#iKnowaTeacher who inspired my daughter to want to become a geologist. She was in Pre-K.
#iKnowaTeacher who helped my son learn how to find joy in learning.
#iKnowaTeacher who inspired an illiterate mother to learn from her 5 year old daughter how to read.
#iKnowaTeacher who took a Spanish class on her own time to better serve her students. Actually, I know 15 of them.
#iKnowaTeacher I know a teacher whose former student wants to be a teacher, just like her.
#iKnowaTeacher who teaches students how analyze political issues.
#iKnowaTeacher who loves music, not for how it sounds but what it makes us become when we listen to it
Jose -
Above are some tweets I will be posting this week in honor of teacher appreciation week. I could go on, and I will on twitter. I hope you will join me. I am starting this internet meme with just one intention. To put a face on the following graphic.
Americans continue to believe their local schools are performing well, but that the nation's schools are performing poorly.
The Gallup poll describes that 77% of Americans gave their local schools a grade of A or B while 18% of respondents assigned schools nationally a similar grade. What this poll tells me is that the American public has been swayed by a narrative. There are all kinds of reasons 
for statistics like this and why we shouldn’t trust them. The explanation for this graphic that I favor is that there is a mask that the public sees when it thinks of the collective idea of teacher but when the public is asked about their child’s school or teacher, they see specific faces of specific people.
Everyday for the next week I will post on twitter about some specific teachers I know and the valuable, caring, life changing, and important work they are doing. Of course there are negative examples of teachers too but, these examples always get attention. I want to change the focus, the narrative. Tell me about the teachers you know that are working to give students the education they deserve.
Image from: http://www.gallup.com/poll/142658/Americans-Views-Public-Schools-Far-Worse-Parents.aspx
Watch it happen…
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Thanks for doing this! This is Teacher Appreciation Week and teachers all over deserve our thanks , appreciation, and recognition! Let’s not forget our support staff as well. In a true learning community, everyone is a teacher, role model, and models in so many ways for our students.
Hi John!
Love this hashtag and your reasoning behind starting this meme. Might I also add that we use #taw2011 to unify our tweets during May 2-6? I actually think #iknowateacher has so much more potential beyond Teacher Appreciation Week and so it might be nice to distinguish this week in particular.
Thanks for the inspiration!
Best,
Alexa
MAT@USC | @uscteacher
I know a teacher that spent a Saturday leading 3 bus loads of parents and students to participate in an amazing youth concert experience after receiving her “pink slip” the day before.
I know a teacher who taught a shy algebra 2 student that it was more important for her to ask questions then to sit back and remain quiet on things she didn’t understand.
I know a teacher that would volunteer his entire lunch hour, every 100th day of school, to dress up as Zero the Hero and bring magic into the lives of kindergarteners.
I know a teacher that manages to always find $1 in her pocket to “lend” to the child who lost his lunch ticket and would not get to eat otherwise.
There are teacher qualities that cannot simply be measured by a single test score.