Best:

Helping kids learn new things.

Seeing their faces when they have that “I get it!” moment.

Using your creativity to teach, create games, design bulletin boards, …

Parents who love their kids and help ensure that they are successful.

Supportive coworkers and administrators.

Vacation time around major holidays.

Worst:

Paperwork, paperwork, paperwork.

Parents who couldn’t give a rats a$$ what their kid does.

Parents who are always telling how something should have been done but are never there before the fact to help come up with ideas to do it.

Unsupportive coworkers and administrators.

Relatively low pay.

I love my job because I really like the students I teach. I enjoy seeing my students get excited about learning and using my creativity to make my lessons more interesting and effective. I also enjoy the camaraderie my colleagues and I share. We have fun, but we work hard and take our jobs seriously. The worst part of teaching is the constant demands of the state (high stakes testing; increased teacher education, etc.).

I am a second grade teacher, but I have had experience in 1st, 3rd, 4th, and 5th. The older grades are nice because they are able to work more independently than the little kids. Whether they actually do is often up to you and the expectations you set (and maintain) with them. They can do so much more than littler kids. I also find the curriculum more personally interesting. Older kids can think deeply and create truly amazing things. They can also be crueler to each other and more defiant to you. Once you start working in different classrooms, you’ll get a feel for what grade you’ll be best at.

It sounds pretty basic, but the best part of teaching is…the teaching! Sadly the worst parts all get in the way of teaching, such as government guidelines from policy-makers who haven’t got a clue, poor parenting which means kids come to school ill-equipped and unappreciative of teachers, and the endless paperwork. It’s not even the money (which isn’t great), it’s the burden of society placed on teachers who are expected to be ‘in loco parentis’ with all the cards stacked against them. (ie disciplining kids whose parents can’t be bothered) We love teaching, seeing kids get it, enjoying seeing them achieve things, loving their kids-eye view of the world and being creative in the way we pass on knowledge. If only we weren’t ground down by the bad bits!

: ) Learning and Disseminating the learning. Constant learning of many things: knowledge, the students, their learning style, how to reach them, how to improve on teaching, and learning about ourselves from the students. The possibility to make a difference in someone’s life.

: ( The system especially in a formal school structure, knowing special needs kids are not benefitting, yet just have to conduct lessons according to pace as still need to achieve the class requirement. Feeling lousy and difficult in being unable or too stretched to assist each and every kid. Juggling job scope NOT relating to teaching!!! Marking works of students who obviously have not put in effort. And chasing for students’ work!!!

Best: making a real difference, getting to know some great kids, and getting to talk about things you are interested in. Having part of the summer off is not too shabby, either.

Worst: being underappreciated and underpaid, and being limited in your ability to teach by laws made by people who don’t know anything about education.

The Good: teaching; no day is the same with kids; the days off

The Bad: low parental support (sometimes we feel like ‘babysitters’); low pay for the work load; government regulated (when often the “government” needs to try teaching before changing something)

Overall, I don’t know what else I would like to do!

Love about my job – working with students, seeing them grow and become independent, and moving to adulthood, learning new things, teaching new things, planning for students

Hate about my job – report card writing, politics within school/district

As you can see love far outweighs hate!

LOVE – the kids, the stability, the benefits, the time off

HATE – the paperwork, the kids’ attitude, being underpaid, low parental support, bring work home

Best: The new and exciting things that happen each day.

Worst: The SOL (Standards Of Learning) stress.