What did a teacher do that made you automatically gain respect for them?
I had a professor that made it crystal clear that if we ever made an appointment and didn’t show up, he’d take 5 points off of our final grade.
I tried to find him during office hours and he wasn’t available.
I told him that I deserved an extra 5 points because he wasn’t available when he said he would be and he gave it to me in the interest of fairness
In my first year of high school, my class decided to play a simple prank on our English/SOSE teacher, by all laughing when he faced the board, and then stopping every time he turned around to face us.
After a few minutes of this, he just left the classroom without a word.
We all sat there, confused, until a few minutes later the assistant principal comes in and explains that we've really upset our teacher; he made us believe we'd seriously beep up...
Then our teacher walked in and pretty much went "gotcha!"
That son of a beep had our respect from then on.
My highschool science teacher paused class to rip a student apart for bullying another student.
Called it out as soon as it happened, infront of everyone, and that bully never went near that other kid again.
Will always remember that.
A math teacher went to the hospital several times to visit a student who had been seriously injured in an accident.
The teacher offered companionship, free tutoring, and genuine encouragement.
math teacher : "I don't care if you have good grades or bad grades, if you work hard, I will work harder to make you pass".
He worked hard for me; I passed ...
Told us a joke about his name (before we could) and allowed us to eat during his classes "because kids your age can't help being hungry all the time", as long as we did it quietly.
Great guy.
His whole attitude made all of us actually pay attention and do our best.
I moved out of home during high school.
It was stressful, to say the least.
I started to fall behind in assignments, I would be absent for days at time, I missed tests etc.
I ended up explaining the bare minimum of my situation to my English teacher, and their response always stuck with me.
"Just do what you can."
It may not seem like much, but right then and there, for sixteen year old kid who felt like simply living was a burden... it was everything.
English teacher in high school asked where my homework was.
Responded “I forgot to do it” and he said to the rest of the class “Why can’t you guys be like Scratch_That_?
He doesn’t come up with some excuse he just tells me he didn’t do it”
I had a principal in a new school i hadn't met yet because the first day of school at my new high school was my dad's funeral.
He had no idea what I looked like, but he sought me out in the really crowded hallways and gave me a hug and his condolences.
Never felt creepy, only cared about.
He went on to local politics and became our mayor.
Only time I have truly voted for the best person for the job and not the least objectionable.
Edited to add:
Wow!
Thanks for the upvotes!
I've never had a comment blow
up like this.
Mr. Peary, if you see this, you earned my instant respect and kept it with your further actions.
We need more like you.
When I was a kid we had to purchase these red punch cards to get lunch at school.
Unfortunately we didn't have that much money so there were times where my punch card would run out and I wasn't able to eat for a while until we got enough money to repurchase another one (why nobody in my family applied for assistance was beyond me).
I had one teacher who noticed I wasn't eating every day and she would bring an extra sandwich and offer it to me whenever she saw that.
I really didn't understand how kind that was when I was a kid but obviously as an adult That was such an amazing gesture of kindness.
Junior year of high school, English class.
We were discussing a story we had read.
One student (let's call him Carl,) made a point.
The teacher was dismissive and basically said Carl was wrong.
The next day, after we took our seats the teacher said, "Before we begin, I was thinking about what Carl said yesterday.
I was wrong to dismiss it so quickly.
Let's take a look at that again."
He then went on to repeat Carl's point and initiate a conversation with the entire class.
After the conversation, it became apparent Carl's point was indeed off base, but I was impressed the
teacher publicly owned his mistake and went down the path he should have.
I had a physical education teacher who organised basketball, volleyball, handball and football tournaments, organised 'olympic games' for the local kids and taught us dancing on weekends.
On his own.
Just for us kids, because we lived in a remote place without many activities and things going on.
He was more than a simple teacher.
I remember my first math class in college.
I didn't take any math my senior year of high school because I finished my math requirements my junior year.
Anyway, the first math test hit me like a truck after never having to try in high school and I scored in the low 60's.
The next three tests, I learned to study and got 3 98's in a row.
