Teachers - The Good and the Bad
In classes, lessons, experiences, and life overall, there are teachers. Depending on the teacher, people tend to judge whether one is good or bad. But, what judgments can you make that would justify a teacher's level of teaching? Would a good teacher have a class filled with students that average at a "B" for an overall grade? Or would the bad ones have a class full of students with a "C-" as an average? Do grades really justify a student's intelligence that they have gained from their teacher? Judgment of a teacher's capability to teach and do it well has many different characteristics that must be thoroughly analyzed before you can say they are not the greatest teacher one may stumble upon. Therefore, we must lay down the laws of good and bad teaching before we start pointing fingers on who is the horrible one.
The judgment is yours to make, but what level of standards can people generally agree on if they were to throw out names on who is good or bad? For example, Mr. Keating from Dead Poets Society was seen as inferior compared to the other instructors, though students thought otherwise. But, the question is, why? Mr. Keating made commitments to his class unlike any other teacher would. Every teacher in the prestigious college-prep school all wanted them to be the same. Uniforms, grades, and even life. They wanted nothing more but to see them graduate and head straight to Yale, get a job, and be "successful." Mr. Keating wanted his students to think for themselves and do what makes them happy as long as they work hard for it. He interacted with students, and even broke the most quiet kid out of his shell of fear as he screamed his beautiful poetry to the class and obtained the cheers and acceptance of his peers. Instructors that teach from the textbook rather than interact and decide not to learn each student individually will struggle to see the students excel and truly retain what is being taught, which those who have attended high school can surely agree on.
Additionally, when a student retains the information that the teacher has now taught to the pupil, they must be able to apply it to real life situation. For example, when my Algebra teacher, Mr. Hale, taught me how to solve an inequality, he certainly did it differently from what my past math teachers have done. To give some background, I suffered a concussion and dealt with the consequence of being sensitive to light and had chronic migraines that felt like someone continuously smashed a hammer through my temples as soon as I heard the sound of a peer's voice. Mr. Hale understood this, and taught me differently from the other students that had no health problems at the time. He would teach me separately in the hallway, even during classroom time, because the light was dimmer. He taught me how to solve this inequality relating to a real life situation. My parents needed to save money during this time period, therefore, was able to compare it to something as little as finding out the unit price of each ounce in different peanut butter brands and jars at the store and then comparing to see which one was cheaper. He also offered before and after school tutoring, going the extra mile. Mr. Hale was not one to teach a student how to solve an equation then when the student would ask why they needed to learn this, he would not reply with, "Because the government said you needed to know how to do this, so sit down and listen." He would teach it and give us real reasons as to why we need to do know this material to make our lives much easier.
In contrast, what makes an educator so horrible you want to stab yourself in the leg with a pencil every time you attend their class? Everyone had an instructor that made their heads hurt so bad, that they just wanted to pull their hair out and scream. I present to you my sixth grade English and Social Studies teacher, Mrs. Acton. A teacher is one who should be able to make the subject you are learning more understandable, rather than more confusing. You would think that this is common sense, but you are absolutely dead wrong. This was the case for Mrs. Acton. She would assign an assignment such as coloring the world map, and tell my classmates specifically to label continents and important lines on the earth such as the Equator or the Tropics of Cancer. The next day, she would change how the assignment should be done and yell at every student who did not magically read her mind and do the assignment the new way like she wanted. Students are not mind readers, nor are we able to comprehend the constant changes to every assignment she assigns, in consequence leading to bad grades and possibly breaking some poor highly motivated kid that wanted the 4.0 GPA for the year. A good teacher should be able to at the least, make an assignment clear enough in description so that students know how do it and stick with what the assignment began with. Grades may not be everything depending on the effort also put into the student, but students getting A's and B's at least shows good character and effort in both the teacher and student. Though in her defense, her life was not the greatest outside of school, as told by her, but a good teacher would put their struggles aside to help their pupils. Common sense and communication, instructors. Please use it! These are key.
In conclusion, these are some characteristics one could use to judge a teacher's skills in teaching to their students. You may find it strange that including common sense into something as big as being an educator would be, for the lack of a better term, common sense, this is something plenty of people - including teachers, also lack. Do not assume everyone has common sense, but judging by average high school teachers that are generally laid-back and uninvolved, think again. The teachers that show up for more than just the salary they are paid will surely stick out like a sore thumb, though in this case, a good sore thumb!
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