The Importance of Teachers

Is there any job as important as the educators of tomorrow's generation?

If you think hard enough, you can probably remember a certain teacher in your life that sparked your interest in a subject or class. As a student within the public school system, and the child of an educator, I have spent many hours thinking about the importance of teachers and the importance of their jobs. Teachers inspire us to become who we want to be and to love to learn. For my ELI this semester, I decided to study child development and its application to elementary education. Though the title seems long and boring, the ELI has proven to be very interesting and relatively simple to understand. Basically, I wanted to look at child development so that I could figure out how we are using it in our elementary education system and why it helps teachers with their work.

This topic is important to me, and you, for a number of reasons. First of all, improving our schools is always a necessity and we can always improve them. Understanding how a child perceives the world and learns is extremely important for any and all teachers. A long time ago, people believed that children think the same way that adults do. We know now that that theory is very incorrect. In fact, a child’s brain is constantly changing, developing, and making connections in the real world. By using our understanding of cognitive development to develop lessons for students, the more successful teaching and learning will be.

Though most theories on cognitive development are very similar, there are some controversies on the topic. There is no “best way” to teach any subject, as each student has a unique and individual way of learning called their learning style. Many of the leading ideas on this topic come from a 20th century philosopher named Piaget. Many of Piaget’s theories are still used today.

I personally believe that teachers have one of the most important jobs in the world. Not only are they in charge of teaching our youngest generations what they need to know to be successful, but they must share and communicate their love for learning. An understanding of how children learn and how we can use this to teach our students is very crucial for each and every teacher.

~Laura