Why I Love Teaching

So today was a typical exam day at my high school. After giving exams from 8 – 11:50 to my "Literacy 9" and "Literacy 10" classes, I sat in a meeting from 12:00 – 1:30 trying to craft a plan to help a failing senior graduate. As I was finally gulping down my lunch at 2 PM over a daunting stack of ungraded exams, I remembered Tyler. He entered my F block exam today by announcing, “Miz Baasch, you are going to make us do too much writing today.” I assured Tyler that indeed, that was my goal.

“Yeah, well, I can do it,” he asserted.

“You could also ‘do it’ in your English class,” I countered, knowing that he was failing English.

“Nah, I’m failing English…but Literacy's is okay.”

“Last year you scored 120% on the one hundred Literacy vocabulary words. You had to study to do that Tyler, and if you studied you could pass English,” I tried to reason.

“Yeah, I studied because I knew I could do it. And you and me have a connection. You like me. My English teacher hates me …”

“Well, if you studied, she’d like you much better! You have to let her see this side of you,” I offered.

“No. She hates me and I hate her and I am failing—but I can do Literacy. But with all this writing today, I won’t be writing next week!”

“Thanks for the warning, Tyler!” I responded…and then replayed his comment, “I can do it....You and me have a connection…You like me.”

And that is why I love to teach.