It Won't Be Easy: An Exceedingly Honest (and Slightly Unprofessional) Love Letter to Teaching

by Tom Rademacher

Overview

Tom Rademacher wishes someone had handed him this sort of book along with his teaching degree: a clear-eyed, frank, boots-on-the ground account of what he was getting into. But first he had to write it. And as 2014’s Minnesota Teacher of the Year, Rademacher knows what he’s talking about. Less a how-to manual than a tribute to an impossible and impossibly rewarding profession, It Won’t Be Easy captures the experience of teaching in all its messy glory.

The book follows a year of teaching, with each chapter tackling a different aspect of the job. Pulling no punches (and resisting no punch lines), he writes about establishing yourself in a new building; teaching meaningful classes, keeping students a priority; investigating how race, gender, and identity affect your work; and why it’s a good idea to keep an extra pair of pants at school. Along the way he answers the inevitable and the unanticipated questions, from what to do with Google to how to tell if you’re really a terrible teacher, to why “Keep your head down” might well be the worst advice for a new teacher.

Though directed at prospective and newer teachers, It Won’t Be Easy is mercifully short on jargon and long on practical wisdom, accessible to anyone—teacher, student, parent, pundit—who is interested in a behind-the-curtain look at teaching and willing to understand that, while there are no simple answers, there is power in learning to ask the right questions.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781517901127
Publisher:	University of Minnesota Press
Publication date:	04/25/2017
Pages:	192
Sales rank:	489,268
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Tom Rademacher is an English teacher in Minneapolis. His writing has appeared in EdPost, MinnPost, and on his blog, Mr. Rad’s Neighborhood, and he speaks about teaching at universities, conferences, and TEDx events. In 2014 he was honored as Minnesota’s Teacher of the Year.

Dave Eggers is author of ten books, including, most recently, Heroes of the Frontier. He is the founder of McSweeney’s, an independent publishing house in San Francisco, California, and cofounder of 826 National, a network of eight tutoring centers around the country. 

Table of Contents

Contents
Foreword
Dave Eggers
Introduction: The Rules
Part I. Summer
Welcome to the Shitshow
The Interview
Getting Along with Grownups
Crappy Job, Great Career
Part II. Fall
Extra Pants and Other Teacher Essentials
Watch Your Mouth
Fear, Anger, and Controlling a Classroom
So, You Think You’re a Terrible Teacher
Part III. Winter
The Goddamn Internet
The Worst Advice Ever
White Guy Bullshit
When Kids Work for Change
Part IV. Spring
Give Your Room to the Kids
Liberal Racism, Racist Racism, and the Middle Road
When Bad Things Happen
I Quit
Part V. Summer, Again
Let Me Tell You About These Kids
Index

Editorial Reviews

"Besides the fact that it is truly laugh out loud funny, this book stands in for what so many teachers need: the teacher-friend whose room you can stomp into when you need empathy over your lack of coolness; the friend who will make you feel better about the mistakes you made, who will celebrate your crazy schemes, who will help you find your reasons why you need to come back when you want to quit. That kind of friend is a rare and precious person who doesn’t exist on many campuses, so thank God that Tom gave us one in book form that’s portable enough to take wherever we need companionship."—Shanna Peeples, 2015 National Teacher of the Year

"In a breath of fresh air called Tom Rademacher, we get that desperately needed voice of a teacher who loves his kids enough to challenge us to think differently. It Won't Be Easy gets us into the classroom and on the path to new ways of educating and valuing the next generation."—R.T. Rybak, former mayor of Minneapolis, President and CEO of The Minneapolis Foundation, and author of Pothole Confidential: My Life as Mayor of Minneapolis

"Rademacher does not hold back... his honest, inspiring, and often humorous book will appeal to teachers, future teachers, and those interested in education."—Booklist

"Many of these narratives are studded with insights into the art of teaching."—Library Journal

"Rademacher's classroom wisdom is suitable for anyone who is trying to communicate effectively with children, especially adolescents."—Pioneer Press

From the Publisher

04/01/2017
Rademacher, a blogger and 2014 recipient of Minnesota's Teacher of the Year Award, offers a series of lessons on what colleges of education don't teach, from what to expect from the first job interview to how to get along with cranky colleagues. This book contains no academic references and shies away from research and statistics. Instead, the reader gets lots of stories. The most affecting tales relate back to Rademacher's key themes: school can be unfair, especially to students who are struggling with personal and family problems; and compassion is the most essential element of quality teaching. While many of these narratives are studded with insights into the art of teaching, the author's avoidance of data trips the text up at times. (For example, when he tries to convince the reader that teachers are not underpaid after all.) Rademacher presents the teaching profession—warts and all—with an air of informality. His style will surely entertain some readers, but others may be put off by the frequent appearance of such turns of phrase as "and stuff" or "but whatever," as well as the meandering parenthetical asides. VERDICT Recommended only for academic libraries serving aspiring teachers at the undergraduate or graduate levels.—Seth Kershner, Northwestern Connecticut Community Coll. Lib., Winsted

Library Journal