Those who Can*, Teach

Education is often looked down upon, like a job anyone can do, like a career you choose when you’ve given up trying to actually BE something.

When you tell someone you’re a teacher you either get the “oh you’ve given up” comment, or some inappropriate over sexualized fantasy the pervert you’re speaking to suddenly feels comfortable sharing with you. Which only adds to the lack of respect given to the profession, we get an awful reputation, all across the board. Kids have one bad teacher out of 8 and suddenly “all teachers suck”, why?

Because as a society we don’t value education, we only place value on those who are out doing. Forgetting those who taught them how to get there.

Not to mention, everyone forgets to look at it from the perspective of:

You do your job, a client at a time, or a few people in your team. You’re dealing with at most 20 personalities.

We are dealing with 200 minimum daily, and how those personalities’ hormones have them feeling that day, how those personalities’ family lives treated them the night before, how much sleep they’ve gotten, if they ate anything for breakfast or lunch, and how all of those personalities mesh with each other that day.

No two classroom dynamics are the same, and you will never teach the same lesson twice.

It’s impossible, one group will focus on one part of the story, another might focus on the characters, another might need help mastering the verbiage and vocabulary used.

There is no amount of planning that can prepare you for who you are going to receive that day. So yes, while “doing” is a challenge, “teaching how to do” while catering to hundreds of other nuances that have, seemingly, nothing to do with what you’re teaching, while still forging on with the lesson, while keeping it interesting, while making sure they’re awake and fed.

Not to mention, being hyper-observant of signs of abuse, signs of malnutrition, signs of discomfort, etc. we are not JUST teachers, we’re the front-line for these kids.

There isn’t one teacher in this country who hasn’t had to approach administration or call DCF at some point in their career. Something someone “doing” could never imagine.

Education is not “just” educating, it’s being a second (or sometimes a first) parent figure, being a therapist; someone they can vent to, being a janitor and maid; we clean up after them more often than their parents do, being the person who teaches them manners, who helps them learn from their mistakes, being the one who gives them balance; and shows them that not everything is black and white, the one who mediates, who cools them down in fits of rage, depression, or fear.

We don’t “just teach” we are so much more than that.