What do I love about Teaching?

Prompt number four is a good one. A nice open-ended question. What do I love about teaching?

I have this strong desire to start off sarcastically right now. I want to make a list of things I don’t love so I can pare down the list to something that floats to the surface. I could identify what I love most as a process of elimination.

When I think about the basic question, “Why do you teach?” I usually come up with the same answer every time. I want to have a positive effect on society. I want to teach students who were like me in high school looking for someone who could help them learn. I want to make the world a better place, and teaching is my small contribution (hopefully) to the world at large.

So my love of teaching is related to this idea that I am in a position to make societal changes in a real and meaningful way. I have an influence on what students learn, how they learn, and on a larger scale, what we do as teachers.

I love change. I love the fact that every single day I feel like going to work is new. Sometimes, this is overly challenging and can stress me out, but I will never have the same moment twice while being a teacher. Each class is different. Each student is different. I may teach the same subjects and topics, but because teaching is so interwoven in the place and time of the lessons being taught, I am the victim of constant change.

Coming to terms with what I love about teaching is a powerful reminder of what I’m doing here and why I became a teacher in the first place. It is good to remember what I love about this job because sometimes it is easy to be consumed by what I hate.