Originally Posted May 9, 2012
It’s that time of year, parents hang around outside the school in the sunshine and talk about their kids and who they may get next year for a homeroom teacher, whether they are staying put or changing schools.
This morning one mother was discussing a recent open house she had gone to at a school in town. The principal said the first thing she does when hiring is make absolutely sure the teacher sitting before her loves kids, can’t get enough of kids and adores working with them. Once that non-negotiable criterion is established then they move onto the business of whether or not the candidate has all the other necessary credentials. Well, dur. No?
Am I crazy to expect that loving kids is the prime motivator to get into education and committing to a life of teaching?
I met a woman who has her teaching degree and homeschools her three kids. I assumed she had studied for the degree so she could educate her kids at home once she started a family. She no, that was not the original plan, but she had decided to home school because of some of her university classmates. Huh? She elaborated; some of them ended up working on a teaching degree simply because they did not have a passion for anything else, or they defaulted to it because they didn’t have the math skills for other endeavours or they chose teaching to have summers off. She said the people who got into it for the love of children and the passion for teaching were the minority. Well, what the...?
Okay, so I digest these nuggets and realize it would certainly explain the teachers who seem anything but happy to be at work. Because if it isn’t about the kids then how could it be enjoyable? I cannot imagine being with children all day, everyday - not even my own two - let alone 25 who belonged to other people, for any amount of money.
This got me thinking about a neighbour years ago telling me that "Teaching would be a great job if it weren't for the kids." She wasn’t joking.
We all hunger to be liked. When we are around someone we know doesn’t not like us we wonder why, wonder what we have done to turn them off. It becomes a very loud and very persistent inner dialogue and either try very hard to win them over, (a useless, exhausting and eventually soul sucking waste of our time and self esteem) or we ignore them. Neither reaction makes for a healthy learning environment and kids are too young to have realized that not everyone is going to like them, they trust that their teacher will.
Kids in elementary school cannot grasp it, tweens and teens panic at the mere thought of not being liked so what must it be like for them to sit in a room and even suspect that their teacher doesn’t like them? Can they learn?
I don’t know, but it sure is a valid question. My kids still have their innate need to learn - and that is really the only thing I want them to get from school. I want that love of learning to grow, to be fed and nourished so it never ever goes away. For that to happen surely they have to be taught by men and women who clearly love kids.
No? Am I expecting too much?
No comments:
Post a Comment