Apparently, all of us fall into the category of either ‘larks’ or ‘owls’, with our natural disposition suited to early mornings or late evenings. Teachers fall into a third category: both.
We have an unnatural disposition refined over the years to sustain high-level functioning all day every day, including a significant portion of the night.
My citation for the latter category is underpinned by what you already know. If you’re reading this, chances are:
- You’ve reached the end of the school day with the startling realisation that you’ve not even managed a trip to the loo.
- Regardless of geographical proximity, you will drive to school. Primarily, this is to facilitate the daily transfer of several dozen schoolbooks and a brace of over-populated ring-binders, to continue working at the end of work.
- Experienced teachers will recollect at least one day when it has taken until breaktime to realise your shoes don’t match.
What I’m trying to say, is that Category Three doesn’t come easily. It takes practice and conditioning. You have to be an early-bird and full of the joys of Spring, whatever the season. You are the warm-up act and the main event. Similarly, there’s no slacking off at the final school bell, as it’s usually the first opportunity you’ve had to address what you’d originally intended to. School days are the educational equivalent of a Mobius Ring.
Only you don’t have to. You’ve chosen to and continue to do so, day in, day out. That doesn’t mean it’s an easy choice or always the right thing to do, but it says more about you than 99% of the mortal population languishing in categories one and two: we are capable of so much more than we think.
But that’s why you teach, so it’s no surprise that it’s the ‘way’ that you teach. Because, of course, better than anyone, you get that children don’t do what you say, they do what you do.
Thank you for doing it considerably better than you have to.