After taking some time to reflect on Aguilar’s first chapter about knowing yourself, I thought I would share with you who I am. Like many children, my values have been a part of me since childhood. I have very strong beliefs in being kind, hardworking, and empathetic in my personal and professional life. How does my personality affect my students? According to the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, I am classified as a ESFJ, or in other words, ‘the caregiver.’ (I love the MBTI information because I took an in-depth quiz my first year of college and the results are the same as when I took a shortened quiz recently online.) Aguilar emphasizes the fact that who we are indicates how we relate to stress (29). Because I have such an interest in the MBTI results, I did some further research on my personality type. I often judge situations based upon my gut feeling. Although I am not dismayed about my identity, rather I need to remember that my disposition affects my students; in other words, a growth mindset is on a continuum and patterns of thought can be changed (31). Finally, as I reflect on who I am, I am reminded about my sociopolitical identity. Because I am a Caucasian woman, I am a part of the dominant culture. Given the facts about my values, personality, and strengths, as the classroom facilitator, it is so vital to remember that as educators, we need to take responsibility for our conscious and unconscious biases (38). Furthermore, as the course continues, I hope to gain deeper insight into being vulnerable with myself and hope to bring my learning into my classroom this fall, where students will need a resilient teacher now more than ever.

I really liked the way Aguilar divided the resilience conversation into three parts. We must begin with ourselves. It makes so much sense that without individual resiliency, we will not be able to deconstruct the organizational and systemic issues our education system faces. 

I appreciate the way the book creates a “journey” for its readers by starting with figuring out and acknowledging who we are and where we are, and then moving into how our habits impact our disposition. I am excited to begin this journey and am grateful to have the time to take it this summer. 

Also, I really liked that individual resiliency is linked to our ability to “address organizational and systemic conditions.” This is such an important topic, especially in today’s society. I hope that if I can strengthen my own individual resiliency, and help others to strengthen theirs, so we can make a positive change for our students and society. 

The introduction points out the importance of working on our own resilience as individuals and as a staff in order to cultivate a healthy school environment for our students. Learning healthy ways to deal with stressors to combat teacher burnout. The more invested we are and the more joy we find in what we are doing the more school morale is heightened. 

Aguilar states we are able to deal with challenges in a more productive way when we have a true picture of who we are. That when we know ourselves, we are able to make decisions and that best serve ourselves and the situation. I  was reminded that self awareness will allow me to get through day to day life and difficult decisions because I will make the best choices, build strong relationships, and direct my energy wisely. Doing so will bring purposefulness into my life.

The elements of self to be aware of are psyche, values, strengths & aptitudes, socio-political identity, and personality.

Values: It is important that we take the time to really think about and become aware of our values. This awareness is important as we make decisions in life and relate to others. Shared values can create connections in the workplace and in the classroom. I thought it was super interesting that going against your values can literally make you feel sick.

Personality: My personality consists of a pattern of habits, preferences, thoughts and traits. I just recently took the official MBTI and was completely un-surprised at my ISFJ personality type. The older I get, the more in tune I am with myself and this self-awareness has helped me understand my reactions and preferences to certain situations. 

Sociopolitical Identity: This is basically the groups to which I belong and how belonging to those groups impacts how I interact with and perceive the world. Having this awareness will help me relate to and connect with my students. I believe that now, more than ever, I have a responsibility to understand how my own cultural constructs drive the ways in which I see and treat others. 

Aptitudes and Skills: This is knowing what I am good at and having an awareness of ways in which I can grow, and then having the mindset that I can and will grow in those particular areas. I can use these understandings to guide my work and relationships by choosing to do things that I’m good at, but also by challenging myself to go outside of the box in order to meet the needs of all of my students.

Culture is the way we do things - our values, customs, and communication styles. I was intrigued and grateful to read about the topic of dominant culture and how it determines how we think we are supposed to act. I appreciate the opportunity and prompting to really think about the ways in which I act a certain way just because it is expected. I can identify with Mohammad on feeling tired of smiling at people in the hallway (not because I think people will be afraid of me, but because I was taught that girls should smile.) In recent years I have become more mindful about why I do certain things and many of them are a result of growing up in very patriarchal structures. This is a good reminder to continue to do so.

Another takeaway I had from this chapter is how the dominate culture can shape our beliefs with and without us thinking about it. Throughout my five years of teaching, I’ve heard multiple boys telling each other that “pink can’t be your favorite color. It’s a girl color.” I’ve always talked with those students about how people can like any color, and pink isn’t only a girl color. I’m always so proud when a student responds with, “yeah we can all like anything we want!” I’m hoping by having these conversations early with students, that they become independent thinkers who are true to themselves. And hopefully they might be more aware of how the dominate culture is trying to influence and limit them.  

