Tough vs. Easy: The Teacher Tussle

We've been talking a lot about teachers lately: awesome teachers, clueless teachers, and teachers who drive you nuts. You spend hours upon hours with these adults each week, and we know that you have feelings—strong feelings—about them.

Today, we're wondering which you prefer: a really tough teacher, or one who's super easy? It's not a simple question. Arguments could be made for both...and as you may have expected, we've dissected those arguments in depth. Before you vote for one or the other, consider these factors:

Rate of Aging
Tough teachers often assign exhaustive amounts homework, which you must stay up late to finish, causing you to age prematurely due to stress and lack of sleep.

With easy teachers, you rarely get a homework assignment, since you are often allowed time in class to finish your work. You can preserve your youthful appearance, and you might even start aging backwards, à la Benjamin Button.

Sacrifice Required
A tough teacher demands that you work hard for an A (or even a B). If you don't dedicate Friday nights to AP Bio, you'll surely fall behind. No Halloween parties or scary movie marathons for you.

If you have an easy teacher, the only thing you have to give up is any hope that you'll know the difference between mitosis and meiosis.

Nap Factor
Your really easy English teacher doesn't mind if you catch a couple zz's during in-class reading. In fact, he won't notice, because he's fallen asleep as well.

There's no snoozing in your tough teacher's classroom. And he'll enforce that rule by making you do military push-ups while simultaneously discussing Catch-22.

Game Show Eligibility
You can do your math homework while your easy World History teacher talks about her bad hair weekend, but at the end of the year, you'll still have no idea why the Magna Carta is significant.

With a tough teacher, not only will you know the Magna Carta's significance, but the year 1215 will forever be burned into your brain. Jeopardy!, get ready for a new champion!

Cinematic Knowledge
An easy teacher will have regular movie days during which she shows film that are only tangentially related to the subject. For example, your Spanish teacher might show Beverly Hills Chihuahua, or your English Lit teacher might show Demi Moore's The Scarlet Letter.

If your tough teacher ever shows a movie, it will likely be something challenging and thought-provoking, like The Seventh Seal or Battleship Potemkin. And you better believe you'll have to write a paper about the political, social, and/or cultural significance of the work.

Extra Credit
Your tough teacher only offers extra credit once a year, and in order to be eligible for it, you have to be within 1 percentage point of the next grade. If you qualify, your extra credit assignment will require you to write a single spaced, 10-page research paper.

Extra credit in your easy teacher's class will require you to bring cookies to share with the entire class. Mmmm, cookies.

Likely Surprises
If you have an easy teacher, you never know what to expect in class. One day, you might get a lesson on the difficulties of adult relationships, because your teacher is going through a breakup. The next day, you might learn about cell-phone etiquette because the checkout guy at the grocery store called your teacher "rude" and "childish" when he refused to obey the "No cell phones at the checkout" policy.

Surprises in your tough teacher's classroom come in the form of pop quizzes. And they happen way too frequently to actually qualify as "surprises."

Parent-Teacher Conferences
Even though you think you've been doing well in your tough teacher's class, there is always a good chance your parent-conference will not go well. On the bright side, your parents are likely to be just as terrified of your teacher as you are.

Your easy teacher will tell your parents how funny you are. "Have you seen that arm trick she can do? It's awesome! We watched her do that for like, 14 minutes one day. Class flew by!"

Measurable Progress
After a year with an easy teacher, you'll know a lot about his personal life, the latest DVD releases, and the first two chapters of your textbook. This knowledge will be of little use to you when you start applying for college.

After a year with a tough teacher, your mastery of the class subject will prepare you for the academic challenges you will face in the future...once you've sufficiently recovered from the actual class experience.

Where do you stand on the teacher divide? Would you rather have a teacher who's really tough or one who's uber-easy?

Related Post: Four Types of Halloween Teachers