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Ben Halpern
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Describe the best teacher you've ever had

It could be a computer science or coding bootcamp teacher — or really anyone else in your life who was damn good at being a teacher.

What about them made them great?

Top comments (15)

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adiatiayu profile image
Ayu Adiati • Edited

My ex-boss when I worked in training development field.
I didn't know anything about this world when I started and got imposter syndrome a lot.

She mentored me closely and taught me everything she knows.
Even when I wasn't feel ready, she "trapped me" to step out of my comfort zone to give some small training sessions. And it wasn't even on my job description 😂
But later on, I found out that this "trap" was actually her strategy to make me grow faster and stronger because she believed that I could do much more than what I thought. And within a year (a year less than what it supposed to), I got promoted.

A great teacher is someone who not can only teach, but also put trust in their students that they can achieve more and help them to grow.
And I had mine :)

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cicirello profile image
Vincent A. Cicirello

A chemistry professor at Drexel University back in mid-1990s. She was entertaining even during a lecture. I still remember one class where she started by inhaling a balloon full of sulfur hexafluoride and then started lecturing in a funny voice as a result as if everything was normal. I took Chem I and II both with this Professor. Chem III conflicted with a required course so I couldn't officially take it. But I regularly skipped the course I was in (as long as I wasn't missing a test) to audit her Chem III lecture. It isn't easy to keep a lecture hall with 100-200 students engaged, but she did so on a regular basis. R.I.P. Dr Sally Solomon.

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nombrekeff profile image
Keff • Edited

Freaking Matias from FunFunFunction and Dan from TheCodingTrain on youtube!!!

In real life, I've never had a teacher that has made a big impact on me. Education here where I live is not the best by quite a margin. Bad luck in that regard I guess. My boss taught me quite a lot too, but I would not consider him good at teacher, he is too smart, and thinks the rest of us are equally smart xD

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nombrekeff profile image
Keff • Edited

Ohh I forgot TheNewBoston, I learned most of my basic coding skills from him.

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lexlohr profile image
Alex Lohr

My last math teacher met our class with the following words: "Please take out your math books and pocket calculators and have a thorough look at them... You won't see them for the rest of this year.".

He encouraged us not to learn formula by heart, but instead to learn the reasoning behind it so we would be able to come up with a solution regardless and learn to think mathematically.

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clumsycoder profile image
Kaushal Joshi

I wish I had a teacher like that.

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andrewbaisden profile image
Andrew Baisden

Hmm its probably a tie between Brad Traversy and Maximilian Schwarzmüller. Their Udemy and YouTube courses have helped me a lot.

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jeremymonatte profile image
Mbenga

I think my really good teacher was the one I got when I was like 8years old. He was amazing and always keep pushing us when we were curious about anything. I really think he played a huge role in the creation of the curious and knowledge entouhsiaste man I am.

So Merci Mathieu P.

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psypher1 profile image
James 'Dante' Midzi

All of my French teachers, from A1 to C1. They all encouraged me to try regardless of how unsure I was.

They taught me that it's not about being correct, but about making an effort and doing the best you can

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chrisgreening profile image
Chris Greening • Edited

Definitely my high school math teacher.

After elementary school I was placed onto an experimental advanced math track and it immediately turned into a massive source of anxiety, self-esteem/mental health issues, loneliness, etc. for the following 8 years all the way through until high school graduation (and partly even into today ~14 years later)

This particular teacher ended up being my math teacher for the final 3 years of high school (precalc through calc II) and despite still struggling every step of the way he was the first math teacher I'd had that was truly passionate about teaching and made me feel like a person (I went through some pretty awful math teachers prior)

Every couple weeks we'd take a break from math and instead spend a whole class learning about financial literacy, technology, current world events, sustainability, etc. and he focused a lot on connecting the math we were learning to practical real-world situations which inspired me to pursue physics in university (which in turn led me to programming and now here I am)

Out of the ~30 kids that started the program I was one of five that stuck through it to the end and I 100% owe it to his consistent motivation - super fantastic guy, I do a bit of tutoring these days and I look back to his teaching style so I can try to help others feel less alone while trying to learn

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clumsycoder profile image
Kaushal Joshi

My science and English teachers in high school.

The science teacher is one of the most amazing professor I have ever met in my life. Every student at my school used to look up to him and pay close attention to every lecture he gave. During his career, I don't recall anyone receiving poor grades in science.

Not only could he teach science, but he could also teach math, English, and Marathi (mother tongue) so well that a visitor would have a hard time guessing his expertise.

And the English teacher, who passed away last year, is the reason why I feel confident communicating in a foreign language today. He had a unique teaching technique and most importantly he treated us like his friends so we had a great bond.

I remember him telling us to learn figure of speech, which was not on the syllabus, to improve our writing skills, but we ignored him.

Later in junior year, I studied figure of speech out of curocity myself. He was so happy when I told him that :)

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lepinekong profile image
lepinekong • Edited

My Math Teacher : he cared about everybody from last to the first. For example he paired last with first one. So there were also 2 support classes after regular hours, ones for the weakests and one for the strongests.

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volker_schukai profile image
Volker Schukai

The principal at our school was also our math teacher.

He was very strict but also very good. If you know what I mean.

When other teachers' lessons were cancelled, he took over the lesson.

This was not particularly popular in the class.

Math instead of a free time.

He was good at teaching math.
I liked that! Even if it meant having less time off.

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steelwolf180 profile image
Max Ong Zong Bao • Edited

My primary 6 form teacher who was also our school's discipline master and math teacher.

He believed in the greatness in us that we had unlimited potential to become a productive or influential members of society to live a great life.

Despite we're a bunch of misfits and less academic inclined kids. Who has high chance to end up in dead-end blue collar jobs, joining the gang due to our environment, family difficultly or less than stellar academic performance.

I was just blessed to have multiple GTO (Great Teacher Onizuka) when I was growing up and i do my best to become one as when I teach people now.

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atulcodex profile image
🚩 Atul Prajapati 🇮🇳

That problems

Who teached me the right way and process 🙏😇☺️

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