I am also using the tools for becoming more aware of what I am feeling and when. Taking the time to observe my feelings in different situations. “Breathing is the switch that can turn off the signals of emotional distress, which sometimes feel as though they switch on by themselves.” (p58) Taking time to pay attention to all the ways our emotions take over our bodies in so many ways and how physically impacted we are by them. 

In taking this first step in developing new stories to empower ourselves we open the door for more optimism in our lives. Which then allows us to share love with those around us. 

This chapter helped to calm some of those nerves because it reminded me that listening, being culturally competent, and letting go of fear will allow us to build a community. It’s easy to partially listen to what a student is saying because I’m trying to do attendance or thinking of everything I still need to do. However, this doesn’t strengthen my relationship with these students. I need to be aware of my body language and actively listen all the time. Personally, the hardest thing for me is not immediately responding or trying to solve all problems. After learning about Culturally Responsive Teaching, I feel like I’m more aware of how my culture and upbringing can affect my interpretation of a situation. This chapter was a good reminder to pause, reflect, and then respond before acting on my initial conclusion. We must celebrate everyone for their uniqueness, and I don’t want anyone to feel like they have to change who they are. Finally, fear is a powerful emotion that prevents us from being a true community. No one should feel fearful about his/her feelings, yet people (myself included) don’t risk speaking up due to fear. I like the idea of healthy conflict, and the conversation starters that were included in this chapter. I plan on using these when appropriate, and hopefully it will lead to my school community becoming stronger. 

I also made a connection to an activity I did in my cohort last spring. We did the “Dots and Have-Nots” activity where we wrote down things that we knew about each student and put a dot next to the students we felt like we had a good connection with. Then, we had to actively work on building connections with students we didn’t feel like we had the strongest connection too. I loved this activity, and this chapter just reinforced how important it is for everyone to feel valued, safe, and part of a community. 

“Trust is an emotional state. It is the feeling of confidence we have in another's character and competence.” (101)

I thought long about the statement made on page 101 along with the areas that focused on trust. What I was first hearing was, simply liking a coworker doesn’t ultimately reflect the amount of trust you have in them. It is possible to like someone, be polite and even consider them a friend while still not having full trust in them and their abilities. But how can this be true? I had to read this section over a few times to really let it sink in. It was weird for me that I was having such a hard time figuring out what I believed to be such a simple concept- trust. . Aguilar says that trust has two main parts, character and competence. I can appreciate and befriend someone with whom I admire their character but my belief in their competence might be lacking. I was having trouble believing that I could consider someone a friend while also not fully trusting them, that was weird for me. But as I moved on and asked myself the questions she stated regarding Relational Trust:  Respect, Personal Regard, Competence in core responsibilities and Personal Integrity, I started to understand it more. These are great tools and questions to ask of yourself and of others to better understand the community we are trying to build within our schools. The community within the staff is felt by the students, they understand when the community is broken. It is hard to teach in an environment where you don’t feel trusted. 

The second was that our brains continue to grow. It was once thought that towards the end of adolescence our brains stop growing. When in truth meditation as well as many other forms of learning continue to change and strengthen our brains. 

I loved this chapter! Here are my biggest takeaways:

I was so amazed at how there is a physical change, that happens very quickly, in our brains when we practice meditation. I loved the quote on page 137 that said mindfulness helps “us become aware of our emotions, take multiple perspectives, regulate our responses, reduce anxiety, and increase empathy.” The benefits of meditation are amazing! This small change can help realize that our emotions don’t define us. With continued mindfulness we can identify, reflect on, and let go of unwanted feelings. 

I also really enjoyed the part on humor. I didn’t know there was scientific proof to show that humor is good for your health, but I believe it. I know I feel better when I’ve laughed with family and/or friends or while watching tv (especially Trevor Noah). 

I really also like how the chapter broke down the strategies we can use for building healthy communities. The first, refining communication skills and focusing on how we can practice expansive listening and truly coming to a conversation with curiosity. The second, learning from the body language we portray. I know I need to remember this one from time to time. The third, one I found most important, increasing our cultural competence. I really like how this section talked about how it starts with ourselves and that we need to always be continuing to learn and change. Lastly, addressing conflict, one thing that I know I need to work on. I really appreciated the sentence stems the chapter gave on starting healthy conflicts when needed. I hope to bring these strategies along with trust, empathy and curiosity to my future interactions with others in order to help build a “healthy, beloved community!”

