A Definitive Difference

This topic brings up an interesting question: Are teachers people, too? We will come back to this later.

The authors of this blog are divided. Specifically, the authors who wrote about the 'cool teachers' subject have different definitions of what a cool teacher is. The writer of the Cool? essay begins with “...no one looks forward to a three hour lecture with a professor that is dull and lacks a complete sense of social ability,” and goes on to say “...they should lighten up... Tell a joke every now and then as to allow the students to relate and want to listen to him/her.” This contributor thinks that a cool teacher is one who tells jokes and makes students laugh at least every once in a while. The argument is that an entertaining teacher is more engaging to a certain extent, and that students will want to listen and may pick up more of what the professor is actually trying to teach instead of just zoning out and watching the clock. In Cool?, a fun teacher is the definition of a cool teacher.

The essay right above this one, Why Professors Should be Shameless Geeks, has a different take on the subject. The first line begins with “My English teacher in high school had a habit of slipping hermaphrodite jokes into our lessons... and when his students fell victim to a hot afternoon and began to lose focus, he’d pretend to slide a piece of chalk into his ear and pull it out his mouth.” This teacher is obviously cool according to the Cool? essay. He even actively and intentionally uses humor to make his students focus, which is exactly what the previous essay argues for. This teacher (revealed to be named Phil) seems to be the perfect example of a 'cool' teacher.

The next part of the quote, however, shows how different this piece's perspective is. “He was the second nerdiest teacher in the school, but everyone agreed: Phil was one of the best teachers they had ever had.” Phil is apparently a nerd, the polar opposite of a cool person. He is funny and childish and has strange interests, which do make him sound like a nerd, and all the students agree on the fact that he is geeky. It can thus be established that Phil is both cool and uncool, which is not really possible.

It seems that we have two authors with exact opposite definitions of the word cool. This is strange, because this word has a specific meaning which is pretty well known, and especially because these different meanings are coming from the same source—the diavlog. The real difference in definition that these writers have is that of what a cool teacher is. The first essays supposes that a cool teacher is fun to listen to, that their method of teaching is funny and attention-grabbing. The second says that a cool teacher is one who is, as a person, not a nerd. It says that teachers who are, as people, nerds are the teachers that use humor to motivate the classroom.

And now we are back to the original question 'Are teachers people, too?' The first essay is based solely on the professor's teaching habit. To them, the teacher is only the person we are presented with in the classroom. It doesn't matter what their personal interests are, we as students see only this side of the educator. Their teaching style defines them in our minds, and so when we say cool teacher, this is what we mean. Why Professors Should be Shameless Geeks, however, sorts teachers as people. If a teacher does goofy things in the classroom and has less than mainstream interests and creates an eccentric persona while teaching, then they are a geek, but because we only interact with their classroom side, they are effective teachers. This essay judges professors as people, first, and I found that most of the essays on this topic have that same angle.

So who is right? The arguments are, obviously, presented different ways. But the first has more merit. For our purposes, we are talking about teachers and how their personalities (in the classroom) relate to how well their students learn. We know them through their mode of tutoring and nothing else. Therefore, not only should we see them as teachers before acquaintances, but we really can't judge their coolness as people through our classroom-only relationship. Certainly, some of their true personality is bound to show through, and I'm sure there are even some professors who don't present a different persona to their pupils. However, I know that all of my most eccentric and humorous teachers were very different the few times I saw them outside of class. This makes sense, because they are talking to a different audience (me versus twenty kids) for different purposes (idle talk versus education), but it doesn't change the fact that the persona that teaches us is the persona that we see and are analyzing in this assignment. We are talking about cool teachers, not cool people.

At least we all agree on one thing. If you want your class to be better students, try being a cool teacher. If you want to be a cool teacher, try being a nerdy person.

Oh, and teachers aren't real people.