NOT another New Year’s Resolutions list
A word of warning: I have been born pathologically optimistic so I cannot help being cheerful and upbeat. For those of you who find this trait rather annoying, please go no further.
Having all gone through increasingly challenging circumstances over the past couple of years, I like to think that we’ve become more resilient, tolerant, and accepting. Whether you’ve managed to go through 2022 relatively unscathed or whether you’ve had your share of crushed hopes and unfulfilled dreams, the fact remains that you’ve made it through another year and a considerable amount of back-patting is in order.
Since I don’t go for New Year’s Resolutions, what follows is my list of “accomplishments” for 2022, all the reasons why I’m patting myself in the back. If you recognise yourselves at any point along the list, feel free to do the same! It’s not a huge list but includes both professional and personal achievements, so it’s a mixed bag. I‘ll try and keep the self-congratulatory note down 😊
- I finally started this blog, after a number of false starts and a ton of hesitation and procrastination – yay!
- I continued my training journey, and I can now work as a DELTA tutor; this meant I got to revise, discover and review some very interesting bibliography on learning and teaching languages.
- I’ve created a lot of teaching materials last year, for a variety of contexts, including training, of course. I’ve got a lot of ideas about more materials now, and I’ve decided what I want to focus on: storytelling at the heart of learning.
- I feel I’ve become more patient, understanding, and supportive as a teacher, and that’s always been a priority for me. Teaching increasingly on-line made me realise how challenging this can be for learners at a deeper level: the online component adding an extra layer of challenge, I could see how much people were struggling and still doing their very best. This in turn made me realise that I needed to step up my game in order to provide the scaffolding needed. I have to say I’m really very proud of my online trainees and the amount of work they put in. You know who you are!
- 2022 has been the year of quitting certain bad habits, like:
- caring for the opinions of people I don’t really know or appreciate
- blaming myself for not foreseeing the unforeseeable!!! (If you know, you know)
- focusing on everything that could (and did) go wrong and not on what really worked (this one is still a work in progress, but I’m getting better!)
- being afraid of putting myself out there: afraid of the criticism, the exposure and the fact that I may discover some unpleasant truths (mainly about myself) along the way. SO WHAT?
This was my achievements list for last year, and putting it down like that helps me see how much I’ve accomplished despite the harsh circumstances we’ve all been facing. If you haven’t made such a list of your own, mentally or in writing, I strongly suggest you should. It is much more grounding and motivating than any New Year’s Resolutions list, which would in fact focus on what you haven’t accomplished yet.
Let’s make 2023 a year we’re proud of!
teachITefl 