I really connected with the section on trust - how it is the feeling of confidence we have in someone’s character and competence. If one or the other is missing, then the trust just isn’t there and that distrust can harm the culture of the building. It was also really beneficial to read about the three main things that need to be present in order for a school to be a strong community. 1) There needs to be a strong relational trust between the school staff, and among staff and parents, 2) Everyone in the school needs to know their role and trust others are doing their jobs, and 3) Our interactions with colleagues impact what we think of them, and therefore whether we trust them or not. I have been in buildings where there just isn’t trust in the administration or amongst teachers and it really does seep into all aspects of the culture of the school. It is so true that the best thing a leader can do is create opportunities for building trust in them and amongst staff. It isn’t entirely up to the admin, though. It is everyone’s responsibility to avoid behaviors that contribute to a toxic culture, like gossip and unhealthy conflict. Last year our district staff was lucky enough to spend an entire day with Willow from Top20 Training and a lot of this chapter reminds me of her presentation. We were taught and reminded to “Keep Our Day” and not contribute to tornadoes of negativity. It is awesome to have a common language to keep ourselves and each other in check. 

I found this quote spoke to me the most in this chapter and brought the ideas around what mindfulness is and why we should practice it to a new level. I really like how Aguilar talks about mindfulness and explains how it is a time for us to take a “timeout” and come to a situation “without judgment and, perhaps, even with compassion.” (127 Aguilar) I feel as though mindfulness is a way in which we can help cultivate the dispositions and habits from the previous chapters as Aguilar ties these ideas in nicely when talking about what 20 minutes of mindfulness can do for us.  I plan to continue to find the time to implement mindfulness into my day as well as my students days in the future. As I now know how it can help aid us in using our thinking brain instead of our reacting brain when we are presented with tough situations.

Although I consider myself to be a good listener, I was struck by the statistic that 65% of communication is actually conducted nonverbally.  This made me wonder about all the school communication that is done via email.  We’re all very busy and email is quick, efficient, and allows us to communicate when we can’t meet face to face, but it removes all nonverbal communication.  Potentially that nonverbal communication is really there in the tone of the messages we read, and yet it is so easy to misread tone into an email when we don’t really know the emotions behind the message.

Aguilar’s focus on increasing cultural competence seems particularly apt during these times when implicit bias is associated with police violence.  It can be so difficult to analyze our own thought processes, but Aguilar’s statistics about the disparity between discipline of African American and white students shows how important this work is for building true community.  

I am also going to try and reach out to friends to help remind me of my goals, Aguilar recommends this. Here is where I find my fixed mindset. It’s hard for me to ask for help because I am afraid that if I fail I am making that person feel as though they are failing as a coach/cheerleader. I have gotten in the habit of telling myself it’s easier to try something on my own or not even try at all. 

Another topic that was a big takeaway for me was the one of Sadness. It brought me back a few chapters where emotions were discussed and how we have to learn to name them. Sadness is one that can be sneaky. Sadness can be masked with other emotions which makes it harder to deal with the real issue. Looking back at different times in my life when I was feeling angry, frustrated and even jealous I can now see that I was actually feeling sad.

I was surprised to learn the science behind why being in the forest, spending time in/around water, and walking barefoot makes people feel good. It makes sense, and doing all of these activities make me feel happier. I feel better after I spend time in the sun, water, and the mountains. My family has a trip planned to go the mountains next week, and I’m excited for the positive health benefits it will bring. I also feel recharged when I read a book I’m interested in and spend time with my dog.  

When I get back to Minnesota, and start getting ready for the school year, I’m going to continue to take care of myself. I’m going to focus on drinking a lot of water, leaving school at an appropriate time each day, trying not to go into school on the weekends, and getting enough sleep each night. During my five years of teaching, I’ve gotten better about leaving school at an appropriate time, but it’s still a work in progress. I need to make sure I’m getting my work done efficiently, and then go home so I can get things done and get to bed at an appropriate time. When I’m teaching, I tend to focus on everyone else’s needs before my own. However, I need to make myself a priority so I can stay healthy and the best teacher I can be. I’m also going to continue to meditate so that I’m recharged, focused, and ready to be my best self each day. 

What a simple, yet profound statement! I really enjoyed this chapter. Here are my biggest takeaways:

Lastly, here is a funny quote from The Grinch that reminds me of Aguilar’s chapter on self care: “6:30, dinner with me, I can’t cancel on that again!”

