Teachers Are People, Too

Students can be surprised to see teachers out in the community doing everyday, ordinary tasks–grocery shopping, flying on airplanes, having coffee at the local Peet’s. I know I felt like this as a kid, even when I became a teacher working on staff with former teachers, I had a hard time using their first names and now am surprised when a former teacher “friends” me on Facebook. There’s that unspoken separation between a teacher as a human and teacher as authority figure/information giver/grader/judgement passer. Does this separation real or imagined help or hinder (or both) the learning relationship?