autobiography

My name is Nicole Giunta but a strong majority of people call me Nikki. I am from a town called Ramsey located in New Jersey and only a short 35 minutes from New York City. I have an older brother, and in terms of my cousins, I was the baby until about 6 years ago. I absolutely love family time, and I love playing with my little cousins. I always seem to disappear with the little ones and prefer that instead of sitting and talking with all the adults. This is the way I have always been which strongly drew me toward becoming a teacher. For as long as I could remember, I loved being around little kids. I can remember going to my friend’s houses for play dates and I would love it if they had little siblings. When I was in middle school, I volunteered at a local elementary school’s after school program to help 1^st to 3^rd graders with their homework. I think at that point, it really enforced my previous desires to become a teacher. I thoroughly enjoyed the expressions on their faces when they finally understood a math problem or when they finished their last vocabulary sentence. I took pleasure in watching them overcome their frustration to really focus and learn what they were supposed to do. It was such a rewarding experience and the more I did it, the more I sat back and truly realized that this is how I want to spend the rest of my life. Another positive experience occurred in high school. I participated in a program called “Parenting Education”. In reality, it wasn’t much on parenting and it was a lot more about teaching. We had 20 preschoolers come into the classroom every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and we would teach the students our lessons. We spent every Monday and Friday finding lessons and preparing them for the proceeding week. This was my first taste of what being a teacher would be like. I had to find a lesson appropriate to what we were working on that week, I had to find a book that might correspond to draw their attention toward what we were doing, I had to find a fun project for them to do, and I had to have all of the materials needed for the project. This is when I finally started to see some of the time consuming aspects of an elementary teacher’s life. Of course, this in addition with many others, I found that preparing arts and crafts for 20 children is tough. In addition, you have to make sure that the project is age appropriate. I found myself keying into their interests to create a project that they would be excited about. However, after taking that class for three out of my four years in high school, I left with more knowledge, and no doubts that I wanted to become a teacher. Helping me establish this conclusion was another rewarding situation when one of the little kids I worked with every day finally wrote his name on his own. For the longest time I was drawing dashes on his paper for him to trace, then we moved up to me writing his name and he would have to write the letters on his own but referring back to my original one. However, this one particular day, he came in and told me he didn’t want any help and I sat there and watched him focus so hard to make sure he got every letter correct and in the right place and when he finished I remember him jumping up with excitement telling me that he did it. I remember him walking around showing everybody because he was so proud of himself and I realized that things like that can occur on a daily basis for some teachers and that is the teacher I would absolutely love to become.

I have set many goals for myself as a teacher. Some of them I believe to be a bit fictional and perhaps unrealistic and others to be a great foundation for me to build off of. I have seen movies and read books such as “The Ron Clark Story” and “The Freedom Writers” and have been so deeply moved by them. I would love to be a teacher who will step foot into a classroom and really make a difference in my students’ lives, not only on an academic level but in a personal level as well. I want to be able to provide them with opportunities they might not be offered and I want to teach them on how to handle the opportunities so they can receive all the benefits desired. These movies influenced me to become an inner-city school teacher but then I realized that not all stories end like theirs and what is why they have become books at this point. However, it is still a consideration for me.

Since there is a possibility that I will be teaching students at the beginning of their schooling years, I think it is really important to make it an enjoyable place for them. I want them to be excited to go to school and be excited about learning new things. If I can create a foundation for learning that they enjoy, I can only hope that they will carry that with them for the rest of their lives. I remember having an amazing kindergarten teacher who made everything so fun and after kindergarten I continued to have a few years of great teachers, and I absolutely loved school. I contribute my academic successes to my elementary school teachers for providing me with not only a fun environment, but a great foundation of the basics for me to add on. I want to be the type of teacher that my students will remember when they enter college. I would love to be the type of teacher whose name is written on a blackboard when one of their college professors asks the question “who was your most memorable teacher and why?”.

For me, it is an amazing opportunity to have the chance to sculpt a young mind and see the changes as the year progresses. I live for the days when I can see some of the information click in my students’ heads. I know I am ready to become a teacher and I know after graduating from the University of Virginia and the Curry School of Education, I will have all I need to be as successful as I have always dreamt of becoming. I am ready for all the negatives (frustrations, extra time, failures) and the positives (the children!) and I know that this is going to be one of the best choices I have made for myself. I am so glad that I am following down this path because I truly cannot see myself becoming anything but a teacher!