So Back In Elementary School Around The 2004-2005 Year Is What I

Have you been in a classroom where the student says the teacher does not teach?

Agreed with Kate Robinson that this is something students say when they feel like the class doesn’t operate in a way that is palatable or easy to them.But my senior year of high school, I actually did have a teacher who didn’t teach, and it was great!My Latin IV class consisted of me and one other student. That was it. We weren’t a small school. The student body was close to 2,500, however she and I were the only students who opted for all four years of Latin. 90% of the student body would choose either Spanish or French, and usually only for the minimum requirement of 2 years.Because she and I were the only 2 people in the course, our class was mixed in with the Latin III class, which had about 15–20 students. As a group, they were louder, roudier, and less well-behaved than we were, so our teacher spent 99% of his time with that course. At my school, going from Latin II to Latin III is a big jump in ability, since Latin I and II were only basic grammar courses, and Latin III & IV were AP courses. (This was back in 2004–2005, when there used to be 2 different AP Latin courses, now there is only one.)This wasn’t a problem for me, though, because we already had a good foundation in Latin translation. Even though I wasn’t naturally gifted in the subject, I worked hard and really liked it. My teacher was a good guy, but when it came to the higher level material, he wasn’t the best at explaining it.The other student, however, we’ll call her J, was a god damn genius. Really. Near perfect SAT score, valedictorian, perfect scores on AP Exams from Biology to Literature, certifiable genius across the board. Rather than Mr. R teaching me Latin IV, J taught it to me better than our teacher ever could.I passed the AP exam at the end of the year, and I give full credit to J. If Mr. R had taught me the material, I don’t think I would have understood enough to pass the exam. Don’t get me wrong, though. He was an ok guy, and decent (though not superb) teacher.The experience was great for me to learn and work independently without an authority figure instructing my every move.

Who was your best teacher and your worst teacher? What made him/her so memorable?

I’ve had great teachers, and I have had not so great teachers.In all honesty, it really depends on the day. There is a lot of gray area in there.However, there were instances that took place where I would say definitely “that was the best thing a teacher ever taught me,” or “that was the worst thing a teacher ever taught me.”If I’m looking at this objectively, the worst thing a teacher ever taught me was a complete lie that wasn’t eve true. And that lie is that women were “not suited” to fly combat jets, and that men were “not suited” to be babysitters.It’s a laughable and inaccurate notion. By far that was the worst thing a teacher (my first grade teacher) tried to teach me. I didn’t buy it.The best thing a teacher taught me was that the human brain is incredibly adaptable, and that what you think are your “limits” are actually just the upper part of your threshold before you start discovering what you are really capable of.In sports we call these “zones.” Over time, with training, you can actually endure a higher level of physical activity with a relatively comfortable heart rate. It takes time and practice.So, you actually can train yourself to make your “threshold” become a “comfy operating zone.”I was taught this by several different (about 5 or 6) teachers over the course of my life. And there’s a reason why.Because it’s true.I would consider them “the best teacher” I ever had.