For The Love of Teachers

 

Hey Internet, it's been a long time. I'm really going to try harder to do these more often, there's so much to talk about. 

So since school started today for us Canadians I wanted to write about something I've been seeing more and more often that has been really bothering me and that is the way kids treat teachers. This mostly pertains to high school since that is the experience I'm immersed in right now, but I'm sure there are echoes of this in other places.

As a student I know just as well as the next kid that it sometimes seems like teachers are some kind of strange alien species that don't exist outside of school.

That sometimes it seems like they are torturers and you are the victim.

Here's the thing though, they aren't.

In high school marks matter and often kids are demanding to get assignments and tests back and that's understandable. One thing I think is less understandable, however, is complaining when things don't get back to you in what you feel is a timely manner.

I mean giving something in and getting it back months later is not reasonable, but a week, two, three? Your mark you get on it is the same no matter how quickly you get it back. 

And that brings me to the next thing. 

When you don't get the mark you want, often the immediate reaction is to blame the teacher. It's because this teacher is an ass, that they mark too hard (and granted there are plenty that are and/or do). 

That's not so much a big deal, but what worries me is that we often don't look inward. We don't ask "What did I miss", "What could I have done better?", "What did I not do enough of" we tend to push it on the teacher. 

But asking these kind of questions in life is the only way that we'll grow as individuals.

It seems nowadays the teacher-student relationship is this weird "I serve you, and you'd better serve me back"  kinda thing, but it really shouldn't be . 

The thing is, teacher's don't owe you anything. 

The good ones care, and they care a lot so they try to help you and do what you want them to, like give your things back quickly.

But they don't have to do that.

All they really have to do is get the curriculum into your head. 

They don't have to stay up to plan some fun way to do that, they don't have to offer extra help, they don't have to decorate the classroom so it could inspire you, they don't have to make you photocopies when you lose your papers, they don't have to supervise extracurriculars so school is at least sort of fun.

Yes school is like torture sometimes, but if you just think about it for a moment, I think you'll realize there are plenty of other examples of nice things teachers do for us. 

Don't you think we should give at least some of it back? 

I've gotten to see a bit of the behind-the-scenes of teacher life, and you know, they work hard. 

The least you can do is respect that. So don't leave your freaking handouts everywhere, some teacher spent a long time making them. 

Listen when they're teaching a lesson, you don't know how long it took that teacher to prep it. Plus it might just be a little bit more amusing than twiddling your thumbs, and you might just -- gasp -- learn something!

And finally, CARE. They've worked hard to have a good lesson ready for you and seeing it fall onto unresponsive faces is probably the thing that discourages and depresses teachers the most. 

There's something up with the kids in school these days, I've heard so many complaints from teachers about how we just don't seem to care anymore. 

And that's scary. 

How are we going to get anywhere as individuals and a population if we don't care, if we're not driven, if we don't have goals? 

So I guess my main message is that we can be a heckuva lot better students and that would be a heckuva lot better for us. 

We should stop being so tough on teachers for not giving us what we want; stop hurting them by not respecting them and what they do for us; and to not take their kindness for granted. They aren't there to serve us, they're there to guide us. 

Teachers are such important and great people. For me personally, they've been much needed allies, people to ask for advice, and have helped me discover some of my passions in life. So don't you think they deserve more than we're giving them right now?

There are absolutely bad ones that merit complaints, but don't let that attitude bleed into your interactions with other teachers. 

In the end they are only human, people who have feelings, make mistakes, and have their lives to live. Whether or not that always seems the case. ;)

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