Teacher Definition and 278 Threads

A teacher (also called a schoolteacher or formally, an educator) is a person who helps students to acquire knowledge, competence or virtue.
Informally the role of teacher may be taken on by anyone (e.g. when showing a colleague how to perform a specific task).
In some countries, teaching young people of school age may be carried out in an informal setting, such as within the family (homeschooling), rather than in a formal setting such as a school or college.
Some other professions may involve a significant amount of teaching (e.g. youth worker, pastor).
In most countries, formal teaching of students is usually carried out by paid professional teachers. This article focuses on those who are employed, as their main role, to teach others in a formal education context, such as at a school or other place of initial formal education or training.

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  1. MsH

    The Forever Learning Physics Teacher

    Hello, I am a high school Physics teacher. I have always loved Physics and took every physics class I could in college. Studying and teaching physics are indeed two entirely different processes. I have an associates of engineering, chemistry, and education degree. My father was heartbroken...
  2. Nesrine24

    Physics Teacher

    I am Nesrine. I am an electrical engineer holding M.sc. in control engineering and working in IT industry for about 25 years. I started teaching physics foro IGCSE 4 years ago and I want to know more about teaching physics. I am palnning to lecturer undergraduate students. I use academic books...
  3. ADrake

    Newbie Introduction

    Hello everyone & thank you for letting me join your community. I am a high school science teacher in Minnesota, USA. I took over the classroom of a former physics/math teacher and have found all kinds of cool but old equipment. I primarily teach 9th grade physical science this year but that...
  4. damarkk

    Hello to everyone!

    Hello to everyone. I'm an undergraduate physics student and a private teacher.
  5. MrKirkScience

    How Does a Teacher of Science Differ from a Science Teacher?

    Greetings, I consider myself a teacher of science instead of a science teacher. I have experience teaching across many subject areas of science. This has enabled me to make connections across all of my differing content areas and share that with my students.
  6. M

    How Did You Discover PF?

    Hi - AP Physics teacher here, from Florida. Happy to join in!
  7. grahamoctave

    New Member

    I am a retired musician and music teacher (woodwinds). I have had a lifetime amateur interest in astronomy and physics generally. I am also interested in the physics of musical instruments. For many years I was an amateur pilot so I also have an interest in the physics of flight.
  8. Hem

    Am Hempstone Oruko a teacher of Mathematics and physics in Kenya

    Am a graduate of Nairobi University in Bachelor of education science (Physics and Mathematics)
  9. D

    How Can Physics Teachers Expand Their Knowledge?

    I am a physics teacher who is constantly seeking to widen the knowledge of physics .
  10. J

    Semi-retired chemistry and physics teacher

    I volunteer in my wife's intro to chem and physics class and her design workshop class at the local high school. I integrate PASCO and Vernier probeware, and help with other experimental design problems, as well as working one on one with students. Both classes are primarily project oriented.
  11. U

    Long time high school physics teacher, just joined forum

    I've been lurking on this site for over a decade (especially when my high school students ask me a particularly obscure physics-related question), so it's high time that I finally joined. I've teach in Pitt Meadows, BC, Canada, and I've been teaching for 25 years and counting. I love teaching...
  12. W

    How Does Wafaa Suleiman Impact Biology Education at UNRWA Schools in Lebanon?

    I am Wafaa Suleiman, Biology teacher....I teach at UNRWA schools in Lebanon
  13. T

    What is the importance of spreadsheet modelling in Physics?

    Hello. I am a Physics teacher currently in Kathmandu. I am experienced in Edexcel IAL and in the past CIE and IB DP. I think a lot about the meanings of numbers, but have poor math skills in terms of calculus but am strong at spreadsheet modelling.
  14. M

    What are the key topics covered in the new GCSE Physics curriculum?

    I have much to learn.
  15. A

    What are some challenges faced by first year science teachers in rural areas?

    Hey folks, I'm a first year teacher in a rural county in the mountains of western North Carolina. I'm teaching physics, chemistry and physical science (physics and chemistry lite). I inherited a large classroom full of strange and wonderful devices and apparati. Many of these I'm not sure what...
  16. H

    Exploring Modern Physics Education: A High School Teacher's Perspective

    I am a physics teacher. Teaching high school physics for more than two decades. I love to interact with colleagues who can share the variations made in the field of physics especially in the high school curriculum. The terms usually change and this effect the exams for students due to the use of...
  17. S

    How can we inspire curiosity and understanding in our students?

    Always looking for answers. Wanting to help my students discover the curiosity about the world. Would love to enable a desire for understanding all around us.
  18. C

    Can Physics Concepts Enhance High School Math Education? Meet CuriosDART!

