Anyone who teaches needs to have passion and the want to teach. But I haven’t found many teachers who fit that description. Most of the teachers I have known are just there to do the job, get paid, and go home. But Mr. Herriot does not fit the description of a typical teacher. He cares about his students, and about making his classes interesting. He goes above and beyond and tries to help his students do better. His class is one of those classes where the bell will ring and you’ll leave wondering where all the time went. I can honestly say I enjoyed going to his class of psychology and miss it terribly.
There are so many reasons why Mr. Herriot is a good—No—great teacher. He is the type of teacher everyone loves, except for those who fall asleep during his class. Those students must HATE him! In his class, there is no falling asleep because if you do, Mr. Herriot will have the greatest pleasure of waking you up with an air horn. But that is just one thing that makes him so funny and entertaining. Another would be his rules on being late. In our school, if you are late four times during a semester, you get a detention. But Mr. Herriot will give you a choice: you can either take the detention or you can lay on the ground and sizzle like bacon. This means you basically have to lay on the floor and flop around until he says you’re good. And if you take the second option, the class gets to decide if you did a good enough job and if you deserve to get out of detention. This happens to only two or three kids a semester, but Mr. Herriot would rather help his students than punish them, and that is a great quality for a teacher to have.
Mr. Herriot does not want to see his students fail. Plain and simple. He goes beyond what a normal teacher does and gives his students multiple chances to come in for help. For example, the day of a test, he will be in his room early in the morning to hold a study session for any student who feels like they need more help before they take the test. He sacrifices the time and the sleep for his students to help them do better. And if you want more help prior to a test all you need to do is ask, and he’ll make time for you to come in for help.
He also likes to wrap everyone into the conversation and get each person to participate. He has a current events section at the beginning of class, and encourages everyone to come prepared with something to share and talk about. This not only gets everyone talking, but it also helps us have a better understanding of what is going on in the world around us.
Lastly, Mr. Herriot is a great man. A few years back, he decided to start a food drive just for his classes. He tells his classes that the class that brings in the most food will get a pizza party and the choice of what they want him to do with his beard. And is this a great motivator to do more. The money for the pizza is coming straight from his own pocket. He would rather spend money to motivate us than donate a poor amount of food. All the food he collects, he donates to the Hartland Food Pantry.
Mr. Herriot is a teacher, a track coach, and a father. He motivates his students to do better and be better. He does his best to help others and the community even, if it’s coming straight out of his pocket. Mr. Herriot is not only teacher of the year, but he is teacher of the decade.