The problem of enrollment

Many instructors are apt to say that teaching is easier, encouraging, and often downright fun with the right students.

And that's because it's true: it is far easier to teach a student who’s eager to learn, to study, to practice, to ask questions, and to improve, versus one who doesn’t want to do any of those things.

But that doesn't mean you need better students. It means that as a teacher and role model—as someone whose job it is to teach--your mission needs to be to find a way to get this kid to want to.

That changing your posture, your strategy, your lesson plan, your methods--while it may be hard--is absolutely critical to the task at hand.

Your students might not want what you want, or what you want them to want, or what their parents want you to get them to want. And, if that's the case, your job (as their teacher) is to find a way to connect this task, this activity, this lecture, this test—to somewhere they'd actually like to be.

No, it's not in the job description. And no, it won’t grant you tenure. What it will do is create an environment that's conductive to learning. To curiosity. To growth. One that makes it easier on you (and your students) in the long-run, because they'll actually want to work with you and listen to what you have to say.

What makes teaching so hard is instructing students who have no interest in comprehending what you're teaching, because they haven't yet realized a good enough reason to care.