    I am a public high school math teacher who connects relevant physics facts to the maths students are studying. I hope PF will provide grist for my mill.
  19. F

    Why are teachers the key to civilization?

    It was a documentary program featuring a bird. I can't recall the specific location, but based on the tape and the geographical context, it seems to be from the northern hemisphere, possibly in northern Europe or Canada. The bird perched on a tree branch near a lake, while on the opposite side...
  20. Z

    Need Help with Physics? Get Assistance from PF's Community of Experts!

    I need one since im about to enter university next year and i didn't have so much physics in HS so i might need a bit of help
  21. W

    Job Skills How do you become a physics teacher in highschool or gymnasium school?

    Hi,I'm a student in Romania and I want to know the steps for becoming a physics teacher. Do you need a master degree or can you teach with a bachelor's degree?
  22. Chris Patterson

    Retired Teacher looking for better ways to post my math equations

    How did you find PF?: A friend, @chwala, has been on the site for many years and recommended it to me. I write occasionally about high school maths in Geogebra https://www.geogebra.org/search/chris patterson . I write in Word and convert the files to PDFs. Feeling Tense is an example. I...
  23. B

    So, I Accidently Made Friends With The Meanest Math Teacher....

    At Parkway Jr. High. Back in the olden days. He actually taught higher levels but was doing the working retirement thing. He was the first math teacher to demand adult level perfection in our work. One does have to get there eventually and he felt it should be sooner than later. (This was...
  24. jaumzaum

    Proving that the teacher is wrong

    Hello guys. I want serious help here. I'm in first year of medical school and I jut had my second test in Genetics. One question of the test gave us a heredogram and asked us what was the most probable type of genetic disease the family had. There were 2 types of disease that would fit the...
  25. D

    Substitute vs Full Time Teacher: Requirements and Licensing in Massachusetts

    I received a bachelors in mathematics fairly recently and I am thinking about a career in teaching. I know that you must posses a license to be a full time teacher in most schools, but what requirements are there for being a substitute teacher? I hear teaching can be too overwhelming for some...
  26. Eclair_de_XII

    If you were a linear algebra teacher, would you dock points for this?

    Let's say you were proctoring some test that required proofs of Jordan canonical forms and rational canonical forms. Would you dock points from a lazy student abbreviating the former as "J-canonical forms" and the latter as "##\mathbb{Q}##-canonical forms" in their proofs?
  27. E

    Undergrad studying Physics and Education

    I am a senior at a state university in Massachusetts pursuing my lifelong passion which is Physics and, to a lesser extent, Mathematics. Currently, I’m finishing a course in Classical Mechanics and will be enrolled in Quantum Physics and Modern Theoretical Physics in the fall. I returned to...
  28. A

    Other My teacher gave out pratice exams?

    Hello, I am taking pre-calculus in college. However, I am worried that my class has grade inflation in it. My teacher gave out practice exam which is the same as the exams except with the numbers switched. How worried should I be if he did this?
  29. astroman707

    Other How to transition from school teacher to programmer?

    I’ve been a school teacher for 6 years, and I want to get into coding. I’ve been told by a CS professor I know that my background is very sought after in the tech industry, and I would be very competitive if I got into coding. Is this true? What’s the best route, bootcamp, nanodegree, etc.? What...
  30. devilish_wit

    Uniform Circular Motion question

    Homework Statement While learning to drive, you are in a 1 320-kg car moving at 34.0 m/s across a large, vacant, level parking lot. Suddenly you realize you are heading straight toward a brick sidewall of a large supermarket and are in danger of running into it. The pavement can exert a...
  31. R

    This teacher has doubts that microwaved food is safe

    What do you think? Why would he think microwaved food would be dangerous? He doesn't really explain why...Most of the time that I heard microwaved food was dangerous was from crackpots that also thinks we will all get fried by 5g wifi... this is a teacher though kind of concerning Starts at...
  32. L

    I Teacher needs maths assistance please

    I teach English at a university in China. I don't want any of my students to fail so I need to adjust exam marks. The exam marks range from 20 to 100. I want to adjust them so that the marks will range from 60 to 100, but I want to retain the proportional relationship between the marks. So for...
  33. S

    Programs Academic/Career Crossroads: Teacher to ME to Naval Flight officer....

    Hello. I am a teacher about to wrap up his fifth year in May. I started at the very bottom, teaching at risk and worked my way up with the help of my former teachers. I now teach AP Physics 1 and IB Mathematics SL. The whole experience has left me jaded. I gave it my all: my personality, my...
  34. Eclair_de_XII

    If you were a Physics II teacher, what would you do here?

    You're proctoring an exam, and a student who wears glasses uses those glasses to try and solve one of the optics problems. Do you fail him?
  35. whitsona

    B Teacher needs help: Bra–ket notation for parabolas?

