Frank McCourt. How did I miss his books all these years?
I have found his writing to be a relief. He’s put into words things I have felt and experienced and would never want to admit to anyone. Feelings of insecurity and a long lasting belief that an immigrant background (even first-generation as my own) is insurmountable for someone to actually play at the same table as all those people with their “beautiful white teeth” and their seemingly carefree lives.
Children of immigrants from certain countries can suffer deprivations in the land of milk and honey, just from being under economic restrictions of a mentality that won’t “splurge” on anything but bare necessities. “Survival mode” does not often allow for the luxury of cultural development.

In this book, Teacher Man, Frank McCourt’s feelings of inadequacy just seem to persist, even after experiencing times of success. I could relate to his feeling lost as students walk into the classroom and he realized how many different mentalities are about to confront him, and not knowing what persona to assume to conduct a class. There is much more to glean from his experience as a teacher, but my own radar picked up on what I have just described.

McCourt encourages his students (and readers) that they too have a story to tell.

I just wiped tears from my eyes as I finished this book. Frank McCourt is a genius of story-telling. He is able to perfectly describe the trials and tribulations of being an inner-city teacher with a human approach. This should be required reading for anyone who has aspirations of being a teacher or has ever been in a classroom. Education today is rapidly changing and it seems like the focus is on test scores, data, technology and less on being an actual human teacher. Stories, questions, creativity, discussions, connections. This is what improves test scores. MacCourt connects with the students like when he has them bring in food from their home to share with the class. They end up writing a "cook book" with all the recipes. Yes, they learned about reading AND writing. To be honest, it can be difficult to keep up the spark that a new teacher has. "But if you hang on you learn the tricks. It's hard but you have to make yourself comfortable in the classroom. You have to be selfish. The airlines tell you if oxygen fails you are to put on your mask first, even if your instinct is to save the child." If I didn't take care of my self, I would have quit 7 years ago. Yes, I will one day leave the classroom. I love the young humans I come into contact with who I teach and teach me as well. I know that this is what I am meant to do.....for now.

On the first day of my teaching career, I was almost fired for eating the sandwich of a high school boy. On the second day I was almost fired for mentioning the possibility of friendship with a sheep. Otherwise, there was nothing remarkable about my thirty years in the high school classrooms of New York City."

So says Frank McCourt in Chapter One of Teacher Man but his own book makes him a liar. There's plenty of remarkable here.

I briefly worked as a teacher and that experience has left me with some stories I will tell for life. (Quick digression: one student called another a subordinate clause because she cannot stand on her own).

So, McCourt's thirty years in education are illuminated with stories of his students, ranging from the Korean boy who dreams about walking into an alley with his strict father and only one of them walking out to Freddie Bell, a student who turns down an A grade because he thinks it was only awarded to him because he is black and the teacher didn't want to be accused of bigotry.

McCourt has to learn how to help all of his students from the straight A crew to those who would rather be anywhere else.

And our narrator does learns to be a great teacher... almost in spite of the narrow school curriculum. He makes many, many, MANY mistakes - he loses students' trust by tattling on them to their parents for example and, in his personal life, his own marriages ends with as little fanfare as it began. However, McCourt stumbles into successful teaching techniques as he learns that what teenagers love - really, what all of us love - are stories.

Decades of teaching through stories are probably what made him such an effortless writer.

I don't read a lot of memoirs but I've read two of McCourt's memoir trilogy and really enjoyed both of them.

Đỡ hơn tập 2 nhưng ko vượt qua đc tập 1.
Phải nói rằng tác giả có rất nhiều chất liệu cuộc sống, tuy nhiên đồng thời ông cũng nhiều lần nhắc lại rằng ai cũng có chất liệu của riêng mình, và hoàn toàn dựa vào năng lực của ng viết để thể hiện chất liệu đó.
Cách sử dụng câu văn dài liên tục của McCourt làm tôi rất ấn tượng, tạo cảm giác bản năng và trung lập. McCourt rõ ràng ko phải một người chồng tốt, vì ông lúc nào cũng như treo ngc cành cây. Ông đã ít kể về chứng nghiện rượu của mình, thay vào đó là kể về học sinh của ông, và cách ông thích ứng với hệ thống. Kết quả khá tốt, nhất là khi cách dạy bản năng của ông để lại rất nhiều ký ức tuyệt vời, đặc biệt là khi ông được mời về ngôi trường danh giá Stuyvesant. Có lẽ mỗi nhà giáo tốt nếu được công tác tại một Suyvesant đều sẽ thành công, theo một hướng nào đó.

