Chapter 2: Respect, Liking, Trust, and Fairness

What jumped out at me came early in chapter 2. It was a simple quote: "It's okay if kids hate you at first. If you care about your teaching, we'll get past that. We're not going to be receptive to someone so quickly-we're kind of young in our thinking." It was interesting to me to get that perspective from a student. I find it a true statement as well. Teaching is not necessarily a popularity contest. It's nice to be liked, as a teacher you want to be liked. But, you don't have to be liked. Being tough at first is good because it will give your students a sense of your expectations. Once you notice them following the rules and behaving accordingly, then I feel you can loosen the reigns.

This jumped out at me because it was a response from a student I would not normally expect to hear from a student. Usually the student just wants the teacher to be nice no matter what. This student is not too young in their thinking like the quote says. As long as the teacher proves that they care about what they are teaching and show respect to their students, I believe that the students will in turn show respect to the teacher.