She also makes a good point that there’s a danger of taking “teaching movies” like Stand and Deliver, Freedom Writers, and Dangerous Minds too seriously.  Even though these movies are based on true stories about educators who made a difference, all of those teachers burned themselves out and left their positions in just a few years.  Aguilar makes another very good point that the movies idealize educators who saw their students as victims that needed saving. 

I thought the research around negative and positive memories was fascinating. I had no idea that it took a tenth of a second to respond to negative stimuli, but it takes 12 seconds of focused attention to make a positive memory. Now I understand why I find it so easy to recall negative feelings. I’m excited to train my brain to focus on more of the bright spots, and hopefully I can teach students to do this too. While reading this section, I immediately had a connection to one of my favorite shows, Friends. This specific connection centers around the episode where Phoebe brings Parker to an anniversary party. He’s such a positive person who can always find the bright spots. Even though the cast gets frustrated with his extreme positivity, he enjoys every moment and it's something I'm going to strive for. I’m going to work on “taking more mental pictures” of things that make me happy so I can be more intentional in making positive memories.

Finally, I thought the RAIN strategy would be very helpful for me, and students, to deal with any frustrating feelings. I’m envisioning making a poster that has a rain cloud and the acronym on it, with kindergarten friendly pictures to explain the words, that we can reference throughout the year. RAIN is a good reminder that our emotions don’t define us; they will pass. 

As I look to beginning the school year, I am excited to try the secret admirer game to help build community in our classroom. I have tried something similar in the past but I did not give each student a specific peer to watch for bright spots. I feel like this makes all the difference. When students are able to find the good/bright spots in all, this is when a positive community is truly built. I really liked the idea of also diving in deeper with the students and making connections between showing kindness and finding bright spots. These are all great ideas that I look forward to using! 

“...come to terms with how you spend your time.” Managing my time is something I do not do well. I can see clearly that this is where I have both a knowledge and skill gap. I saw a lot of myself in the description given from before Aguilar kept her first time log. Keeping a time log is something I REALLY need to do! My intention: I will do the most important things when I have the energy, ask for help and delegate tasks to people that have the time and that are there to help. Doing this will free up so much time! 

It is important for teachers to be compassionate because compassion make us more resilient.  Compassion addresses many needs, prevents problems, repairs systemic imbalances, and makes your stronger.  Compassion building ought to be a focus in our schools and should also extend into the curriculum to teach our students.  Studies show that their are plentiful benefits of compassion.  Compassion makes us healthier and happier, primes our minds for collaboration, makes difficult relationships easier, and strengthens communities.  It is also valuable to be compassionate to ourselves (self-compassion).  Self-Compassion is to extend kindness to yourself so that you can have the strength and energy to examine and make changes.  It doesn't do us any good to be ruthlessly self-critical and unforgiving when making mistakes.  Love and compassion go hand-in-hand.  Basic human nature is compassionate.  Our brains get the same pleasure from helping someone else as we do from gratifying our own personal desires.  We need to practice compassion!

I have always said that time is my worst enemy.  There are only so many hours in the day and it is really tough to fit everything I want to accomplish into one day.  Our text discusses some helpful tips to manage our time.  The author knows that if we are going to be good learners, we need the time and energy necessary.  Some of the time managing tips Aguilar gives are to confront the planning fallacy, chunk bigger projects into smaller ones, make to-do lists, obey the calendar, use focusing mechanisms, and stop multitasking.  These were great reminders for me.  Aguilar also gives advice for managing the energy we spend as a teacher.  She encourages us to pause and renew when we need a break, get the hardest stuff done first, as a friend to keep you company, and celebrate the small wins.  I really appreciate reading this helpful tips and believe this will help me be a more resilient teacher. 

I thought this quote summed up my major takeaways from this chapter. When we have a better understanding of the learning journey or conscious competence ladder which Aguilar talks about, we can gain a better perspective on our personal thinking and gaps when it comes to learning a new skill. I thought the idea of the conscious competence ladder went hand in hand with the idea of minding the gaps as Aguilar speaks about. It is important for us to identify our own personal learning needs along with our students learning gaps as well. When we are better able to understand and identify our gaps we are then able to make change in our lives as we work through the conscious competence ladder. I can see how empowering and liberating this truly is when it comes to facing challenges head on. 

