Sitting in my Early Childhood Education class, I thought "this is what I want to do for the rest of my life." I had always loved kids. I babysat from the age of eleven and I thought my life dream would be to one day own my own preschool. I specify preschool because I didn't want a full-day child care center. I wanted to have easy hours that would allow me to be home when my future children returned from school. I love to teach and children need to learn so it seemed a perfect match for me. After several classes, including some elementary education classes, I was assigned to spend a few weeks observing a preschool in action. It was great. I didn't have to do anything, except take notes of things I thought they did well, and things I felt needed improvement. My ultimate goal was to have my own preschool, design my own curriculum and schedule.

I loved the classes and soon I was given the assignment to work with a preschool, not just observing, but as a teacher's aid. At first it went great, the kids were fairly good and the parents seemed to like me. I was offered a teaching job at the end of the assignment and was thrilled to take the first step toward my goal.

Not long after, I learned something about myself that I never really knew. I didn't have patience for several children having needs, tantrums, discipline problems, sickness and so forth. I love to teach children, but I realized I was stress, tired, and became frequently impatient with them. I wasn't happy. I wished I had tried out a teaching environment long before I had invested so much into preschool education. It was frustrating for me when the realization came that I would not be able to make a life career in this field. I began to look for new ideas and I thought perhaps older children, not quite so young, would be easier; thus I continued into Elementary Education. It was while helping in our churches young primary age group, that I realized my nerves just could not handle several wiggly, noisy, and disruptive children of any age. It finally sunk in that I would not do well in a class room setting. If I were to stay in teaching I would need to look toward school counseling, or something consisting of a one on one or small group environment.

It has been years since then and I have found that my passion is a world away from my original plans. I realized that having an opportunity to shadow a career sooner could have saved me much time and hard earned money.

Shadowing simply isn't an observation of career tasks; it is rolling up the sleeves, so to speak, and getting your hands dirty. By performing, even the mundane tasks, the job requirements becomes more clear, and therefore, easier to determine the bad aspects with the good. Many aspects of a job are unseen to observation. I clearly did not know how I would handle small children in a stressful situation until I was the one responsible to do so.

Shadowing could prevent years of training in an area one simply would not be happy. It may help one decide a career choice that will ultimately bring the satisfaction needed for a future full of success. What a shame to spend so much time and money in an area that I could not tolerate. For those considering education opportunies, shadowing may just be the solution to help reveal strengths, weakness' and ultimately the passion that will bring about rewarding, successful employment.

Learn more about this author, Melanie Miller.
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