You’ve got to be a teacher to get it

I’ve always heard, even from my teachers, that teachers are crazy people, especially English teachers. If we look at it carefully, we may see why. Here’s a list that you are more than welcome to add to. What is it that only English teachers do? Only English teachers…

Photo on Flickr by Denise Carbonell

• Say COME – CAME – COME and expect to be understood.
• Correct people when they say “It’s me” instead of “It’s I” and don’t understand why people can’t get it right.
• Keep spelling words to people when they say they haven’t understood a word you’ve just said.
• Constantly ask people to discuss in pairs or in groups something that needs no comments on. (“Oh, yes, Steve Jobs has passed away. Talk to your partner about it!”).
• Ask people to use the subjunctive and expect them to really know what that is.
• Find it annoying when people ask “Who are you looking at?” instead of using whom.
• Watch movies and pay closer attention to the chunks and expressions used than to the plot or the action.
• Laugh out loud in the movie theatre in the saddest part of the movie due to horrible subtitles.
• Tell people that they are using a plosive instead of a fricative and don’t understand why they can’t get it right!
• Tell his or her students that what matters is communication, but keep pestering them for using the simple past instead of the present perfect.
• Find it normal to ask someone to touch their upper teeth with their lips.
• Don’t understand why is it that people don’t know names of book authors as well as they know who soap opera stars are.
• Find it interesting to discuss about family, the environment, relationships, celebrities, museums, and places you’ve been to every semester.
• Watch all videos on YouTube with their lessons in mind, and not to unwind.
• Know 458 different way to put students in pairs but end up always using the same technique.
• Expect students to use sophisticated vocabulary and structures every time they say something. It’s obvious that you should always say “a bewildering array of options” instead of “lots of options” – anyone knows that!
• Feel that they’re being assessed every time they open their mouth to use English.
• Tell students that it’s OK to make mistakes, that everyone makes mistakes, but cannot sleep at night because they sent a text message that wrote “I already did that” instead of “I’ve already done that”.
• Spend hours online trying to find the next big thing that will get your students to study English outside the classroom.

And finally, only teachers know what it’s like to…

• leave all troubles behind you when you close the door of your classroom.
• be able to help someone really learn something.
• treasure each and every student for who they are and what they can accomplish, and by no other standard.
• share someone’s happiness for passing a difficult exam.
• make a real difference in people’s lives.

A happy belated teachers’ day to each and every one reader of this blog. This humble teacher/blogger hopes that one day we, teachers, are valued by all wonderful and crazy things that we do. 🙂