Do you ever find that sometimes being a teacher means more to the other people in your life than it does to you yourself?
For example: I have a friend, who, whenever we're someplace together and someone asks what I do for a living, he jumps in with "she's a teacher" before I can take a breath to answer on my own. On one hand, yes, there's a pride in the profession, but since I only recently received my credential after a career change and since I'm subbing, I don't always feel like "a teacher." Often I feel like a babysitter, or still a teacher-in-training putting in my dues. When you tell someone you're a teacher, it opens up the next question of, "what grade do you teach." As a sub, I have to explain that I'm subbing, that teaching jobs are scarce here, blah blah blah.
Even when I finally finished my courses, I found that family and friends were more excited about the whole thing than I was at that point. I was simply exhausted.
Then, there's the "summers off" and "only work until 3" myth...anyway, do you ever find yourself up against others' romanticized ideas of the profession?
Everyone, for better or worse, has an opinion of teaching. And nothing I can say in a quick conversation is going to convince them that they're wrong.
Teaching is part of who I am. If it's not something you can respect, then either we won't be spending much time together or we'll have to limit our conversation to other topics.
I have a family member who always makes the comments about how teachers have it SO easy and the summers and blah blah blah. Makes me want to throw up even thinking of her. She popped in one day and saw my rolling cart with everything I needed to do and hasn't made another comment.
Teaching is part of who I am. If it's not something you can respect, then either we won't be spending much time together or we'll have to limit our conversation to other topics.
Teaching is part of who I am. If it's not something you can respect, then either we won't be spending much time together or we'll have to limit our conversation to other topics.
I have an aunt (whom I love dearly) that always told people I was a teacher, even when I was subbing- which irked me for the same reason- then I would get the "what grade do you teach" question and I had to explain the situation so I didn't seem to be rudely ignoring them.
I do agree with Alice though, it's part of who I am- if people have a problem with it, it's usually not someone I spend a large amount of time with anyway!
I am proud of being a teacher, and when people introduce me as a teacher I (and I believe that person) am proud to be know as a teacher. Teaching is a noble job.
Do you ever find that sometimes being a teacher means more to the other people in your life than it does to you yourself?
In Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind, Shunryu Suzuki makes an observation something like this:
"Visitors to the Soto school see the Buddhist monks mediate and believe they are doing something special. The monks are meditating as they do every day; they are sitting. This is nothing special. "
When I was a young man in the Army I worked on tactical thermonukes most days of the week. It was what our unit did and it did not seem special. Every once in a while I will be relating a story that involves this tangentially and it completely derails my narrative; the eyes get wide and the questions start. I have since learned to subtly step around the topic because others find it interesting than I did/do.
