What makes a ‘good’ teacher?

Written by Dagyeom Youn - Year 7

Good teachers vs Not so good teachers: What classifies them? To figure this out, I interviewed 5 students in year 7 and 5 teachers.

My investigation to discover the answer began with a couple of short interviews with our fellow teachers:

Teacher A (English)

“A good teacher has to care about the students they teach and try various teaching strategies to allow them to  understand more easily.”

Teacher B (Maths)

“In my opinion, patience and empathy are the key elements that make a good teacher - they have to be patient with the speed students go with and understand their feelings.”

Teacher C (Business & Economics)

“A careful approach towards both wellbeing and learning. We always have to be cautious when approaching students’ wellbeing because they might have troubles like private concerns which will affect their learning.”

Teacher D (Science)

“First of all, being friendly is really crucial to be a good teacher. This means caring and knowing their students’ subjects”

5. Teacher E (History)

“A good teacher? It definitely comes from caring about other people and understanding their feelings. They can’t teach when they don’t even care about their students’ feelings.”

Now let’s see some of the students’ answers to the question.

1. Student A

“In the perspective of a student, I believe that most learning and work should be done at school, not at home. This means that a ‘good’ teacher cannot give students too much homework to do.”

2. Student B

“I think a ‘good’ teacher has to have interesting teaching styles to prevent us from losing focus and not get distracted. In test seasons, teachers must post what we have learnt in lessons onto platforms like google classroom so students can review.”

3. Student C

“It has to be listening to students’ voices carefully and respecting them. I’m sure that students deserve as much respect as adults.” 

4. Student D

“Everyone would say ‘kind’, but most importantly, they have to let us have some fun sometimes like partying, reading, or playing games!”

5. Student E

“For me, I always believed that equality is really crucial for both students and teachers. They need to treat everyone fairly and be respectful.”

Teachers mostly talked about empathy and care towards learning and wellbeing, while students focused more on respect, and having fun in lessons. It was really interesting that the teachers and the students gave different opinions.

Now, putting that aside, what do you think makes a ‘good’ teacher?