The first day of this class it was mentioned about working with our personality strengths when teaching. During the lunch period I was reading the book “You Are The Medicine” and it mentioned how every person has a gift and those gifts rise at certain times in their lives. It made me think about how sometimes we often do something that we perceive as small for someone however, to them, it may have meant more that we’ll ever know. For example, the book mentioned that this lady owned a jewellery shop and people always came in and often had moments of release where they were able to pour their heart out to her. She later reflected that she realized that she had an aura of healing and a space where people felt seen, heard and safe to speak their truth. This made me think about the power of healing, energy and connection. That moment when you realize the impact you made on someone, or when you’re in that moment and later reflect on it, can be so powerful and moving.
In class we discussed that before, the system was designed as learners were seen as products of the system. Some schools it still is seen as that, however, there is a shift happening and that shift is where we are trying to create learners who drive their own product. This is the future and it is moving and inspiring. I want to be apart of this new shift in education and work at a school that envisions student centered learning.
Reflections on my personality
When we did the personality activity, I was confused, I felt that I had a bit of qualities from each type of personality. After looking at the four quadrants more thoroughly, I feel that I am in the amiable personality quadrant and expressive personality quadrant. My clashing personality would be the drivers and analyticals.
While looking at the quadrants, I noticed that my sister would be in the driver quadrant and that is why we are always clashing. My personality type is people-based and ask-based. Whereas the driver personality is tell-based and task-based.
While working as a teacher, I will meet many co-workers who are in the various quadrant personalities and some in the middle. To have a healthy working relationship, I am going to practice setting clear boundaries and try to maintain them with my driver co-workers. I think it can be easy for me to get sucked into taking on a lot of tasks because I want to be helpful, however, I think some people can take advantage of that.
Some things I can try to implement in my interactions with driver co-workers is to be concise when engaging in conversation. Be less emotional and provide facts rather than extra details. As I was reading about drivers, it started to make sense to me. Whenever I talk to my sister, she always appears irritated when I show emotion in my voice, so I’ve started to just get to the point when I have something important to tell her. Drivers seem to be bothered by a lot of detail and emotions.
In the classroom, as an amiable personality, I would need to have structure with my busy schedule. If this part of my personality was coming out more during a certain month or week, I would get myself to refer to my lists and organizational for support to redirect my energy and focus.
When I am feeling more of my expressive personality in the classroom, things that would help me are keeping on track for my daily schedule, and to do list of all the important tasks for the day. I feel like when my head has a lot of thoughts, it can overwhelming so during those times, I find it helpful for me to refer to my to do list and tackle one job at a time.
I feel that my personality has changed since my brother passed a way. I have become more quieter but I still feel like I have my enthusiastic part of my personality. Depending on my grief, I feel that I am connected to both quadrants. Grief is always with me and will continue to be with me however, I feel that my personality is affected by the process of grief that I am in. For example, I have random days where I am feeling more emotional and filled with regret about how things happened with my brother then I feel that I am more in the amiable personality (less enthusiastic, hesitant, keeps emotions hidden) I won’t talk about it with anyone because I feel like my sister doesn’t get it etc. However, If I am feeling inspired about my brother and all that he taught me then I feel more in the expressive personality quadrant. In this process, I am able to write down my feelings and find ways to honor my brother. I also find that if I am very sad in my grief I am more timid and when I am in a more regulated mood, I feel restless, there are a lot of thoughts in my mind and I often feel like I forget things as I have so many thoughts going on.
This personality assignment really allowed me to reflect on my personality and it is something I have noticed in the past four years. How I have changed. I feel like I lost apart of myself. I used to be more positive, happy and cheerful. I want to get back to being more social and less anxious. I will. It is something that I am consciously going to be aware of and take active efforts to rekindle the positive parts of my personality that I know I still have deep inside of me.
