Teachers Go Beyond the Call of Duty-- What's Your Calling?

This following blog post came from Mrs. Kallas's blog, which you can view here.

      This year for the TAFE Region and State Competitions, I am competing in four events. These events include the ELF Test, Portfolio, Chapter Scrapbook, and the Breakout Session Presentation. I chose to do these based on my observations from last year. For example, the Chapter Scrapbook competition seemed very fun last year, since I love doing crafts. Also, I had my portfolio done last year, so I decided to do that competition since it wouldn't need much work. Breakout Sessions was also chosen because I helped do it last year, so it seemed fun to be able to do a presentation, while also interacting with other students.  I enjoyed each of these competitions, and would not have changed my choice! My favorite part of these competitions was the fact that I got to work with a group in two of them. Also, I enjoyed the fact that portfolio and scrapbook both consisted of the activities we do in this class. Those two competitions highlighted all of the great opportunities and experience available to us in Education and Training. However, one issue that I came across while creating my presentations was the lack of time. We had to miss many days at our field sites, and also had to rush the week before contest to finish scrapbook and portfolio. I never had time to run through each of my competitions and practice presenting until the day of competition.

Scrapbook group at the awards ceremony

     Since I was so stressed trying to hurry and complete my projects, the only thing that I would change is that I would have started earlier on the projects. This would reduce the stress and rushing that I had to do in the final week before competition. However, through competing at Region, I have learned how to work productively with a group, and also make something acceptable and presentable even if I do not have much time to prepare. After this recent competition,  I am very excited for the State Conference that is held at UT Arlington in February. I plan to add more artifacts to both my portfolio and the scrapbook, and also rehearse the breakout session presentation before the state competition.