.