Teachers: Impressions that Last a Lifetime

Almost any adult is able to remember many details of each of their teachers throughout elementary, middle, and high school. It isn’t uncommon for an adult to be able to recite the names of every teacher from every grade, as well as any quirks or memorable events that occurred in that class. This just goes to show the importance of teachers in the lives of children, and now much of an impression can be made. But what do teachers really teach children? Will kids really ever use the knowledge taught in class, or do public schools completely lack any real world skills?

The public school system of America has been criticized endlessly by people for as long as many of us can remember. If you look at the learning curriculum of kids in every grade, you can see why. Many children are learning things that don’t do anything to further their intelligence or their learning abilities. In Kindergarten, children learn about the metamorphosis processes of various insects. The different stages of the insect are discussed. But when you consider the intelligence of the average kindergartener, you wonder if this information is being spoken to deaf ears. Can they really appreciate the beauty of nature and the amazing life processes?

Many say that rather than teaching these children various facts that will never come in handy, we should be teaching them how to learn and prepare them for future years. Humans are by nature a very adaptive species, but school is not exactly a natural environment. The children deal with things that don’t come naturally for any human being. So in their younger years, schools should be more focused on giving children the passion for learning and the desire for knowledge that will help them in later schools, and also in their life in general.

Some think that this would be impossible, and that the school system is doing a great job as it is. Supporters for the system say that the best way to accomplish it is to create a rewarding and safe learning environment in which the student does his or her own research and studying, and uses deductive reasoning to reach conclusions. If a curriculum or teaching method could be developed that would accomplish these things, it would be an amazing step forward for the school system and teachers as a whole.