A Special Gift

Dr. Wendy Ghiora – Posting #34 – December 26, 2009

Since we have just experienced the season of giving, I’d like to ask you to ponder for a moment a very special gift. It is the gift of teaching. There is nothing I can think of that compares with this very special gift. If you are fortunate enough to have been blessed with the gift of teaching, you have most likely discovered it is all but impossible not to share it abundantly.

In fact, the feelings good teachers have about teaching haven’t changed much over the years. Here is a portion of an article I found in Time Magazine, dated May 5, 1947:

Considering a teacher's lot and a teacher's pay, why should anybody want to be a teacher? Well, there are reasons. In the National Education Association's monthly Journal, Wisconsin Teacher Dorothy McCuskey recalled a couple of her own: "The day you help Johnny discover that multiplication is really a short form of adding, the day a whole class cooperates to write a poem which expresses the fresh new beauty of a child's world, you know why teaching holds people. . . . All farmers and even tenders of city ivy pots know the fascination of watching things grow. But for the teacher it is not things—it's people."

Added California Schoolmarm Kathryn H. Martin, in the educational magazine Clearing House: "People who are too smart rarely make good teachers because they can't understand why other people make so many mistakes. . . . If I didn't remember how I felt about long division, I'd go berserk some day when I see 'there' and 'their' mixed up for the one-millionth time. . . . The most interesting thing about teaching is not what-you already know, but how much you learn and need to learn. A teacher who 'knew it all' would be nothing but a sad automaton, but I've never met one. Most of us don't know very much, but we keep on trying because the children insist. . . ."

You see, the more things change, the more they stay the same. The best teachers are there to learn as much as they are there to teach. They guide and nurture children and revel as they see their students grow. That part is included with the gift wrapping.

Yes, teaching is a unique gift, one that can be used to change lives in so many wonderful ways. Teaching is not really a choice, but rather a “calling.” If you are one of the few who has this gift, use it wisely; its power can illuminate the future of our world with bright smiles and caring young men and women who show thanks to their teachers, through their many accomplishments. This is definitely one gift you won’t want to “return.”

So, during this season of giving, be thankful for the teachers who have made a difference in your life, but be even more thankful if you have received the special ability to teach others. It really is “the gift that keeps on giving!”

Wishing you a brilliant New Year!