Raven Richard, BSEd ’17, Robinson Primary, Robinson ISD
First-Grade English, Reading and Writing Teacher

My first year as a teacher was tiring, stressful, full of surprises and AMAZING. I am a first grade teacher at Robinson Primary. I teach English, reading, and writing.

My junior year at Baylor, I was a TA (Teaching Associate) at two different schools. My senior year I did my internship, at Robinson Primary with Kindergarten, and then I was hired at Robinson Primary! It was really nice to start at a job with people I knew and students that I had taught the year before. I feel that Baylor definitely prepared me to be a great teacher, however they didn’t prepare me for all of the paper work, meetings and many types of parents! Nevertheless, I survived and successfully made it through my first year.

As a first-year teacher I knew it was going to be hard to teach 20-plus students with different learning  abilities, but it was even crazier having two different classes with 20-plus students in each class. I had to learn really quickly the personality, learning abilities, behaviors and NAMES of all 40-plus students. Of course, no student was the same, so adapting my lesson plans and how I taught things was very important to me. My main goal was to make sure that every student succeeded in first grade and was prepared for second grade.

At times I didn’t think I was doing the right thing or teaching the subject at hand correctly. But all my doubts and concerns would be erased when my students took a spelling test and aced it, when a student read a book and scored a 100, or when they learned to use a capital letter at the beginning of a sentence and use the correct punctuation.

As a teacher I have learned many great things about myself and grown from what I have learned. I truly fell in love with my students and I am ready to see what this upcoming school year will bring.

These are a few things I want to leave with you.

Make sure that you love the career you have chosen.
Maintain communication with your students and their parents.
Ask questions.
Work with your partner teacher and your team (they understand everything you are going through).
Yes, there will be challenging obstacles, but guess what —you can start over the next day.
Most importantly, make time for yourself and family.