What I Should Have Said

Recently, I was asked what I regret most about my 35 years of teaching. I thought of going all self-confident and saying I regret nothing. But that’s just not true. So after thinking about it for a very short time, I mumbled something about not teaching enough electricity in physics, and that I wish I had changed the way I did my experiments. And while I do regret those things, in the scheme of life, those are small things, just details. Not things to make a huge difference. But the next day I was reading some incredibly poorly thought-out post on Facebook written by one of my former students. So I thought about that question again. And I changed my mind.

Here is what I should have said:

I regret that I didn't try harder to teach my students to think. To use their brains to weigh all the data, evidence, ideas, theories and viewpoints. To use their heads and their hearts to take all this information and come up with an answer that is their own. To not settle for an answer that sounds right or feels good. To realize that no matter how rich, how smart, or how famous someone is, that someone else’s viewpoint should not be their own. To understand that if something seems too easy or too obvious, it probably is. And to accept nothing from anyone without thinking it completely through, unless it comes from someone that you know loves you.

I regret that I didn't try harder to teach them to differentiate right from wrong, and to act accordingly. To not assume “it’s only wrong if you get caught.” To base right and wrong not on what is popular at the time, but instead to base it on what mom and dad taught them, what their religion teaches them, and what good ethics requires. To not take the obvious choice, but instead to come up with what they know in their hearts to be right, and then act on it, no matter how hard it seems, and no matter how it looks to others. And to not worry if their choice of right doesn't always match everyone else’s, because only they know all that is in their heart.

And perhaps most of all, I regret that I didn't encourage them to have the courage to take the road less traveled, the choice that may not be obvious or popular or easy, but the choice that is right for them. To take a chance, not just on the little things, but on the important things. To not play it safe. To accept the conflict that comes with risks and going against the grain. And that if they take a chance and lose, to gather themselves up and look for the next opportunity.

I know actually did teach all this, to a point. But not like I should have. Why not? Because it’s hard. Who am I to impose my idea of right or wrong on students? Especially when it may not match that of their parents or the majority of society. And to teach them to take chances in life when most around them are telling them not to? Trust me, teaching redox reactions and Newton’s Second Law problems is simple compared to navigating the mine field of all this. But that’s really no excuse. Looking back on it, I don’t think I followed my own advice. I think I tried, but probably not hard enough.

You know, I’ll bet quite a few of my own teachers had the same regrets I do…after they had already retired. Which is the wrong time to be thinking this way. I should have thought harder about this 35 years ago. I believe that I was a good teacher, and positively affected a lot of kids, but I have to wonder what more I could have done.

I wish I had read then what I wrote just now.