Many of my clients tell me I need to work for the Department of Education to encourage people to become teachers. Since I am so passionate about my teaching and I think it is the best job ever, they think I can convince any person, even those who do not like children, to shift to education.

I have my doubts about convincing any person, but I am sure that being an educator is the best job ever.

When I work with my clients on Needs and we get to the stage where they understand the need to make a difference in the world, I understand again why a teacher fulfills this need every time he or she goes to work.

Unfortunately, many people think that teachers are a conduit of knowledge. They take knowledge from one side, chew it and hand it to the students in an easy way.

Teachers, on the other hand, see their work in a more purposeful way. To them, teaching is a facilitation of change. Teachers are there to help their students grow and evolve. They are there to help their students design their identity by learning.

For a teacher, teaching another grammar point or another math concept is nowhere near the excitement and fulfilment of teaching to develop a positive attitude or good habits. You see, it is hard to make a difference in the world by teaching multiplication, but easy by teaching ways to learn.

It is hard to make a difference by teaching to read, but easy when the reading is about friendship. For teachers, knowledge is only a tool to teach attitude.

We learn math not to be able to go to the supermarket, but to be able to stimulate our thinking. We learn to read not to be able to sign a document but to be able to read about love, excitement, motivation and characters. We learn science not to be able to get great grades but to appreciate the world around us.

Teachers have that in mind every time they get up in the morning and pack their lunch to go to work. Their students’ well-being and education is far more important to them than the grades on their report card.

I am not my kids’ teacher at school and I told them from the first day they went to school, “I wish you a teacher that recognizes his or her profession as a mission. I wish you a teacher who will help you carve who you are and will stay in your memory as someone who meant a lot to you and was there to love you and help you be the person you wanted to be”.

I consider myself lucky, because I have been touched by many teachers, especially when I studied special education. The years when I was deeply inspired by those who define education as a tool to change the world.

Remember that your child’s education is much more than the grades on his or her report card and look for those teachers who are there with the vision of touching your child forever.

Yours,
Ronit