You Know You’re a Teacher When…
You repeat everything you say to your friends at least
five times.
You think of the new year starting in August.
You tell your husband to spit out his gum.
Your favorite place to shop is the teacher’s bookstore.
You can eat an entire meal in 20 minutes or less.
The neighbor’s trash looks like something you can recycle for your classroom.
You count all your Valentine Day cards and smile.
You pick up a handful of napkins in a restaurant.
Your wardrobe is covered in paint.
You wake up in the middle of the night and say, “Who’s talking?”
Other people joke that it must be nice to have three
months of vacation.
You are afraid to take a sick day because the sub doesn’t know your kids like you do.
Johnny swears and you smile because it was a grammatically correct sentence.
What Do Teachers Make?
(The "unsantized" version of this poem, can be found on the poet's site, www.taylorhicks.com.)
Dinner guests were sitting around a table discussing life. One man, a CEO, decided to explain the problem with education. He argued, “What’s a kid going to learn from someone who decided his best option in life was to become a teacher?” He reminded the other dinner guests that it’s true what they say about teachers: “Those who can do, do. Those that can’t teach.” To corroborate, he said to another guest, “You’re a teacher, Susan. Be honest. What do you make?” Susan, who had a reputation for honesty and frankness, replied, “You want to know what I make? I make kids work harder than they ever thought they could. I can make a C+ feel like a Congressional Medal of Honor and an A- feel like a C+ slap in the face if the student did not do his or her very best. I can make kids sit through 40 minutes of study hall in absolute silence. I can make parents tremble in fear when I call home. You want to know what I make? I make kids wonder. I make them question. I make them criticize. I make them apologize and mean it. I make them write. I make them read, read, read. I make them spell definitely beautiful, definitely beautiful, definitely beautiful over and over again, until they will never misspell either one of those words again. I make them show all their work in math and hide it all on their final drafts in English. I make them understand that if you have the brains, then follow your heart…and if someone ever tries to judge you by what you make, you pay them no attention. You want to know what I make? I make a difference. What about you?”
Teaching is the profession
that creates all others.
If you think education is expensive,
try ignorance.
~Derek Bok,
President, Harvard University
their packages earlier than others.
~Michael Carr
All I Ever Really Needed to Know I Learned in Kindergarten
by Robert Fulgham
Most of what I really need to know about how to live, and what to do, and how to be, I learned in Kindergarten. Wisdom was not at the top of the graduate school mountain, but there in the sandbox at nursery school.
These are the things I learned: Share everything. Play fair. Don't hit people. Put things back where you found them. Clean up your own mess. Don't take things that aren't yours. Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody. Wash your hands before you eat. Flush. Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you. Live a balanced life. Learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work some every day. Take a nap every afternoon. When you go out into the world, watch for traffic, hold hands, and stick together. Be aware of wonder. Remember the little seed in the plastic cup. The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that. Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the plastic cup - they all die. So do we. And then remember the book about Dick and Jane and the first word you learned, the biggest word of all: LOOK . Everything you need to know is in there somewhere. The Golden Rule and love and basic sanitation, ecology and politics and sane living.
Think of what a better world it would be if we all - the whole world - had cookies and milk about 3 o'clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankets for a nap. Or if we had a basic policy in our nation and other nations to always put things back where we found them and clean up our own messes. And it is still true, no matter how old you are, when you go out into the world, it is best to hold hands and stick together.
"The greatest sign of success for a teacher is to be able to say, ‘The children are now working as if I did not exist'.”
~Maria Montessori
Eight Reasons to Become an Early Childhood Educator
1. Cute little children...cute little paychecks.
2. Confidence that you will never ever forget how to count to ten.
3. You get to sing your favorite songs over and over and over again.
4. Play, play, play!
5. With all this bending who needs aerobics?
6. Your classroom art is proudly displayed in many kitchen galleries.
7. Small hands...large crayons.
8. You get to make the little ones count.
~Author Unknown
"From a Brand New Teacher"
Author Unknown
Let me see if I've got this right. You want me to go into that room with all those kids and fill their every waking moment with a love for learning. Not only that, but I'm to instill a sense of pride in their ethnicity and behaviorally modify disruptive behavior. I've got to teach them good citizenship, sportsmanship, and fair play, how and where to register to vote, how to balance a checkbook and how to apply for a job.
