Blog Assignment 1

I can be somewhat of the model type when I want to be :)

I want to start off by saying "WWWWAAAAAARRRRR EAGLE, HEY!" I'm Daphney McFadden and I'm a transfer student from Auburn University. I am originally from the beautiful city of Mobile, Alabama. I have lived with my grandparents since the age of 5. My parents were never married but both have played vital roles in my life. My dad married when I was about 5 or 6. Together my dad and step mom have two daughters, Destiny and Derica. My mother is now divorced after 8 years of marriage. Together, my mom and stepfather have three children; Melaine, Michael and William. My passion is Education because I want to be an inspiration to a student as some of my teachers were to me.

 I attended Auburn University for 2 years, majoring in Liberal Arts/History. My original reasoning for attending Auburn was the university's vet program but I was too late turning in my application to the vet school. Unfortunately family issues moved me back home. My mother's divorce, my grandfather's health and my great grandmother's continuing medical issues. The divorce completely wrecked my mother, financially and emotionally. This among other things I would rather not speak on at this time. When I arrived at USA, I found the opportunity to enter into the College of Education. Education is in my blood...literally. My paternal grandmother was a math teacher at Tuskegee University and Blount High School. Her daughters followed suit. My Aunt Griselda, who is the eldest of three, is a Speak Pathologist for the Mobile County Public School System. My Aunt Alesia, who is the middle child, just recently received her PhD in African American Studies (I think). My mother always told me that if I failed to plan then a planned to fail.

When I was thinking of what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, I thought about my high school years. My freshmen year of high school, my class totalled at about 800+ students. By 2009 (my graduation year), my class size was 153. I found that to be astonishing and unacceptable. I felt as though the students did not have enough positive attention home and "vented" his/her frustrations out at school. This caused the student to get into some kind of trouble at school. I made up my mind that I wanted to start a mentoring program between upper and lower classmen; juniors and seniors mentoring freshmen and sophomores. This is still my plan but, as I said before, I still would love to be an educator. I can be a bit of a "hard butt" (censorship) but I feel as though children need it with a mixture of love and attention. This is what my former Cisco Instructor, Mr. Andrew Large, would call "tough love".

What being an educator means to me is being a child's second parent (minus the physical punishment). To me, being an educator means being a counselor. To me being an educator means presenting useful information to a child in a well-organized manner and then having that child to be able to SHOW me that he or she has learned that concept. I know that I am going to be the hands on type of instructor because that is how I learn. An educator is not just a teacher of academics but also of life skills. As my mother taught me, I will teach my students "If you fail to plan then you plan to fail". I plan on teaching them time management skills as well to better prepare them for the next level. As presented in "Randy Pausch on Time Management". Dr. Paush was a young, enthusiastic college professor who lectured about how to set goals and manager time. He was very entertaining when he spoke which, in turn, made people interested in what he had to say. Unfortunately he lost his battle cancer and died at the age of 47. As I watched the video, I learned the steps to Time Management: Make a plan. Set a goal. Achieve that goal. (this is the summarized version). I am going to have my students to set a goal for themselves and I want them to have it done by the end of the semester.

I hope to become an EDUCATOR, not a "burp back" teacher.