I enjoyed the part about forgiveness as self-compassion as well. It’s so easy to hang on to hurt feelings and keep grudges against people. However, it is not healthy for us. We end up hurting ourselves more by holding on to anger. Instead, we need to forgive for our own health. I like that Agular reminded us that we don’t have to be best friends with someone that we forgive. I think this is an important distinction for students and adults. 

Aguilar’s description of her own great compassion for her students resonated with me.  I’ve also experienced exhaustion at times by the emotional pain of seeing horrible realities some of my students live with daily.  As much as compassion is a positive force, that emotional exhaustion isn’t something that can be tolerated forever.  As Aguilar says, “resilient people do hard work for a long time” (p.211).  Because of this, the idea that Buddhist monks can train themselves to feel compassion without the emotional pain is valuable.  I want to support my students compassionately with this slight distance so that I can continue to support them for years to come.

I also know for a fact that I need to work on being creative and providing opportunities for my students to be creative. I was recently struck by something I read that talked about how teachers think they’re having their students create with projects and such, but really they’re just providing recipes (step by step directions) and the students aren’t creating anything on their own. By the time kids get to middle school, many just want to know what they have to do to pass the class. I was (and still am sometimes) the same way. I want to challenge this thinking in myself and my students and be intentional about fostering curiosity, which will hopefully inspire some creativity as well!

I also like how in this chapter Aguilar talks about how “creativity without risk reaps shallow rewards.”(262)  I felt as though this was a great phrase to share with my students as it goes hand in hand with taking risks in learning and making mistakes to learn from. I like to use this phrase with my students from Mrs. Frizzle in the Magic School Bus, “Take chances, make mistakes, and get messy”. 

I have a few chapters in Aguilar’s text that stand out to me, but Aguilar’s chapter on ‘Riding the Waves of Change’ resonates with me the most. Here are my biggest takeaways:

I really liked how in this chapter there were a ton of connections made to the previous chapters habits and dispositions. When we encounter change we are given an opportunity. If we make the conscious decision to focus on what we can control we are able to free up our “emotional energy”.  Therefore, if we in turn deal with our emotions around the change we are also more apt to take action. However, sometimes even when we take action change does not just happen over night. It is important for us to practice patience with not only ourselves but with others as well. Throughout the process we can also count on setbacks along the way and just as we teach our students to persevere through their mistakes and setbacks we also need to put this into practice when in the midst of change. What a fitting message as we all gear up to embark on a very different school year ahead! 

I enjoyed reading how to use several simple options for appreciating others.  Public appreciations is one way to make some feel special in front of a group.  Written appreciations are also a great idea.  This is actually something that we do at our high school in Hutchinson.  At the end of a faculty meeting, our principal will hand out “positive perks” notes that we can fill out about complimenting anyone in our building.  It helps create a sense of community in our school.  I also see this from our students.  One of the classes in our school is called REACH.  This class is meant to support students that struggle with academic or behavior hardships.  At the end of the trimester, one of their assignments is to write letters to their students thanking them for the trimester.  I always look forward to seeing those notes in my mailbox from the REACH students.  They are always so encouraging and uplifting.  

Appreciating yourself was another takeaway that was beneficial to read.  It is not selfish to celebrate yourself.  It can make a teacher more resilient and better equipped to continue working for students.  I feel like I do this throughout the school year.  I might reward myself with a nice meal or a special clothing item.  It motivates me to continue working hard knowing that I have something fun to look forward to.  I like how Aguilar closes out the chapter.  She says celebrations and appreciations open up underground rivers of resilience that fill our individual reservoirs and those of our community.  That is reason enough to be grateful!

you no longer take it for granted.

It shows that when we show gratitude nothing has changed about our lives but you look at in a different way. There are many situations were we could have more gratitude to truly see the situation for what it is.

Wow! I am honestly speechless. I feel so thankful that this course was the first course in my journey at St. Mary’s Teaching + Learning Program! I have definitely learned about the difference between a fixed mindset and a growth mindset, how to cultivate resilience in everyday moments, and lastly, knowing that choosing my thoughts will ultimately result in joy and freedom. 

Here are my biggest takeaways from Aguilar’s conclusion:

We have the freedom to choose how we want to show up to a situation. This book has taught me many life lessons but most important it has taught me to be purposeful in everything I do. It has taught me strategies to find and bring my best self to situations I encounter. I could not be more grateful for having the opportunity to read this book right before we all forge on into a very different school year. The uncertainties and range of emotions are plentiful but I choose to bring a positive attitude to each day as well as practice/teach the habits from this book.