The last week of class, the professor (who was a hard ass by the way and would kick you out for having your phone out) called me up to her desk after class and said clearly you were having a bad day that first exam, so don't worry about that grade because I won't count it.
It really changed my view of that professor.
Instead of shouting at my loud class for not shutting up before the lesson began, my history teacher decided to quietly tell the story of a pink elephant that wanted to be an astronaut.
After a few seconds, people started to shut up and listen about the pink elephant.
When everyone was quiet and listening, he stopped mid-story.
As much as it made me respect him.. WHY DIDN'T YOU FINISH THE STORY FFS!
THAT CLIFFHANGER!
A supply teacher spend the day recovering my lost sticker collection.
I'm sure its done in other countries but in uk primary/junior schools.
Playtime becomes a trading hub on the playground for stickers.
Anyway, one particular day i made a massive haul of stickers which I misplaced for a split second and it was gone.
I was devastated and my teacher saw me in distress when i got back from class, my teacher promised she would get them all back for me.
True to her word she did.
In fact it turned out several people had
made off with my stash of stickers and she spent her lunch time tracking down every one of the children who had them, claimed them back and grilling the kids in turn to who else had my cards and getting them to see her.
By the end of lunch she returned them to me all accounted for.
For a supply teacher to do this, it was a seriously kind gesture as most teachers would shrugged their shoulders and carry on as if nothing happened.
​
EDIT: Wow this exploded fast!
many thanks for the upvotes and
rewards!
A lot of people are asking me what a supply teacher is.
Its just another way to call a temp replacement teacher when the normal teacher is ill or can't teach on that day.
She was an absolute legend.
We had her for a few weeks and she made learning damn fun:
First she came up with a picture of an image (in our case it was robin hood) and each limb or part of the body had a reward on it.
Small stuff like 10 minutes of playtime for example.
bigger parts, meant bigger rewards.
As the students did well (good marks, good behaviour etc), they got stickers and you stuck it
on the picture.
It was a class effort as you all worked towards the prizes and for our young minds this was amazing as we never had that kind of incentive.
Second there was student of the day.
The MVP of the class and she would announce it at the end of the day in front of the class so that YOU knew that you were the MVP and EVERYONE else knew it and how you earnt it.
She even had a dedicated corner of the chalkboard for your name.
Again as a kid it just blew your mind and you got perks like getting to sit on the chairs instead of the floor and of course.
Stickers.
yeah i cried when i saw her go.
When she got those stickers back, i was absolutely compelled that night to write her a thank you message and got my parents to sign it.
We had an exam, saying “I’ll test your honesty and your teamwork, I’m gonna leave the room once your exam starts”.
So we thought it’s between honesty that we don’t share answers with each other, and teamwork by cheating.
We were so desperate, and cheated the exams.
Professor came back 5 mins before the time is up and asked, “so did you share your answers with one another?” And yes we said.
“Okay” he said.
Since you are all honest and you proved to me that you had your teamwork as a class, I will exempt all of you for this exam.
i told my english teacher about my unfortunate experience at my last school (just stupid people treating me like crap) and he approached me after class and said "hey, i'm sorry that happened to you.
y'know there is a phrase in the english language that i think you ought to know.
f\*ck them".
Not take my beep I was a pretty decent writer in school; able to pop stuff out pretty quickly that was superficial but sounded good.
The first time I had a teacher hand my work back pointing out that I managed to compellingly fail to say anything was sort of a slap in the face that I didn't realize I needed.
I had a business studies teacher who used to be a mental health professional.
So she knew the signs when my depression was particularly bad (for example submitting work at 3am) and would always make sure I had eaten and offered me coffee and generally made her classroom a safe space for anyone.
Sesstein if you're reading this you're amazing!
He told me he gives $3 to Wikipedia every month.
Respect.
I had a professor once state that she doesn't believe in trick questions.
Students trick themselves up enough without the professor helping that along.
She never did put trick questions.
I had been put in a lower set due to class capacity issues.
He started off with a spea h around what we would be learning this year and then assigned work to the class.
