I have wanted to be a teacher for as long as I can remember. In elementary school I would stay late at school and help the teacher. For Christmas I would want workbooks and played school with my brothers. To me a teacher is a force of change, they change not only the children they teach but their families, school, and their community. If I were to categorize my philosophy of education I would call myself a progressive-essentialist. I believe that a student is the driving factor in their own learning with the teacher providing the foundations that the student can build upon. To me a teacher is often a student's parent, counselor, mentor and friend. I am not becoming a teacher for the paycheck or the vacation time, far from it. I am becoming a teacher to make a difference, to change the system that I grew up in. I look back to all my educational experiences, and I can see each of the philosophies we have been taught, and I look back and wonder, how has my philosophy changed because of these experiences?