Students and staff explain what makes a good teacher

The tapping of pencils and clicking of pens were the only things that could be heard through the expanse of the classroom. Some students worked vigorously on the assignment that had been handed out to them. Some sat in their seats, staring aimlessly as the seconds ticked by on the clock at the front of the room. Making the next day’s lesson plans, the teacher sat silently as the bell rang and the students shuffled out into the hallway. The last student left with the small click of the closing door, leaving nothing to be heard but muffled voices as everyone made their way home for the day. The teacher peered over the laptop screen and onto the stretch of deserted desks and chairs, teaming with students the minute before. With a blink, the teacher’s eyes flew back to the laptop.

According to busyteacher.org, one of the main characteristics students look for in a good teacher is belief in his or her students. The site also said it is important for there to be support from teacher to student.
“I look for a teacher who respects their students, helps them to grow and someone you can come to and feel comfortable around them,” senior Carsyn Greet said. “I also look for someone who is friendly, not monotone the whole class period when giving a lecture [and] wants to engage the students.”

Greet said she would advise teachers to connect with their students. By giving the students something memorable about the class to latch onto, she believes that that would help teachers get more personal with students. She also recommends smiling a lot.

“My best experience with a teacher would be my English teacher because she was really good at providing examples, getting personal with the students by telling stories about her life and who she is to help us connect to one another and get to know her,” Greet said. “She made sure that we were succeeding and she would definitely notice when a student was upset or something was wrong. She’d want to make sure that all was well and that the personal life and school life was important.”
Professors at the University of Rhode Island conducted a study on how student-teacher relationships affect learning. In the study, investigators went to a neighborhood setting in the East Bay, Rhode Island, area to observe and interview classroom teachers they had trained to be the best in their practices. The professors conducted three interviews with each of the teachers and compared the results to the observed interactions in the classroom. It was evident to the researchers that there was a definite correspondence between the way a teacher taught and the achievement of the students in their class.

“I think probably one of my best experiences with a prior teacher was in high school. It was a physics teacher that I had and physics was a very tough class for me. There was a target, we had to put it in the right spot so a ball would hit it and we got really lucky. It was all luck and it was obvious that it was,” science teacher Chris Jenson said. “He pulled me out into the hall and he said, ‘I feel sad about your lab today.’ I was confused because we had done really well. I said, ‘Why would you say that?’ His answer was, ‘Because I think what you’re learning is that you can get lucky and get your way through life doing part of it. You could do so much more than that.’ And it was the first time a teacher had ever called me out on something, so it caught me off guard. It helped change the person that I wanted to be.”
Jenson has been a high school teacher for six years, not including the years he taught residents and students in his medical career. His interest in teaching grew from his medical career. As a science teacher, Jenson said he tries to bring different styles of learning into the classroom according to specific needs of the students.
“I respect the fact that my students learn different ways, so I try to force myself to teach different ways,” Jenson said. “I, personally, tend to be a visual person. I think if  I didn’t try to force myself to change it, that’s what a lot of my lessons would become.”

Jenson understands a learning style that is beneficial to one student may resonate differently with another. As a teacher, he  said it is his responsibility to acknowledge the differences in learning within every student. Sophomore Kale DeYoung recognizes his learning style apart from others.

“I would probably say the teacher that helps best for me is an interactive teacher, somebody who engages in the class instead of sitting at their desk and doing nothing,” DeYoung said. “Overall, I’ve had teachers who have sat at their desk, but they’ve done a pretty good job of helping the class as well.”

Math teacher Kelley Alexander said  interaction with peers is one of the most effective ways to learn within the classroom. She said she teaches through her own experiences as a high school student.
“I was a sophomore before, so I sat at a desk,” Alexander said. “I didn’t have much interaction with people. I was pretty much all on my own, so that was the first thing. I wanted to be around people.”
Alexander said, in math, there is not much you can do kinesthetically to explain something. When teaching, she said she likes to show the visual aspect of math by making hand motions on the board to show movements in different mathematical situations. Alexander said different students have different ways of learning.

“I can explain something to one kid and it totally clicks,” Alexander said. “Then I can explain something to another kid and they get it, but maybe they get it in a slightly different way. Every student has different little things that they can point out and they can understand. You can explain something to a whole class and then one kid will ask a question that you would have never thought about and most of the class would have never been thinking. You get surprised because everybody’s mind works so differently.”

Sophomore Christie Seyl said she appreciates when teachers can bring more meaning into different works that are incorporated within the classroom.

“In eighth grade, with our social studies teacher, he did [this] thing where they made the barricade, like the trenches from World War II, and we had to go in and be part of the minds of the soldiers,” Seyl said. “That was very intense and I learned a lot from that.”

Seyl said when teachers change things up with lessons, she finds that it is more memorable. She said teachers should try new things within their lessons to keep students interested.

“Have fun with what you do,” Seyl said. “My mom is a teacher and I know if you’re not having fun, then you are not going to want to teach. You’re not going to want to grade homework or anything. If you don’t like the kids then it’s not going to happen so you have to find good things about students to bring out and incorporate into the classroom.”