Message from the Principal When meeting a person for the first time the
ago, “as a teacher I
perennial question pops up at some stage in the
possess tremendous
initial conversation “What do you do for a living?”
power to make a
After a slight pause I let the enquirer know that I am a
child’s life miserable
teacher, having already processed the two responses
or joyous, I can be
that are most frequently offered; 1) something about
a tool of torture or
having great holidays or 2) I couldn’t do your job,
an
(normally a combination of 1 and 2). This is often
inspiration,
followed by a derogatory comment concerning
humiliate or humour,
teenagers these days.
hurt or heal. In all
instrument I
of can
Mr Russell Gordon, Principal
situations, it is my response that decides whether The truth is, I love being a teacher. I love engaging
a crisis will be escalated or de-escalated, a child
with the vibrant, talented, multi-faceted teenagers
humanised or de-humanised”.
that populate the majority of our schools. Often the teaching profession is seen in a negative light by
Our purpose at Ōtūmoetai College is to grow our
society in general, but what other profession has the
students into young men and women who will
privilege influencing the direction of an individuals’
achieve their personal best, embrace diversity, grow
life simply by what we say and how we say it?
resilience and develop meaningful relationships with others. To achieve this purpose, we need to have a
Teaching is a powerful profession. It is safe to
strong partnership between school and home. So,
say that in 20 years time students probably won’t
the next time you have contact with your child’s
remember what content a teacher has taught them,
teacher, be it via email, letter, telephone or face to
but that same student wtill still remember how that
face, know that we are working as hard as we can to
teacher made them feel. Haim Ginott, a teacher
help your child become a ‘Powerful Learner’.
and trained clinical psychologist wrote 40 years
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