When I Named My Blog...

In retrospect, I may have misnamed my blog. With the craziness of the last few weeks due to the new job, I haven't paid too much attention to my blog or any form of social media. Everything has been focused on resigning from my old position, getting ready for my new position, and finding a place to live in Fresno. Now that my old classroom is packed up, the tearful good-byes have been made, and my apartment is all packed up, I have finally been able to participate again online and noticed the title of my blog: "Celebrating Failure in Room 23." Oops.

 Naturally the title was inspired by  my old classroom; the place where it all began:
The area behind my desk in 2013.
In that classroom, I truly discovered myself as a teacher through all my mistakes and successes, but mostly the mistakes. When I named my blog last year, it seemed appropriate to mention the actual room where I was celebrating failure and growing as a professional. Even in the pictures below, you can see the growth I made in that room. In 2013, I swore I would never sit my students in groups of four; too many distractions, too many behavior issues, too much of a risk. Then within my first year of teaching I decided to try groups and now I can't imagine ever going back to rows.


            
        My classroom in August of 2013.


My classroom in August of 2014.

Locking up my first classroom.
At the time of when I started blogging, it seemed like the perfect name even though I knew I wouldn't' stay in that classroom forever. 

 But now room 23 at Woodlake High School is no longer mine and will be occupied by another teacher in the near future.  I considered renaming my blog in an effort to stay 'relevant' to my career or simply starting a new blog, but both of those ideas seemed wrong. Deleting "room 23" from the title made me feel as though I was deleting that part of my past, which made me the teacher I am today. Even though I'm no longer that new clumsy teacher at the end of that creepy hallway, it will always be an integral part of my career. As a result, I have decided to keep my blog name the same in order to pay tribute to the beginning of my career as well as remind me of how far I have come. 
First period in the Spring of 2015 :)

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