This was the first year I was a Beyond Recycling Educator, I faced a number of challenges but was always excited to teach these classes, and would leave the school feeling uplifted!
The challenges I faced were largely around:
1. Feeling confident and prepared for each lesson
2. Working with a busy schedule on both my and my teachers part
3. Keeping my lessons on track and on time!
While the first two I was able to manage the third became harder and harder the more involved the class got with Beyond Recycling. I was so grateful to have a class that was enthusiastic about each topic. We had many great classroom discussions that branched off of the lessons. However, this often meant I ran out of time for the full lesson. I used a couple strategies to help combat this problem:
1. While preparing for my lessons I would anticipate what areas may require more conversation time and build that into the plan
2. When conversations were developing unexpectedly but moving in a productive direction I would look ahead in the lesson and see how I could bring the conversation back to this lessons and continue through
3. On a few occasions, I just needed to accept that we would be finishing up the lesson at the start of the next class!
Overall the part of the program I was able to deliver was extremely rewarding and I thoroughly enjoyed being a part of the Beyond Recycling Team this year! Thank you to my wonderful class, teacher, and Wildsight for the support!