Best and worst and why?

4th grade, Mrs. Hammond: Went to a one room schoolhouse built in 1849, a mile from my house. Not a traditional one room school, since there was only our grade, but Mrs. Hammond ran the show solo, dispensing justice with expertly thrown erasers. My self-confidence grew by leaps and bounds, and it was the only time I ever cried because the year was over.

Honorable mention to a number of college professors, and Mr. Bailey, a math teacher in high school, who actually thought I might amount to something. He was wrong, but the thought still sustains me.

my all time best teacher was an artist named William Baziotes. He was a"colorist" painter of the AE school of the 50's, and as a kid in an advanced art placement program, I was allowed to take courses at a college where he taught .
I discovered early that alcohol and creativity did not necessarily have to be conjoined. I learned but , apparently didnt retain the lessons. Baziotes taught me to think about a painting as a problem to be solved like math or science. That led me to an early early career in art with my early work looking industrial , like those of Picabia, or Demuth. I still think of a work in a "problem solving" context even though now Im just splashing watercolors around.

They all were really pretty good, but I'll always remember learning to read with Mrs. Hillard (and, of course, Dick & Jane) in first grade. That was pretty heady stuff. We all had our own books, but she had this giant version of it suspended on chains in the front of the room, and she turned the pages with a stick. Think what she could have accomplished with PowerPoint. I also recall her running around the room sniffing 6-year-old butts in search of The Farter. She was spraying air freshener and muttering curses. We all were terrified of her because she always public announced the name of the guilty party and shrouded him in a cloud of Glade. She seemed ancient, but I'm probably older now than she was then. Hmmmmm ... that was supposed to be my good example.

I can't remember the name of the worst, but he was kind of a Don Knotts-looking guy and he taught both P.E. and Civics in high school. In P.E., he started each class by making everyone run laps. Always. Indoors and outdoors. We always ran until someone vomited. Seriously. Then he started his regular lesson, if he really had one. Our revenge always came on current events day in Civics. I guess we subscribed to The Toledo Blade for that. Anyway, the guy had a speech impediment and he would always start class by shouting out: "Cwass! Cwass! Queer your desks & take out your Towedo Bwades!" The cwass was wolling on the fwoor by then or simulating sex acts with their desks ... what a life he must have had with that speech problem ... we always figured he taught just to keep his military deferment.

In grade school I loved my 6th grade teacher, B. I don't really know why, I think I was too young to recall. She left part-way through the year and was replaced by the much hated P. - poor guy never had a chance with me. I think I liked B. because she really seemed to listen to me/us.

I adored my senior year english teacher. I liked a few of my HS teachers, but this guy was my favorite. Mr Lamb was a vietnam veteran and brought in a picture of him in the jungle, by the ruins of an airplane with blood running down his forhead. He still carried the scar (which was bone-deep). He had us read and report on short stories from around the world. We read books set in small villages in africa, asia, the south pacific, etc. We read Siddartha and we read Camu and Hess. Quite the variety - quite a soft-spoken, kind teacher. I've often wondered about him.

I was so lucky to have so many good teachers. I'd like to recognize them here:
Kindergarten - Mrs. Burnett - kindest woman in the world.
2nd grade - Mrs. Miller - again, funny, loving and kind
3rd and 4th grade - Mrs. Wentzel - very sharp and very funny
5th grade - Mr. Senick - soft-spoken transplanted Englishman who is still teaching fifth grade in the same classroom in the same school, thirty years later. (I'd have to say one of my very favorites)
7th grade Science-Mr. Arendt
8th grade Social Studies - Mr. Calimano
9th grade English - Mr. Kaczmarek
10th grade English - Mr. Redman
11th grade Ancient and medieval history - Miss Meine
12th grade Current American Issues - Mr. Brown
College - Shakespeare and Creative Writing - Jed Bierhaus
Medieval Literature - Bob Yeager
Abnormal Psychology - Jeanne Thune
All of them were wonderfully affirming to me - encouraged a life-long love of learning - and are the reason I became a teacher. Cheers!

Having gone to Catholic schools from 1st grade through my bachelor's degree, I've had some pretty horrendous teachers.

The good ones were Sr. Mary Thomasine of the Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth. She was the principal and my 3rd, 6th and 8th grade teacher. All of the other nuns from that order were either crazy or senile but she was intelligent, reasonable, well read and, important at the time, a lady in the old-fashioned sense of the word. After we graduated and went on the high school, she was assigned to a girls' boarding school in France. She came back to my high school just after I graduated as a French teacher. I revere her because she presented our class with a reasonable way to handle creationism.

In high school, although I was taught by the same order of nuns, I had a few stand out teachers. The best included our biology teacher, whose name escapes my memory. Although she could be rough and grim, she was a real scientist and a great teacher. The other star at our high school was Sr. Mary Edward, who taught American literature and journalism. She not only supervised a paper that beat out every other in the state of Michigan the first year it was eligible for that contest, she shepherded me through the rigors of a contest conducted by the NYTimes, which cited me as one of the best young journalists in the country. Five members of my class of 142 students went on to write professionally.

