The Good Teacher

At a sheva brachos - one of the seven parties religious Jews have for the newly married - for a Hasidic couple, I met Chava, the grandmother of the groom. A teacher for 35 years, she raised five children of her own, three of whom are rabbis. Her husband, who died eight years ago, was also a rabbi. She strongly believes that the only reason any children fail in school is because teachers are not paying enough attention to them. She says that teachers need to show they love the children, and the children should have some love for the teacher.

I didn’t have a lot of teachers who shared Chava’s philosophy. I found that most teachers only knew how to teach one way and couldn’t deviate for any kids who looked at things a little differently. There was very little room for creativity and very little time to work with the kids who needed more help. The idea of teachers loving their students sounded so odd to me when I heard her say it. But I remembered a few special teachers who did make a difference in my life. A tenth grade English teacher, Mrs. Ali, took an interest in me and later had me tested for the Gifted program. At 17, I finally realized I might have been smarter than I thought. By 18, I figured out that I was the wrong kind of genius. My kind of genius can hold a decent conversation, write a good short story about what I did for my summer vacation, and figure out puzzles like the Rubiks Cube. The good kind of genius can help cure cancer. Unless I accidentally eat some kind of berry which turns out to isolate any cancer causing genes, I’m probably not going to cure any diseases. But I can film old people giving me advice.