A Teacher and Teacher Appreciation Week

This is Teacher Appreciation Week, and I am a retired teacher.  I come from a family of teachers, just as my husband comes from a family of nurses and others may come from a family of farmers or accountants or military people.  There is a certain pride in ownership that comes from having a trade and it is frequently passed down through generations.

            Concerning this week, however, while it is nice to be appreciated, I feel as if the honor and joy of teaching were all mine.  Teaching was the most satisfying work I ever did.  It was very hard, but truly satisfying things are hard.  I was lucky enough to find a way to earn a living at a task for which I had a natural affinity.  I was good at it, frankly, I was exceptionally good at it.  I enjoyed studying the science of education while practicing the art of teaching.  I received opportunities and awards that made my life better and a bit more interesting.  But the bottom line was that teaching made me feel good—and useful—and empowered. 

            To set an environment that leads students from where they are to discovery and from there to application is an intellectual high that can not be described.  Teaching was always my pleasure and I thank so many people for that opportunity.  Oddly, many of those people were also teachers.

Miss Elsie Mae Webb was my high school English, Shakespeare and College Prep teacher.  She was tough as nails.  No one—and I mean absolutely NO one—stepped out of line in her class.  But she also assumed that we could all learn the hard stuff.  You simply had to do what she told you to do.  No shortcuts.  No short change.  No excuses. 

There is a life lesson there.   

In college Dr. Robert Larson was my professor for every American history class I could take.  His love of the American experience made me a life-long scholar of the same.  He also taught me a life lesson.  In each of Dr. Larson’s classes his students were assigned two books to read for the final exam.  On the last page of his final exam you found out which of the two books you had to critique.  Most students played a game of Russian roulette, gambling on which book he would ask for and reading only that selection.  I always read both books, but I had his number and could have handicapped the choice if I wanted.  Dr. Larson loved the populists.  He would take Commerce of the Prairies over The Robber Barons every time. 

Every historian has their favorite era and mine is the Gilded Age.  When I read The Robber Barons, I admired the Rockefeller’s, the J. P. Morgan’s and the Andrew Carnegie’s of this world.  Some were good people, some weren’t, but they were efficient builders of a burgeoning nation.  I liked them.  Dr. Larson, who disagreed with me on much of this, taught me that our disagreement was fine.  To Dr. Larson, a well-reasoned idea was an acceptable point of discussion and disagreements were the whetstones of thought.  Dr. Larson, now in his 90’s, is still alive and I occasionally communicate with him.  He made me a better person, a better American and a better teacher. 

During Teacher Appreciation Week, thank a teacher who rests easy on your mind.  But as for me, I have already received more from this profession than I could have ever given.  I thank God he made me a teacher.  It has allowed me to keep the faith.