Who were your favourite teachers at school?
The coach? The passionate motivator? The hardnut? The “friend” teacher? The one who gave easy grades?
My top three were: Mr Meakin, Mr Gibbons and Ms O’Keeffe. For very different reasons.
How has Mr Meakin impacted me?
I’ve fast come to realise that teaching, real, life altering, perspective changing teaching, begins outside the learning space. To be a teacher that influences the lives of students, we must embrace our role outside the learning space.
Mr Meakin was my rugby coach. He taught me discipline, dedication, team work and how to suffer. Training sessions would often push my body past its limit. I hurt. I suffered. I always came back.
I developed some crucial life skills through my time on the sports field. It was there more than any other place that I learned how to function in society; which, after all, is one of the primary reasons for education. I didn’t learn how to function in a group through “class group work”, nor through “group assignments”. It was sport that guided me. I discovered leadership, trust, communication and respect.
More than anything it was the respect that grew from having a willing, enthusiastic and dedicated coach that impacted my life during my education. Here was an adult to look up to. Here was a teacher giving their own time to impart life skills outside the classroom. Here was a teacher willing to share and expose themselves to the physical hardships of sport. It was fantastic!
As soon as I entered this education game, I knew I had to coach sport. I’ve since coached rugby, cricket, athletics, basketball, soccer and even NETBALL! Apparently the skirt suited me!
The times I’ve spent outside the class have had more of an impact on the lives of the students than any moment I could have shared in the learning space. I have been able to grow and nurture relationships in an amazing way. I have seen students at their lowest points, having just lost a game, or struggled to run that last mile. Students have been brutally honest in these times; the bonds of sports teams are phenomenal. It is here I have been able to be the greatest role model. Here the student sees the educator that seeks to nurture their whole self; to listen to their stories on a long bus trip, to commiserate with them when it was their bad kick that lost the game for the team, to run back and pick them up when the physical training was too tough.
These moments are not static. The next day in class there is a team member willing to calm the noisy room; I have an new ally in the learning space. A week later, a student will fight through the difficulty of a complex question; he learned to trust me to guide him on the field, now he trusts me to guide him through the course. A year later, the student that offered to help me coach has been given a leadership role within the school.
You want to win in the learning space? Start by winning outside it. Coach a sports team (even my mum has coached a soccer team to a finals, she still doesn’t understand the offside rule). Take a debating team. Direct the next school production. Offer to help the school band or choir. Whatever you’re passionate about, be involved in it.
Coach Meakin, thank you. For the pain, suffering, discipline, hardwork and dedication. It’s made me a better educator.
History Re-Written 