After that he walked up to me and gave me a big book with the syllabus and told me he knew I’m too smart for this class and instead of following what the class does he wants me to work through the syllabus at my pace (faster than others being implied) and he would come and check on me after assigning work to everyone else.
He said I could do lots of little each class but I needed to finish the book by the end of the year.
Super duper motivated me to smash his class.
We had a pretty cool and badass teacher in 5th grade.
He was cool, made jokes, made lessons fun but at the same time, didn't take beep
We had these REALLY naughty boys in our class, like they pulled pranks, skipped class, bullied other kids, never turned in assignments or projects.
One day they did something really bad (don't remember what it was) and it made our teacher REALLY REALLY MAD.
I was like, this is it, we all about to be a bunch of witnesses.
I thought he was about to put hands on these kids.
This man was livid.
He called the main instigator to the front of the class, and just stared at him for what seemed like forever.
And this kid was just like, not bothered, had an attitude.
This teacher then starts talking, cool and calm, lecturing this kid about all the bad choices his making, about how he needs to think about if those choices are going to get him anywhere in life, stuff like that.
He brought that kid to tears.
This kid, who thought he was the beep oh so cool, untouchable, will never have to face the music kind of kid.
He stood there in tears.
The teacher wasn't rude or disrespect, didn't like hit the kid or scream and shout at the kid.
Simply spoke to him about making better choices.
Teacher said the "lecture" we a lesson to all of us.
I just think it was so cool the way the teacher handled it.
Spoke to him (all of us) in a way that made us think about our future for the 1st time.
Make good choices.
My Speech class teacher (public speaking, etc) in my senior year of high school knew that I was a budding free speech/ anti-censorship guy.
So for our debate project, she put me on the Pro-Censorship team.
I was *pissed*, but when I asked her about it she gave me a line about how the teams were already set and she wasn't going to change them.
Over the next few days I found out that two of the people who were on the Anti-Censorship side were actually in favor it, and a few people on the other teams were likewise put on the sides that didn't match their own views.
Even at the time, I saw what she was doing, but every time I think about it, I see just how brilliant she
was at teaching us how to look at the merits of all sides of an argument, as well as how well she knew the attitudes and ideals of at least 60-odd students that took her classes.
He admitted that he didn't particularly want to be a teacher but did it for a stable career (the type of guy who should have been an English PhD but didn't have the money to chase an academic career like that; he was way too good to be teaching high school English).
I had a teacher in the 6th grade who gave me a C+ on a poster project that I turned in.
When he saw my disappointment he asked, "What grade do you think you should have gotten?"
I thought for a second and said "a B+".
He immediately scratched out the grade and gave me a B+.
(Tragically, I saw in the news a few years later that he drowned while on a fishing trip.
That got to me.)
I had an English teacher who would give me oranges in class because if I’m eating then I can’t be talking.
I was also in love with her and probably still am but that’s besides the point
Edit: I was in love with her because of the way she used to bring stories to life, I used to sit there dreamily with my clementine and fall into her soft voice.
She used to give me oranges mainly because I’m a bit retarded and sitting still just doesn’t happen for me.
It wasnt every lesson but she noticed the correlation between no orange vs orange
lessons.
Edit: *wasnt
It was a professor, but she said she wasn't going to have a textbook for the class.
Basically, she didn't respect the textbook representatives trying to take the pharma approach to force kids to buy an $170 access code.
Instant respect.
You just had to show up to the lectures and she'd teach you what you needed to know.
I had a teacher that really understood different types of learning.
I was awful at testing and never did well in school, but I was very intelligent.
He pulled me aside one day and said, "Look, I know you're not an idiot but you're just not good at the school thing.
I know you're good with your hands.
If you can fix my rocking chair I'll pass you."
So I went into my woodshop and fixed his rocking chair.
He really had the respect of every student and he knew how to talk to us as equals and not children.
He's literally touched the lives of tens of thousands of people with beep like that.
May your day be filled with joy and happiness.
And please remember to like, share, and subscribe for more quality content everyday.