When a teacher invests her time, skills, and strategy in a student, she is acknowledging his value, and making the world accessible to him. Along with language and math, we impart joy of discovery, strategies of organization, development of work ethics, test-taking skills, and the necessity of cooperating as teams. Ideally, children must venture beyond the world where all means and ends gratify self. They must see their impact on the natural world, their families, neighborhoods, and the international community. Information must permeate students on every level of their being.
Excellent teachers impart a life-long love of learning. They provoke hunger for knowledge, a spirit of questioning, that the student carries out to recess and home after school. As salt makes thirst, a little teaching should arouse curiosity. In today’s world, adults scramble to upgrade skills as some job sectors disappear and others arise. The adult who learned much from wise teachers is equipped to keep learning. The ability to learn must extend beyond classroom years. Therefore, we are not merely teaching the specific content of various subjects. We are giving students the ability to get knowledge for themselves. This ability is modeled by teachers who love to learn.
Students know whether adults around them love learning. The focal points of the home and classroom clearly show what teachers value. Classrooms and schools should contain all sorts of wonderful books. One of the most important things my hard-working blue-collar family did was to join a book club. There were always glorious new books arriving in brown paper packages. History, biography, and poetry lined our shelves along with a set of children’s dictionaries. My parents also took us to libraries to check out books. Their love of books was the most powerful influence of my young intellectual life, along with the magical half-hour read-aloud time after lunch every day with my 2nd, 3rd, and 4th grade teachers. No actress has better interpreted emotional material than Ms. Hartman as she read Old Yeller and A Wrinkle in Time. Our class lived those books. After she finished a chapter book, kids scrambled to check it out next from our in-room library. The words that were a bit difficult for us came alive again as we re-read it in our heads, hearing Ms. Hartman’s tones echoing.
I seek to reproduce love of reading in my classroom by stocking up on colorful magazines and books of all types. Every time the students see a new pile of magazines, they know that they can take one or two with them. When a young person is especially drawn to a book, I often let her keep it. Therefore, I hunt down many used book events, trolling yard sales and library give-aways for the best “catches” that my students might enjoy.
In addition to a love affair with learning, effective teachers love their students. Children and teens instinctively sense how their teacher envisions them. No child is “stupid” or “hopeless.” Some will not make A’s or B’s, but all can learn more than they currently know. Some children sift through emotional tragedies that impede their learning progress. Others are so bright that we bore them to tears. Additional students can learn if we help them accommodate disabilities. Whatever the case, we must address a multitude of needs in order to help children learn. In providing instruction in a classroom setting, we are setting up numerous figurative ladders so that pupils can enter the learning climate at many different points.
Teaching occurs through a variety of channels in addition to books and chalkboards. Using multimedia often opens the world of education for kids with disabilities. Video games, surround-sound movie theaters, and large screen television sets have married colorful sight and rich sound to catch total attention. In the classroom, we must similarly teach in Technicolor. We now must use every tool in our school media center, plus our voices, body language, and all our artistic ability to demonstrate concepts to kids. Computer programs such as Micro Type Pro can really facilitate communication for children with various difficulties. Also, varied assessments give opportunities for students to shine in many ways. Thus, the student who dreads true -false tests might thrill the class with a vivid Powerpoint presentation demonstrating the same content mastery. A team of students might create a presentation or a debate. I search for innovative ways for all the student to “win” at learning.
The effective teacher is convinced that her job is indispensable. Otherwise, the task will seem too burdensome. I will remember that my lesson plans equip the kids to jump hurdles and achieve. For one child, decoding a sentence is a huge accomplishment. For another, getting caught up in a science project is the key to a future career. My personal goal for each student should coincide with the student’s goal and her parent’s goals. To keep my sanity, I will realistically evaluate what is teachable in the designated time frame, measuring against state standards. At each milestone, we should celebrate.
The end product of teaching will soon look different than it has in the past. Our next well-taught generation will create art, music, new medicines and find ways to penetrate the oceans. They will also design web sites and discover new stars. Some will be successful if they simply hold a job and pay their own rent. Others will debate the ethics of bioengineering. They will tackle world evils like child porn rings and terrorism. Someone will create a workable system of health care. The generation we are instructing now will face challenges not yet conceived. They need sophistication, ingenuity, and compassion, and ethics.
This sounds like a huge agenda. Teachers take on the role of visionaries, dreamers, scientists, philosophers, counselors, and politicians. In fact, it all begins with the very simple skill of reading. Understanding the written word is the beginning of all the other fields of knowledge. Handling numbers is the second most important skill. Applying the skills is the next step. Acquiring these basics equips students to fulfill destiny. And that is our cue to begin teaching.
