Love the kids

“You have to love the kids.” That has become something of a mantra in a class I am teaching for future English teachers. We’ve had two veteran and dedicated high school English teachers speak to the class, and both emphasized that caring about the kids is a key to effective teaching. I know of other teachers and coaches who are great at what they do who tell people that loving the kids is a crucial factor in the equation of teaching well.

In the class for future English teachers, we read “Teacher Man” by author Frank McCourt of “Angela’s Ashes” fame. In “Teacher Man” McCourt chronicles his three-decade teaching career in the New York City schools before he became a famous author. McCourt writes about how he entertained students with stories about his life, including his early years in Ireland, and how he challenged students with unconventional writing assignments and discussions. McCourt also loved the kids, though, and that, more than anything, made him a special teacher.

I lack formal training as a teacher, so my techniques may be unconventional, even ineffective at times, but I think I at least partially make up for that because I love the kids I teach. Some get on my nerves occasionally. In fact, I have a group now driving me nuts because I want those students to take full advantage of the education being offered instead of looking for shortcuts. I’m frustrated with those students, though, because I care.

Yes, some people I teach are not exactly kids, some are even in their 30s and 40s, but many of my students are college freshmen and sophomores, meaning they’re 18 or 19, kids in many ways who need nurturing.

Quite simply, if you love the kids you teach, you’ll want desperately for those students to succeed. You will care about those kids as individuals. You’ll go the extra mile because you want those students to be well educated about many things, to be able to excel at not only the next level of education but the next level of life.

I truly believe the key to improving education in our country is not more standardized testing or Common Core or Race to the Top. I believe the key to improving education in our country is having more teachers who truly and deeply love the kids.

Teachers who don’t love kids, or who don’t love kids anymore, or who consider the kids pains in the rear who have to be endured every day, those teachers should be removed from classrooms. Their hearts are not into the work, and the kids know it and hate it.

But many such teachers, no matter how burned out, not matter how kid-loathing, are not going to go anywhere because they’re not trained to do anything else, and teaching provides a steady paycheck, with benefits.

Additionally, such teachers are protected by teachers’ unions. I’m a teachers’ union member, and I’ve told fellow union members that we should be self-policing, that we should not support such instructors, even press for dismissal of teachers who don’t have their hearts in serving their students. I think such teachers are stealing money, basically, and I’m not hesitant to say so.

This has not exactly made me the most popular teachers’ union member.

That, though, is fine with me. As long as the students know I’m there to provide the best education I can, to help those young people to be the best human beings they can be, I’m OK with not getting along with some of my fellow teachers.

That’s because I love the kids, and as a teacher I believe that’s what matters most.