MENTOR ESSAY

Teaching children has never really been a life passion of mine, but after this year in UTAP, I might seriously take it into consideration. I learned so many things, and to me, being a mentor means a lot of patience, dicipline and hardwork. Who ever said that being a mentor was easy lied straight through their teeth because it definitley takes more than a glance to see the big picture. To me, being a mentor is an honor. And that's saying more than the next guy.

The first time I taught the kindergarteners, it took every fiber in my being to not lose control! I'm not exactly known for being the patient one and trying to teach a science lesson to a whole bunch of 5-year-olds wasn't exactly the cherry on top. But as the year progressed I've learned very well that sometimes I have to bite my tounge or count to ten just to cool my steam down. I understand that they're 5 and sometimes I have to repeat things once, twice, or maybe even five times. But if they get the knowledge, I'm happy as a mentor that I helped them reach that stepping stone.

I didn't know being a mentor would take so much planning. You have to have a full lesson plan including procedures, materials, purpose an assessment and a variety of other things needed to make a successful day in the classroom. If you are not a deiciplined mentor, you will never get this done by deadline. And if that happens, not only will you realize that your lack of commitment damages your terms as a mentor, but your children in the classroom wouldn't be too pleased. They're young and their hunger for knowledge is at it's peak. Why ruin it? Being a mentor takes a lot of dicipline. If your not diciplined your kids surely won't be.

With anything in life, you have to work hard to get what you truly want. I believe that if you want to be a good mentor it is imperative that you give it your all, 100% of the time. By working hard, you are able to obtain the feeling of greatness as a mentor knowing that your helping change someones life. Your students benefit as well because they are learning from somebody that really cares about what they do.

Being a mentor has more meaning behind it than if I were to explain it on a piece of paper. It takes patience, dicipline and hardwork. On here, I can't show you my feelings of happiness, joy, anger, stress and many more when I'm asked what being a mentor means to me; it is not tangible. But the main emotion I've felt this year is proudness. I'm proud of myself, I'm proud of my peers, but most importantly I'm proud of my students because they let me in their life and they hopefully learned a thing or two from myself. But either way, they gave me a sense of accomplishment and they made me happy. Sometimes, that's all you need.