I am to check their heads occasionally for lice, maintain a safe environment, recognize signs of potential antisocial behavior, offer advice, write letters of recommendation for student employment and scholarships, encourage a respect for cultural diversity of others. I am required by my contract to be working on my own time (summers and evenings) and at my own expense toward additional certification, advanced certification, and a Master's degree. I am to attend committee and faculty meetings, and participate in staff development training to maintain my current certification and employment status. I am to be a paragon of virtue larger than life, such that my very presence will awe my students into being obedient and respectful of authority. I am to purchase supplies, room decorations, bulletin board supplies, supplies for children who can't afford them, and luxury items such as scissors, glue, scotch tape, paper clips, notebook paper, red pens, and markers with my own money as there is no money in the budget for these items. I'm to do all this with just a piece of chalk, a few books, and a bulletin board, and on a starting salary that qualifies my family for food stamps in many states...
Is THAT all?
What you leave behind is not what is
engraved on stone monuments, but what
is woven in the lives of others.
~Pericles
In the midst of winter,
I found within myself an invincible summer.
~Albert Camus
What Do Teachers Make?
(The "unsantized" version of this poem, can be found on the poet's site, www.taylorhicks.com.)
Dinner guests were sitting around a table discussing life. One man, a CEO, decided to explain the problem with education. He argued, “What’s a kid going to learn from someone who decided his best option in life was to become a teacher?” He reminded the other dinner guests that it’s true what they say about teachers: “Those who can do, do. Those that can’t teach.” To corroborate, he said to another guest, “You’re a teacher, Susan. Be honest. What do you make?” Susan, who had a reputation for honesty and frankness, replied, “You want to know what I make? I make kids work harder than they ever thought they could. I can make a C+ feel like a Congressional Medal of Honor and an A- feel like a C+ slap in the face if the student did not do his or her very best. I can make kids sit through 40 minutes of study hall in absolute silence. I can make parents tremble in fear when I call home. You want to know what I make? I make kids wonder. I make them question. I make them criticize. I make them apologize and mean it. I make them write. I make them read, read, read. I make them spell definitely beautiful, definitely beautiful, definitely beautiful over and over again, until they will never misspell either one of those words again. I make them show all their work in math and hide it all on their final drafts in English. I make them understand that if you have the brains, then follow your heart…and if someone ever tries to judge you by what you make, you pay them no attention. You want to know what I make? I make a difference. What about you?”
If you think education is expensive,
try ignorance.
~Derek Bok,
President,
their packages earlier than others.
~Michael Carr
All I Ever Really Needed to Know I Learned in Kindergarten
by Robert Fulgham
Most of what I really need to know about how to live, and what to do, and how to be, I learned in Kindergarten. Wisdom was not at the top of the graduate school mountain, but there in the sandbox at nursery school.
These are the things I learned: Share everything. Play fair. Don't hit people. Put things back where you found them. Clean up your own mess. Don't take things that aren't yours. Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody. Wash your hands before you eat. Flush. Warm cookies and cold milk are good for you. Live a balanced life. Learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work some every day. Take a nap every afternoon. When you go out into the world, watch for traffic, hold hands, and stick together. Be aware of wonder. Remember the little seed in the plastic cup. The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that. Goldfish and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the plastic cup - they all die. So do we. And then remember the book about Dick and Jane and the first word you learned, the biggest word of all: LOOK . Everything you need to know is in there somewhere. The Golden Rule and love and basic sanitation, ecology and politics and sane living.
Think of what a better world it would be if we all - the whole world - had cookies and milk about 3 o'clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankets for a nap. Or if we had a basic policy in our nation and other nations to always put things back where we found them and clean up our own messes. And it is still true, no matter how old you are, when you go out into the world, it is best to hold hands and stick together.
"The greatest sign of success for a teacher is to be able to say, ‘The children are now working as if I did not exist'.”
~Maria Montessori