28 September 2011

Could YOU teach?

Since many mavericky media types seem to think my job is crazy easy, I thought I'd post some of the oft-forgotten requirements.

Can YOU:

  • Go seven hours without a bathroom break?
  • Calmly accept that your shirt has been used as a Kleenex and you have no way to change it or even wash it well?
  • Stoop and squat to tie at least a dozen shoes a day?
  • ...including those whose laces are wet with unknown liquids?
  • Read Bearsie Bear and the Surprise Sleepover Party, making distinct character voices for all seven sleepover participants?
  • Go an entire working day without talking to any adults?
  • Open twenty milks in ninety seconds?
  • ...while cleaning two spilled milks?
  • Hunt through musty backpacks full of papers, small toys and crumbs to triumphantly find a permission slip?
  • ...then run a 50 yard dash at NFL-draftable speeds to get it signed?
  • ...and remembering to bring a pen and a clipboard?

3 comments:

  1. Anonymous6:33 PM

    It amazes me how easy people think your job is. I work in a school in a supportive capacity and could NEVER be in a class of more than 10 students for more than an hour without wanting to lose my mind. Teachers have some seriously unreasonable demands being placed on them. Thanks for being a voice the under- appreciated public school educator.

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  2. I always think teaching is the equivalent of starring in a Broadway musical production that runs six hours a day, for which you make your own costumes, do your own makeup and sell the tickets.

    Thanks for the kind words!

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  3. As a newspaper veteran, I can also tell you that the NORM in the newsroom is to be highly literate and hopelessly beyond dysfunctional in math. I know a few outliers, but they are definitely the rare and few. So practically none of your media attackers could remotely pass the math portion of the CBEST. I would dearly love to see them required to try.

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