The Arbitrary ChuckJerry

I realized today one of the reasons I enjoy teaching. We hear all the time how we need to stop and smell the roses and I suppose what that equates to is noticing all the little details in life and appreciating them.

In all of the other jobs I've had I would go there, do the work, leave, and forget about it. There were many days where I would literally do nothing and it made absolutely no difference.

Teaching is the exact opposite of that. In order to teach a lesson, you have to plan basically down to the minute. The beauty of writing and executing the lesson plan (or the absolute bane of it, if that's your perspective) is the necessary attention to detail. In that sense, I have to stop every day and notice the details, not only in planning but while class is happening as well. It doesn't always go perfectly, obviously, but in the end I get to have those moments over again and make sure that they go better next time.

I suppose I'm the type of person who delights in the details of life. Teaching is a good opportunity to jump into those details.

There are other reasons I enjoy teaching, but I think the reason it seems to suit me is the planning. If everything goes right, there are really no surprises in the lesson. As soon as I learned the term I knew I was 'risk averse' and surprises and so forth don't really excite me. The students, of course, are a surprise a minute, but even they fit within the framework of the plans.

I guess it wasn't really a revelation, but the thought just sort of crystallized today while I was planning.