The Secret Lives of Students: “Dear Future Teacher…”

Breakthrough Miami

Teley Laporte, 10, says teachers need to add a little "magic" to their lesson plans.

For today’s installment in our series, The Secret Lives of Students, students write a letter to their future teachers. 

Editor’s note: This post was written by rising middle school students Teley Laporte and Joshua Partridge.

By Teley Laporte, 11

Dear future teacher,

Good listening skills are very important when teaching a group of students.

You should be open to new ideas from students.

You should give quizzes if needed.

Being funny is not that important, but don’t be so strict.

Some kids are very sensitive.

You need to know what’s in style in the kids’ world so you can be familiar with it and have something in common with them.

Make up consequences for when students misbehave.

It would be nice if you have rewards when children do something good like do their homework every day for a week.

Send home weekly progress notes to show parents how students are doing in class.

You should know how to entertain your students or else they will get bored and fall asleep in the middle of your lesson.

Don’t forget to put some magic in your teaching.

From an actual student,

Teley Laporte

Dear future teacher,

In order to be a good teacher, I think you should do hands-on activities.

You should always be reasonable.

You should make a good first impression to the students to make them like your class.

If a student doesn’t understand, I believe you should pull them aside and teach them.

You should be fun and never uptight.

You shouldn’t give a lot of homework, but if you do, you should make it fun.

I believe that if we’re reading part of a book for homework, the next day you should probably act it out.

I think you should always understand the student, or at least listen to them and try to understand.

You should at all times be patient.

Always be fair to your class.

For me, I’m a visual person and need to see things.

Maybe you should write everything out for your students.

The students might have ideas that you can use, so you should listen to them.

If you don’t have an understanding with your students, the class just won’t work.

Your rules need to be reasonable.

Never, never, never not have rules, they are extremely important.

Be sure to enforce your rules.

You should try to entertain your students, that’ll keep the class fun and not boring.

Sincerely,

Joshua Partridge

Partide is a student at Doctors Charter School. During the summer school program with Breakthrough Miami, he attends The Cushman School campus.

All month we’ll hear from students about life in Florida schools. They’ll open up about conflicting home and school rules on fighting, being hungry at school, feeling left out of academic programs, and other aspects of school life.