Teachers as role models

“Elementary school teachers provide a model of appropriate and inappropriate



classroom practices that their students can in turn learn from when they become teachers.”





         



         I feel that this statement can incorporate much more in regards to the teacher serving as a



model than just for preparation for future teachers. Elementary age children, especially those in



the younger grades, are very impressionable, and often any highly visible adult will automatically



serve as an influence in their own mental construct for how a person is supposed to act and



behave. While parents/guardians, family and the likes are by far of the most significant influence,



the elementary teacher often portrays the defacto role as that infallible and omnipotent figure



with all the answers, an image that makes sense in the developing logic of the young mind.



Remember our surprise upon finding out that our teachers did not in fact live inside of the



school? That they had separate lives, and made mistakes just as easily as the rest of us?



Remember trying to impress a teacher by sitting up straight, eagerly raising a hand whenever a



question was asked, and trying to use as many big, “adult” words as possible? Our teachers truly



are our first adult models outside of the family. How many parents become disappointed when



their children start to quote their teachers, often in contradiction of the parents, as a source of



information? Teachers provide us with an early example of proper grammar, behavior, manners,



and so much more.



         To refute the statement mentioned above, I feel that it is very difficult to use my own



childhood schooling experiences for much of a basis in my preparations for being an elementary



school teacher, for many of the same reasons I just mentioned. Quite simply, being asked to



recall my (elementary) past educators conjures up images of these wonderful people who could



do no wrong. I remember my favorite teachers from that time through “rosy” lenses, and have, in



fact, dehumanized them through idolizing them. I have placed them far too high on a pedestal to



compare myself with them, whether their actions, in fact, warranted that placement or not. In



truth, the best role models that I have in preparation for becoming an elementary teacher are my



professors and the teachers that I have shadowed, if only for the fact that they were more easily



viewed through a more critical and unbiased eye.



         To further refute the statement above, one must point out te fact that elementary teachers,



seeing as how they are not in fact endowed with the sense of precogniscence, have no way in fact



of knowing which of their students will become future teachers. While their actions, appropriate



or not, do in fact help guide us, preparing examples for someone who is to be a teacher and



someone who is to be something completely different, like a police officer, are completely



separate approaches. With that said, I feel that the statement would be better rewritten as



“Elementary teachers provide a model of appropriate and inappropriate lifestyle practices that



their students can learn from when they become adults.”                    











essay start time: 7:27pm

end time:8:13pm