Marygrove College was run by the more liberal, more classy, better educated Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Out standing professors included the chairman of the philosophy department who later became the academic dean and the radical young nun who taught sociology. Outstanding lay professors included exiled Cubans Ferman Pinado (doctorates in both philosophy and law from the Sorbonne) who spoke seven languages but who sometimes forgot which one to speak in class and Jorge Castellanos. The beautiful and dreamy young nun who taught art was also superb.

Loved the professor of American lit at Wayne State who looked like a sea captain and Daniel Hughes who taught the Romantics and who had one of the best senses of humor I ever encountered.

At Harvard, there was history prof McCormick who passionately loves teaching and the redoubtable Greg Nagy, from Classics, who is an experience. Of course, I can not close without thanking the great man who supervised my thesis, Tomas.

I often wonder if any teachers in here will see their own names?
for me, i was lucky to have some great teachers, but not because they were great teachers. They were great because they were good people. my top five are
the late George Black
the late John Polkodowski
Mary Jean Tarantini
John LaNunziata
and a college proffesor Tom Leary
the first two cared about me as a person as well as Mr L. The MZ, Ms Tarantini, taught me about enthusiasm when teaching. A flame she carried until her retirement. And Mr leary Taught me how to teach history. to bring it down to the personal level.

Is the best teacher [let's forget the worst; I suffered only one really poor teacher, and that was 50 years ago, so he is surely excused by the statute of limitations!] the one who gave me the best advice or the one who made me most enthusiastic about his subject? I was very fortunate in having a large number of really inspirational teachers, so I'll tell you about Edward Smith, who gave me the most important advice of my high-school years.

I really loved Math, so I spent my sophomore and junior years taking double-period classes in the subject. Early in the second semester of my sophomore year, Mr. Smith introduced the topic of probability. I was greatly excited because probability theory was then (1950s) becoming important in all kinds of disciplines. Trouble was that I could not GET it. Calculus, yes; probability, NO! What was wrong with my mind? After three days of trying my best to get hold of the stuff, and, noting that all my classmates found it a breeze, I thought my Math life was coming to an end. For the first time in my life, I asked for help after school, which Mr. Smith was delighted to give, for he had noticed my growing frustration.

When I arrived, Mr. Smith had put out a set of glass jars and colored marbles. We were going to attack this probability business from scratch! BUT, after 90 minutes of heavy concentration, under the personal guidance of a very astute teacher, I was still mostly at a loss. I was just about in tears.

Mr. Smith took my arm and walked me away from the recriminating jars and marbles. In a very calm and friendly voice he said, "[Miklos], you are a very good Math student, but this does NOT mean that you will be a whiz at every topic you meet. In fact, as you go through life, you will find that there are certain concepts that, no matter how hard you try, you will not understand. This does not mean that you are a failure in any way. This is just the way it is. Everyone, no matter how bright, has gaps, limitations, blind spots. Next week, we'll be starting another topic, and I'm quite sure that you'll have no problem with it. So, forget about probabilities. You may understand them in college--or you may never get them. It doesn't matter. In the larger scheme of things, these patterns of marbles mean nothing."

Hearing these kind words was the ultimate load off my mind. Yes, effort is extremely important, but, for everyone, there are some things that effort can't crack. Then, you just need to say, "Next!"

This was a profoundly important life lesson. Thank you. Mr. Smith!

My best teacher was Ms Brown my social studies teacher. She was born to teach. First of all she loved what she did, and I think that is very important. She knew her subject, and knew how to present it, this being more important still. By the way she carried herself and treated us kids she showed us she cared very much for her students. She was truly a teacher!

Jo, when I see threads like this makes me realize how lucky I am at having known the wonderful people in my life that inspired me.

The worse was Mr Shelton my music teacher. He was a good teacher but for one thing; he had some stomach problems, and the smell that came out of his mouth was TERRIBLE. I did not like going to his class, and if I had to go to his desk I just wanted to die.

I've been blessed with a lot of great teachers.

In elementary school, there was Mrs. Laird. Always nice and welcoming. I remember one day, we had been doing English or something of the sort, she got an urgent call over the intercom saying she had a phone call. She was out for a while, and came back in tears. Her husband had died of a heart attack. She retired the next year, I haven't seen her since.

I didn't go to middle school, was home schooled.

But even in my first year of high school, I had two really great teachers:

Ms. Cook
Mr. Warehime

Mr. Warehime transferred after only one year, I'll doubt I'll see him again. But he was a great teacher that actually got the students; even though the never got him.

Ms. Cook is kooky and crazy and I love her. She somehow handles the most obnoxious kids (whom I would have punched by the time she's calmly telling them to "go sit down"). She introduced me (and the entire class, but they didn't appreciate it personally as much as I did) to Eliezer Wiesel's Night. She goes to hear him speak and I adore her for that. I will still visit her next year, even though I won't have her classes.

I easily relate to most of my teachers, provided they are welcoming, warm and down-to-earth. Most of my teachers see that I view them as humans, not evil-dooers here to take me away from my X-Box, and I often spend a lot of time outside of the classroom with them.

There are also many teachers I've gotten to know and love that I haven't had a class with yet, merely from seeing them in the halls or working with them somewhere else. But for now, those three are tops

The worst may have been Sister Selma in the 7th grade . . . but there were so many mean and crazy nuns . . .