We’re Gonna Jump Start Second Grade

Do you think people enjoy teaching for the selfless aspect of making a difference in someone else’s day/life, or do you think they just want to be seen as someone who teaches? I always wonder this about the grade school teachers who go around boasting their cute outfits. Like, are you a teacher because you love kids and you find solace in helping to shape America’s tomorrow, or are you just doing it so you can be the hot teacher and gain the unconditional adoration of 9 year-olds.

When I was in first grade, I played the computer game Jump Start Second Grade. Please ignore the fact that I was batting above my intelligence level for the sake of this story. Well, it’s not really a story. But back then, I’m not quite sure if Microsoft Word was a thing yet. Or if it was, I was in first grade and my parents wouldn’t have known what the fuck that was. So in this computer game, there was a, uh, computer… in the game. You could click on the computer and start typing a letter: complete with a print button.

Anyways, at the time I thought that the only person who really believed in me and my academic potential was my teacher, Mrs. Sedgley. So I would creepily write her letters, print them, and then send them to her home address – which I looked up in a phone book. See? Unconditional adoration.

I never got any response. To be honest, I don’t really know why my mom let me do that: send letters to another person’s home residence. Now that I’m thinking about it, I can’t imagine why my mom would waste money on the postage stamps. But hey, maybe they did all get sent to Mrs. Sedgley’s house, and she just wrote me off as some weird stalker student. That’s right: she wrote me off AND she didn’t write back. I mean, it wasn’t like I was really talking about much besides which friends I recently hung out with, or maybe that I got a new pet Beta fish.

My point is: did Mrs. Sedgley really enjoy enlightening the youth, or did she just enjoy receiving my countless letters as a form of self-worth? You should really think about where your motivation lies the next time you want to become an instructor at some capacity.