    I am about to do a unit on the wonders of vector decomposition for year 2 in a 3 years science curriculum where the kids follow along with the historical developments of science. It's the science class I wish I'd had before becoming an engineer at MIT. In year 3, we are with Einstein and...
  36. W

    Help a HS teacher understand uniform motion?

    Greetings all, I apologize for joining your forum just to inquire about something that should be relatively simple, but you seem like a group of physics geeks able to articulate coherent arguments, and I need someone/s to help me see a different perspective on how to make an argument. For the...
  37. M

    MHB Can Every Student Master Calculus? The Legacy of Jaime Escalante's Teaching Hope

    Jaime Escalante's Legacy: Teaching Hope By Claudio Sanchez For 20 years, Jaime Escalante taught calculus and advanced math at Garfield High School in one of East Los Angeles' most notorious barrios, a place where poor, hardened street kids were not supposed to master mathematics, and certainly...
  38. M

    MHB Do High Expectations Lead to Student Success?

    If we expect kids to be losers they will be losers; if we expect them to be winners they will be winners. They rise, or fall, to the level of the expectations of those around them, especially their parents and their teachers. Jaime Escalante Famous High School Teacher
  39. ibtissem

    Career change -- University Language Teacher to Physics....

    Hello, I am new here , I am 28 years old with a Linguistics Master degree and a three years experience as a language teacher at University. Since my childhood I was fond of engineering and Physics, but unfortunately and due to some personal circumstances I was not able to pursue a degree in...
  40. P

    Studying Not doing well in a class -- Teacher is abusive. help please

    So in my upper division mechanics course I've stared to not do well on my quizzes. The difference between a fail is 30 points and a few points extra is a 80 -90. The tests have a very fine line, and the teacher does not think this is a issue. So I go to ask him for help. He gets mad at me when...
  41. M

    Courses Studying a nuclear engineering topic without a teacher?

    Hi, is it hard to study Neutron diffusion / nuclear theory from Introduction og nuclear engineering Lamarsh without a teacher ? , noticing that I will be taking Nuclear theory course on the next semester.
  42. bdolle

    Physics International High School Teacher

    Hey guys, I'm from the US and 28 years young. Was riding a motorcycle through Bali and met a guy from the UK who told me he teaches math at the international high school in Bali, but taught in other Asian countries as well. Work for 9 months, vacation for 3 months and get to live abroad. Sounds...
  43. Dusty912

    Your physics teacher has asked you to build a barometer

    Homework Statement . Your physics teacher has assigned you the task of building a water ba,rometer. You've learned that the pressure of the atmosphere can vary by as much as 5 percent from 1 standard atmosphere as the weather changes. (a) What minimum height must your ba,rometer have? (b) One...
  44. Z

    Courses My physics 1 & 2 teacher skipped so much material....

    I go to a community college for mechanical engineering and I always thought that physics 1 and 2 were way too easy and that my teacher probably skipped a lot of important material. One of my friends just transferred to a university to major in physics and he's been telling me that we didn't...
  45. Dr. Courtney

    Insights Blaming Government for Teacher and Scientist Failures in Integrity - Comments

    Dr. Courtney submitted a new PF Insights post Blaming Government for Teacher and Scientist Failures in Integrity Continue reading the Original PF Insights Post.
  46. Z

    Article in "The physics teacher" "Only two forms of energy"

    Hi I remember reading an article some years back (5?) on a description of energy categorized into either potential or kinetic energy. I think it was an article in "The physics teacher" but can't find it... Anyone remember it? Martin
  47. A

    New High School Physics Teacher

    Hi! I am one class away from graduating with a degree in geology from my university. I have a specific interest in geophysics and spent my summer in Ecuador (and spent some time at their Geophysics institute) and in New Mexico working with Los Alamos National Lab using geophysical techniques...
  48. S

    Homework Problem Regarding Linearization

    Homework Statement Hey Guys, I don't really want to have to post this in of all places due to how advanced everyone else is compared to me, but I went to my second physics class and I have a huge problem. My teacher gave me my homework, but I have no idea on Earth how to do it because she...
  49. P

    Exploring the Vast and Minute: A Physicist's Journey in Sydney

    Just introducing myself. My name is Paul Looyen and have taught physics for 22 years, mostly in Australia, but also for three years in Virginia, USA. Interests is the big (astronomy) and the small (quantum) but obviously enjoy lots in between.
  50. spero14159

    My role as a teacher in higher education: feeling useless

    This one may sound like a rant, so please forgive me if I am generalizing a lot. In my student life as well as teaching career, I have noticed an alarming trend that makes me question the worthiness of my profession. The only type of students that I (as well as other teachers I have seen in...
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