If you’ve been following this website over the course of recent weeks, you are aware that I will be mentoring a student teacher in the coming weeks.  I met Mr. Kaylor for the first time today and as we discussed our mutual expectations for his experience, I implored him to constantly ask questions of not only what I am doing but why.  In doing so, Mr. Kaylor will challenge me to reflect upon what is happening in my classroom and allow me to re-think the reason things are done the way they are.  We all need a challenge in life to stay fresh and I am viewing this upcoming mentorship as an opportunity to challenge myself to become better.  Not all of us are great at finding our own challenges in life.  On the other hand, many of us are challenged in many aspects of life; but I am not just talking about difficult times.  I’m talking about the experiences or people in our lives that cause us to step back and re-evaluate the status quo.  We all need someone to be a challenger in our lives.

I was made aware of this today as I discussed my practice with another teacher in my department.  She has begun to inquire my thoughts on a host of issues related to the experiences we are having as teachers in our district.  Perhaps she sees me as one who can challenge her.  The best news is, in the process of helping her cognition, it allows me to continue the process of self-reflection I began several years ago.  It is a win-win situation for us.  I am looking forward to challenging her, the student teacher, students, and others I may come in contact with throughout my service as a teacher, a father, a husband.

A challenger can be any number of people we come in contact with on a regular basis; heck, it could even be a chance encounter with a stranger.  Every opportunity we have to be questioned should be looked upon as an opportunity for growth.  Some of us might recognize these behaviors in a boss, spouse, friend, or teacher.  I can only hope that each of us has at least one person in our lives that drives us to dig deeper and make progress.  Challengers allow us to reflect, learn, evolve.  It is those challenges that allow us to move beyond the status quo.  W. Edward Demming said, “Change is not necessary, survival is not mandatory.”  I want to do more than survive, I want to grow – in all areas of my life.

Of course, if we are to grow as people with the aid of a challenger, we must first be accepting of the challenge in the first place.  I understand that my students probably have not yet had a profound experience with being challenged and the subsequent growth experience.  I believe they will over time.  However, for this to happen, we must accept that we are not perfect; we must understand that how we perceive ourselves is not the whole reality.  I struggle with this all the time.  We get in a routine of doing things the same way because, at some point, we decided that was right or comfortable or easy, repeated over time our habits become right in our minds.  It takes a challenger to smack us with a dose of reality once in a while.

As my students are reading this (???), I hope the begin to look at challenging times as something more than a temporary experience that needs to be tolerated.  Each experience with a challenge or challenger can and should be valued for what it is, an opportunity to reflect, develop new skills, or reaffirm our beliefs.  Here’s to the challenges and challengers among us.