Chapter 8, Beginning Again, The Current Challenge to Teach Summary and Analysis

Teaching well requires many character traits. A teacher needs to be intelligent, ethical, reflective, and caring. She must have a heart and a brain. Teaching requires faith and hope. Teachers must be willing to work against the grain.

Teaching requires an individual to be alert and wide-awake. They must try to see children as wholes and organize the classroom around those wholes. Good teachers "kidwatch" and pay attention to who their students are.

To teach is to choose a difficult and challenging life. Teaching requires faith in yourself and other children. It will not have a steady flow. It requires change and development, along with the skills to grapple with and contribute to an evolving environment.

The intellectual work of teachers is not merely about subject matter...