Teacher man

Nothing better than reading a book about teaching career in a teacher’s day.
I can say I feel the same way as the author from the university life as well as life as a teacher, choose teaching just because I couldn’t do anything else, have a love-hate relationship with it, and before I realize, I have loved my career to the point that I have no life outside my school,my students, my workload.
I love the way he see opportunities to teach from every where, just like me.
When the author shares his experience as teaching English as a foreign language to students, that reminds me of the teacher in a tv show ‘’Mind your language’’ ,
I spent the best morning reading this all the way to the end, and I found the answer, “ ENCOURAGEMENT “ is the key for great teacher. I keep that in mind and treasure every chance I have with students.

Tưởng hay nhưng rời rạc quá, giọng văn hài hước nhưng mình ko tìm thấy nhiều triết lý về giáo dục trong cuốn sách này.

Who doesn't want to be a teacher and Irish after reading this, will never be either.

Better the second time around. McCourt is simply funny and entertaining.

You feel yourself in the classroom with him. You feel yourself understanding and understanding the laughter, of teachers that you know. Now that the author is late, I feel like mapping out the sites he mentions in Limerick. We should take the authors who are with us seriously, to appreciate where they're from. Reminds me that I miss both McCourt and Pete McCarthy, humorous Irish writers who have passed since i first read them.

I have read all three of McCourt;s books and I must say they remind me of a great Martini. Like the first Martini of the evening, "Angela's Ashes" is remarkable. It flows through your mind awakening thoughts and feelings too long forgotten. It makes the reader feel compassion and sorrow for his fellow man while maintaining one's faith in the human need to survive and thrive. "T'is", like a second Martini, starts off reinforcing the experiences from the first but somewhere along the way it gets muddled and enlightenment fades into confusion. The third Martini "Teacher Man" is a mess. It is a haphazard collection of awkwardly remembered vignettes that are attached to each other in a steam of conscious manner. Everything seems funnier than it is and when it is all finished you can't recall much about it.

I would have given this book 4 stars as it was very entertaining but for the constant use of religious deity as profanity. Others may say it was necessary, especially if the children actually used those words but I disagree.

In this book, McCourt kind of summarizes his 30-year teaching career in four different schools in New York City, highlighting various lessons and memorable situations as he does so. When he teaches, he finds himself retelling various parts of his life and upbringing to his students, which he includes here as well. So this is kind of an autobiography in a sense, but also a book about a specific teaching experience. I thought the stories McCourt described were funny, interesting, sad, hopeful, and all showed that the profession of teaching is one that is highly impactful, both to the students and the teachers themselves.

Also to note: While "#3" is in the title description, you do NOT have to read McCourt's other two books to understand this one.

I can honestly say that I wish I hadn't read this book. I suppose it answers, indirectly, the puzzling question I've always had over why students & teachers "hook-up", but I don't think that was the premise of this book. I wish I could scour from my brain cells the images left there thanks to having read this book. So many other things I could have done with my time...

Such a great and satisfying book for where I'm at right now. I love Frank McCourt and who knows why it took me this long to read the third of his memoirs. But thick in the middle of my first year of teaching it hit the spot it ways I can't fully articulate.

What I loved:
His honesty. It has been so long since I read his first two that I forgot how much I love his writing style. But especially applied to the crucible of teaching, it was just exactly what I needed. He lays it out in a very refreshing way.

What I learned:
That I'm not alone. That it's just the nature of the beast to never feel completely sufficient for the task.

A favorite passage:

I didn't always love teaching. I was out of my depth. You're on your own in the classroom, one man or woman facing five classes every day, five classes of teenagers. One unit of energy against one hundred and seventy-five units of energy, one hundred and seventy-five ticking bombs. And you have to find ways of saving your own life. They may like you, they may even love you, but they are young and it is the business of the young to push the old off the planet. I know I'm exaggerating but it's like a boxer going into the ring or a bullfighter into the arena. You can be knocked out or gored and that's the end of your teaching career. But if you hang on you learn the tricks. It's hard but you have to make yourself comfortable in the classroom. You have to be selfish. The airlines tell you if oxygen fails you are to put on your mask first, even if your instinct is to save the child.