On 10/17/09, ACP wrote:
> On 10/17/09, student wrote:
>> "This is by far my biggest mistake teaching here...well now
>> I know how it is and don't have to make the mistake
>> repetitve".
>>
>> It kind of hurts my feelings...even if it wasn't directed
>> towards me specifially..but it seriously kills spirits in
>> the class and it makes everyone dislike the teacher and not
>> want to study. I was actually excited to come into class
>> today and then he says this. I don't even know why it
>> affected me that much lol strange. But it seriously annoyed
>> me. Do you think he really meant it? or he said it because
>> he was angry? i need opinions of professors

It sounds to me more like the professor is reaching out for
sympathy or empathy. It wasn't very smart of him to say it
because it one of you tattles on him, he could get in trouble.
But if you change your thinking from being insulted to
recognizing his statement as sort of a cry for help, then maybe
you can turn this into a positive. Believe it or not, professors
are people, too, with pain and joy in their lives. If on a day
like that, you walked up to the professor and said, "Hey, prof?
Are you having a rough day today? Well, thanks for being my
teacher and things will get better," you will probably be one of
that teacher's favorite students.

I totally understand that the personal issues of professionals
should not be your problem. It really isn't your problem if the
person who works at the service counter at the car repair place
is having a bad day or hates their job--same goes for the
janitor who cleans your office or the cashier at the grocery
store. Sure, they should be professional and hide their personal
feelings. But on the other hand, if you learn to accept that
some people will share their feelings when they shouldn't and
then you use that as an opportunity to show some sympathy or
kindness to those people, well, you will be surprised how many
friends or allies you will have.

I will give you an example. My first year teaching, the janitors
at the school seemed very gruff and unhappy. So I asked them
about their job and such. Turned out that they were
short-staffed and all doing double duty and they were kind of mad
that they had so much work to do. I could have taken the
attitude that it was their problem if they didn't like their job
not mine. Instead, I asked every one of them who I ever saw come
to my room to clean what I could do to make their job easier for
them in my room. They told me that they were very annoyed by
having to clean up little scraps of paper off the floor such as
the little circles from hole-punched paper or the tatters from
notebook paper that is torn out of the notebook. So I made a big
deal out of never letting my kids leave the classroom without
picking up every little scrap of paper under their desks. I
became the absolute favorite teacher of the janitor who always
cleaned my room because I showed him caring and sympathy. He
always brought me extra cookies from the lunchroom and he would
do all sorts of little extra favors for me. It turned out that
the janitor was a pretty important part of my life because he
had keys to every room in the school. Let me just say that the
janitor always had my back and I'll leave it at that.

So instead of turning your professor in and getting him in
trouble, why don't you turn the situation around into a positive
experience for the teacher and you

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