Surely, everyone has had, has, or will have a teacher in life. A teacher of nursery school, music, English, math, Portuguese, college. Whatever it is, education professionals have been part of our history since our early years. On October 15, is celebrated the Day of Teachers in Brazil. As in many other countries around the world, the date was created to honor these professionals, who are fundamental for guaranteeing the right to learning for all.
However, one day a year isn’t enough to celebrate the teaching work, which demands a extreme responsibility. Some of these teachers tell stories about their activities, professional development and the learning of their students.
Marina Alves holds a degree in Social Sciences and teaches sociology for students at state schools of São Paulo. She told about the necessity of having sensibility and attention while exercising the profession, since it is essential to deal with children and adolescents with numerous differences between them.
“One of the cases I remember was when a student who always gave me a lot of work in the classroom, to the point where the school board was asked to call his tutors for it. The story they told us about him was that when he was small his father was arrested and his mother abandoned him with his grandmother. The grandmother also couldn’t stand the boy and left him to be raised with an uncle, who had a history of committing sexual abuse. After that, I could no longer feel anger because of his behavior. It only reflected and translated the sad reality in which he lived. With that I realized how much we need to look at the student beyond the classroom and realize the problems that can sometimes be happening. “
Idelson Junior is still a newbie in the classrooms and has only a year of teaching, but he reveals that he has learned a little bit on how things work. He teaches mathematics at a private school in the East Zone of São Paulo. Still in the process of adapting to the space and the students, he already understood that good humor is fundamental if you want to get along with young people in High School.
“As soon as I began to teach, I entered the classroom with a more serious posture, which was what I was accustomed to when working in large companies. Over time, inevitably, day to day and the students themselves have been showing me that, despite the responsibility of the profession, the classroom is a place that ends up being something relaxed. I will not say that it isn’t difficult to work with some students, with the temperament of the adolescents. But even because the difference of generation, of the new things that they bring, most of the time we have fun.”
The experience is something not missing for Ana Cristina Martins. With 20 years of profession, the pedagogue teaches classes for Early Childhood Education in schools of São Paulo. For her, the role of the teacher is also to have a social side and try to help the student in some way.
“One thing that struck me a lot in those 20 years was the story of a student about 12 years ago. I teached at a school in a very poor neighborhood., and the students were always very humble. As a teacher, it bothered me to see children who, at times, school meals were the only ones they had for the day. One day I had the idea of putting together a basket of food of all kinds and giving it to some of those children, to try, in some way, to minimize this situation. I tried to choose one of my students as I saw that the family had more difficulty. I set up the basket and waited one day for the mother to pick him up at school, so that I could deliver in person. The day I gave it to him, his mother cried and told me that just that day she had finished all she had to feed her children. This mother thanked me for a long time, and I also felt grateful to be able to help, because I was there in that classroom because I think being a teacher is a bit of that too.”