Distinguished Teacher Brian Brady

As a classroom teacher it is imperative to be able to "reach" each one of your students as well as to maintain classroom attitude and behaviors. In order to do this successfully a teacher has to have an understanding of the purpose of the students' behaviors' that they may present. It is therefore necessary for a teacher to have an understanding of the motivation of their students'. If it was possible for a new teacher to spend some time in a 1:1 educational format with a student that may exemplify the population they were preparing to teach it would offer tremendous benefits as they might better prepare to empathize with a student that is displaying behaviors within a classroom, and therefore might know which strategy to implement in order to appropriately remediate. I would also advise new teachers to observe veteran teachers' as much as possible in order to get a sense of the rhythm that it takes to maintain focus and motivation within a classroom.

The best thing about teaching is the positive changes we are able to cultivate in students'. This is particularly rewarding as I know that change is difficult for anybody, so when a student makes that conscience choice to try to improve themselves it is because they feel the security and motivation to do so, and we have therefore cultivated a change for the better that may last for a lifetime.