February 10, 2003

why they do it

I've always figured teachers choose their field for one of two reasons: either
educating young minds is the most important thing they can think of to spend a
lifetime doing, or they can't think of anything better to go into. If you're
lucky, you get more of the former than the latter in your educational
career.

I'm anchoring class today and tomorrow, which means I keep it
running as teachers cycle in and out to teach different modules in addition to
teaching a couple of modules. After running a class all morning, I've come up with
a third reason people go into education: power. Think about it: they're
stuck there all day. I can speed things up or slow them down, try to
interest them or not, and because they'll be required to use this stuff, they have
to at least try to listen.

Now, there are limits in my power. If I
teach a bunch of crap, these people will tell me so, and will tell their bosses
so. If I were stupid and mean enough to tell them they can't take bathroom breaks,
they'll laugh at me and go anyway. Good thing, because I don't want that sort of
power.

But now think back to first grade. The rumor of a second
grade teacher who wouldn't excuse you, ever, was terrifying, and you didn't have
the experience to realize few teachers really want puddles on their classroom
floors. You had to have a pass to walk the ahlls, so you couldn't just sneak out.
You could be kept after school or during recess. And you had to believe what the
teacher said, because you didn't have any reference to compare her to. (Especially
if all the reference books had words too big for you to read.) Pure power. And
every school had at least one who did abuse the power enough that the kids were
scared of her. I wonder if they still do, or if increased scrutiny on teachers has
ended that. Thank goodness for all the rest of them ... but why didn't they stop
the power-hungry ones? What did they talk about in the teachers' lounge?

Posted by dichroic at February 10, 2003 04:59 PM
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