I come from a family of school teachers. My mom taught high school Latin and French on Long Island in New York while my sisters and I were in what was then called junior high and high school. My older sister was a teacher when I was still in college.

I had the distinct pleasure and honor of teaching elementary students in West Caldwell, New Jersey for 28 years. Hard work, a full school day, and evenings prepping for the next day, still brought immeasurable rewards in helping children learn – learn to respect themselves, their peers, and the whole idea of learning.

Even now, after retiring as an elementary teacher in 1997, I get restless around August 20. A holdover mood from the mid-August teaching years. I would start looking over ideas for bulletin boards, buy second-hand books for youngsters who were still challenged by  “graded” books. Some learners needed different strategies for “reading” what seemed like squiggles on pages and other kids called them words.

Usually our class lists were already decided by mid-August, so we could make name tags, individual folders, and those precious writing journals that were used daily for writing. Even in kindergarten, the little ones were honing their skills as emerging writers/readers. Ownership of their work – scribbling, with drawings, random letters going in every direction ( not everyone gets left and right that easily), slanted, and sometimes even in a straight line marching across the page. 

EVEN BEFORE THE KIDS ARRIVE

Once the custodians had our room cleaned, my colleagues and I would be at school for a total of at least 11 hours for environmental prep. My classroom  (“this will be our second home for the next ten months”) always looked colorful, explorable, and included photos of people and places in our school neighborhood. I loved it and felt comfortable welcoming kids on that first day of school. 

For 28 years, regardless of the grade level, it never varied. The first day most kids took a seat ( “wherever you are comfortable”) and were pretty quiet and curious, “being good” for at least the first 20 minutes as we got to know each other. After that it was wiggle time, or talk time, or recess depending on the age. 

Books on shelves ready to be explored, math manipulative in boxes, quiet areas for reading, writing, thinking, creating. Shelves with paper, pencils, markers. I was very fortunate to work in a district in New Jersey that had abundant supplies and with administrators who supported the best of educational philosophy along with keeping that balance of “we” with teachers, staff, and parents.

SALARY REALITY

I did not get paid for those August days of prep. I did not “get two months off every summer.” My New Jersey teaching contract began the first day of school, usually a date in early September and terminated on June 30. I signed a new contract for each year I taught. So what I got was two months of not teaching and not getting paid. I usually had a summer job – teaching summer school, sales at the local department store, or office manager of a local business.  

YA GOTTA LOVE IT

I loved teaching young children, seeing the face of a child light up when a problem was solved, or a friend sat down to help them, and vice versa. I know I made a positive difference.

Teachers are certainly everywhere – from neighbors, coaches, older siblings, the mail carrier, characters in books, to politicians, athletes, and TV celebrities. Parents are those very first teachers, with a definite vested interest in guiding and helping their own children learn ways to succeed happily in our world. 

I believe most school teachers bring that kind of caring to their classroom. I never had biological children but when my kids asked if I had children, I’d grin and say, “Yes, this year I have 24.” (or 28 or 30, whatever our class size was.) I had a sense of that trust needed to send a child off to our school each day; we were in partnership with each child and each parent. 

THANK YOU, TEACHERS

Here in Arizona at the end of July, school parking lots begin to have a smattering of cars, more each day. I know some teacher is in the building, getting ready to meet a new group of students, getting ready to make a difference. Thank you, school teachers. Thank you, families, for supporting public education, and your children’s teachers.

Ethel Lee-Miller blogs regularly about people, the power of words, and her writing life. She retired after 30 years of teaching, and semi-retired from coaching, and professional editing. Founder of the Eastside Writing Room based in Tucson AZ, she’s posted 100s of blogs, and is the author of Thinking of Miller Place, and Seedlings, Stories of Relationships. These days she writes to inspire, to connect with folks, teaching about the power of words, gather writers together, and for the pure enjoyment of it. Ethel enjoys teaching, speaking, and storytelling at Odyssey Storytelling, Artists Standing Strong Together, Center for Spiritual Living Tucson, and anywhere there’s a mic or a Zoom room.