A Time to Talk

by Elliott D. Landau, Ph.D.

Once someone said, “A teacher is like a signpost. He can point the way, but he can’t take you there.” Someone else said, “A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops.” And someone wrote, “A teacher takes you from where you are to where you are not.” All of these statements are true, but they are not true of all teachers.

Too many of us think our teachers will tell us all that there is to know. Teachers can’t do this for us; much of what we learn we have to learn for ourselves. Teachers are like signposts along the way. They point to where we should go and are glad to help us, but we must use our own brains and do our own hard work in order to get where we want to go.

Through their guidance, teachers affect those who are in their classes today, their children in time to come, and their children’s children of the future. Our teachers try to help us become more than we are. They often treat us as what we might someday become.

A big part of teaching is loving. We hope you love your teacher.

Illustrated by Dale Kilbourn