TECHNICALLY A TEACHER

A friend of mine wrote a comment about a week or so ago asking what it takes to be a good teacher.  I wrote out this long tirade which he never received, so I figured I'd post it on here.

"Dang, what kind of questions are you asking me? What does it take to be a good teacher? How the heck do I know? I don't consider myself a good teacher, and I don't know how I would become one.

I can describe a bad teacher. The ones that pass students for buying them a sandwich or for daily purchasing a newspaper they get for free from the school. Teachers that don't remember their students' names, who take absolutely no interest in who they are.

Part of being a good teacher is running a classroom well. It's like managing a store or whatever. So, in my opinion, discipline is very important. Being able to deal with individuals and groups, preventing conflict, and multi-managing the learning of a class while working with an individual student are all things that good teachers should be able to accomplish.

I'm lame, because I can't do these things. I can't really run my classroom. I'm also not goal-oriented. I don't know what our educational goals are/should be. I don't even have the next week planned out, let alone the semester. I wish I knew what I was doing and where I wanted to go with my class, so that I could effectively and engagingly spur them into learning something important and useful.

My strong points are that I am able to talk to my students one on one and that I really do care a lot about them as people (as well as their success in class and in their futures). I stay with them after class and I spend a lot of time after school. I'm not fake and I'm completely genuine in my interest in them. However, not everyone cares about that, and not everyone believes my sincerity. I'm just another teacher talking out of my ass, who doesn't really mean what she says.
It would be great to change someone's life, but how often do people ever really even know when they've done that? When a person's life or viewpoint is changed, they rarely immediately tell the "stimulus" person about it. They may not even recognize it, or how great of an influence was made, until much later. So yeah, I would love for someone to feel that way about me. But I doubt it has happened. A lot of students like me. Many want to visit me, write me letters when they move. I'm glad that they feel close to me and want to maintain contact. But does that mean I've changed anyone's life? Not really.

Especially academically. The only way I've changed students academically is by giving them fails. They get older and decide it's time to stop failing all their classes. But that's not really my influence. That's just the repercussion of a sudden personal desire to succeed. And there are far more students who choose not to succeed. I put my heart and soul into a handful of student last year who either barely passed one of my classes or barely failed. I worked with them on the weekends, after school, in class.....I put everything I had into them. And they didn't make it. And now I have some of them again, and they are once more unmotivated. I cannot put myself into them like that again. I don't have the energy to do so. The only reason they partially succeed (if at all) in the past was because I dragged them along every day and every moment.

And I can't do it for them again. If they have no desire to do well, I cannot break myself attempting to do it for them. And I understand that's not what you're talking about -- dragging kids along. You're talking about motivation and belief. I try to do that as much as I can. But like I said, people rarely know when that works while they are dishing it out.

I'm hoping to be a better teacher. So far I'm not starting out that well. I've had a lot of disappointments thus far. Some have been from my students, but most have been from myself. I'm tired. I'm unmotivated. I'm already frustrated. What to do? What to do...