ETL504 Reflection

Over the course of this year I have begun to see the true importance of my role as a leader in the school and the effect this has on the wider school community. Working in quite a large school with close to 800 students sometimes becomes a struggle to make my position and role known across the school. Students often see me as a librarian and not a teacher although I always correct them as soon as it is mentioned. My main goal this year was to present myself as a figure within the school that is full of information and those skills that other teachers do not possess. This sets me apart from the rest and assures the school that my position is crucial. This will continue to be my focus for as long as I am a TL.

I have often considered myself a follower, never a leader, which has made for quite a big learning curve. Having only taught as a classroom teacher for a few years, I have also not had a great deal of experience in organisation and decision making. Therefore, I have definitely surprised myself in what I have achieved personally over the last two and a half terms. 

At present my leadership style lies somewhere around the servant style of leadership. I feel I am quite nurturing and understanding of others in my school and often put others before myself in my role. While this is a good trait to have I know I need to stand up for myself more and become more assertive in my role and the way in which I communicate with staff. Showing qualities and traits of a transformational leader would be ideal and is something to work towards. I may never show all the qualities of a transformational leader as I realise that some simply come down to personality traits. However over the remainder of this unit I am sure I will continue to build upon my leadership skills.

While I have the full support of my principal and fellow staff members, I often feel that I do not have a particular team or stage that I belong to. I am continuing to make that extra effort to be central to everything that is happening in our school and to show staff and students how important my role is and how it fits in with what they are doing. I know this is something I need to continue to be proactive about and aim to ensure the school is aware of this.

While I know I still have a long way to go in becoming the type of TL I would like to be, I often need to stop and consider how much I have already achieved this year. It is reassuring knowing other people are going through something similar and this is quite evident on the forums. The network we have built as retraining TLs is quite strong and is good to see the small successes each of us have made. It’s also reassuring knowing we all have issues and problems we need to deal with as well. I hope I can reflect back on this year in a few years time and see the impact I have made as a qualified TL.