With all this teacher bashing going around ( and now more so, thanks to our Governor), I have to wonder, "Why?". See, I wonder this, but I know why - it's just the easy thing to do. Of course there are bad teachers among all these amazing teachers, but aren't there always bad seeds out there? My mother once told me that a person can do 999 good things, and 1 bad thing, and even though that person has done so many good things, that person would be most remembered for that one bad thing done. I guess as humans, that's just how we are. Psych 101 tells me that we, as humans, do this to make us feel better about ourselves; One more downfall that is not ours makes us look better, makes our self esteem go up. Hence the popularity of tabloids, gossip magazines, etc.
So, when it comes to talking about teachers, we remember all the "bad ones", and extend those memories, and then feelings to every teacher. But really, have we, or anyone ever taken note of all the amazing teachers out there? Have stories of these teacher ever hit the news? Of course not. If you are a teacher hater, who think that our job is so easy, who say that we get paid too much and have too many vacations, then I challenge you to do a case study on a teacher for one month. Tell me, tell all of us if that teacher is non-stop moving from the moment he or she walks into the school to the moment he or she leaves. Take note of how many extra hours are spent in the school, whether before or after school. Take note how how many more hours are spent at home working on school business after he or she comes home from working overtime during the school day. What is the percentage of time during weekends spent doing school work or thinking about work or thinking about his or her students? How many times has that teacher worked through his or her lunch, eating with one hand, while grading papers with the other? How much of his or her own money did this teacher spend to enrich learning opportunities, or buying supplies, or clothing for his or her student(s) because either the child's parents can't or won't? How many sleepless nights or night dreamt of his or her students? How many times has he or she has cried from frustration or stress or cried for his or her students? And if there happens to be a vacation during that month of the case study, how many hours of this "vacation" was spent working? Then, at the end of the month , when the case study is about done, I challenge you to see if you could do it. Would your perception of teachers change? I guarantee you that it would.
