Everyone needs an education.  If you want to have a good job when you grow up, then you need to have an education.  Without an education, you will probably end up working as a garbage man or a worker at a fast food restaurant washing dishes or taking out the trash.  Where do you go to get an education?  You go to school.  When you are at school how do you learn?  Your teacher will teach you what you need to know in order to have a good job and a good life when you grow up.  I chose to interview Ginny Pietruszka who has one of the most important jobs there is in today’s world. 

Ginny walked into her kitchen, smiled and was ready for the interview.  First, I wanted to see what she did as a teacher. She answered, “I am a computer teacher at this moment.  Up until November I taught gifted and talented.”  She paused and thought a moment.  “For the last four months I have been teaching children from kindergarten to sixth grade about computers.” 

Now that I knew what she did as a teacher, I asked her if she thought teaching was an important job.  She thought with a smile and then said, “I think teaching is very important because everyone would have a hard time doing what they were doing if they didn’t have an education.”  Then she added, “I also think that teaching computers is important because computers are becoming more and more part of our lives everyday because of modern technology.” 

“Do you enjoy teaching?”  I asked Ginny as an off to the side question.  She answered grinning and without any hesitation, “Yes, very much.” 

I asked Ginny if she always wanted to be a teacher, and when did she realize that she wanted to teach.  “Yes, I have to say I did always want to become a teacher.  I started considering it in fifth grade.  I had this great teacher explaining things and ever since I saw Mr. Jones teach I always wanted to be a teacher so I could be as great as him,” Ginny answered smiling. 

Then as I searched through my notes, I asked Ginny if she enjoyed school when she was younger and what grades she enjoyed the most.  Ginny thought and gave a little hum, then answered, “I really did enjoy school.”  Then she jokingly added, "I was probably one of those schooly nerds who studied hard and did well in my classes.  Fifth grade was great with Mr. Jones.  Tenth grade was also fun, not so much the teachers , but I had a good group of friends.  Oh, and I had a great geography teacher in twelfth grade who took us on all these neat fieldtrips.  So, yeah, I liked school.” 

Getting back to the subject of computer teaching, I asked Ginny if she thought it was harder to teach the little kids or the older kids computers.  "Both are fun to teach," she said.  “The little kids make you laugh a lot, but for computers,”  Ginny thought as the sounds of chairs falling and her son laughing interrupted her and then said, “for computers it is probably harder to teach older kids just because they want to do everything the way they do it at home.  With the younger ones it is easier because most of them are just learning a lot and don’t use the computer that much at home.  Then again it is sometimes more fun working with the older kids because it is more fun to do projects with them.” 

After answering that question, Ginny went out into the familyroom to talk to her kids who were making tents out of blankets and chairs.  When she returned to the kitchen, I asked her how she deals with failing students and if she got very many kids who don’t understand computers.  After a moment she replied, “I don’t see too many in computer class.  When I taught regular sixth graders some kids were having trouble and I tried to give them all the help I could;  I would have parent volunteers come in and work with them, get students who understand it pretty well to help during recess and I tried everything to help them bring their grade up.”  Ginny sighed, then added, “You just try everything and if they want the F then they won’t try and it won’t work, but if they really want to bring it up, then they will try and hopefully they will succeed.” 

The interview with Ginny Pietruszka was coming to a close.  I just had one more question to ask before I packed up and left.  My closing question was, “If you could have been anything in the world, a lawyer or a doctor or anything you wanted, would you have still wanted to become a teacher?”  The room was practically silent besides the sound of the ticking clock.  Then she answered, “I have thought about that before.  I don’t know if I could have been a doctor because I don’t care for blood and guts.  I wouldn’t have made a good dentist because I wouldn’t want to stick my hands in everyone’s mouth all the time.  Maybe I wouldn’t mind being an eye doctor because I wear contacts and would understand that.  I never really seriously thought about being anything but a teacher because I always thought that when you teach you can be almost any of those jobs.  While I teach science, I could pretend with the kids that we are scientists and we could all do fun experiments.  Or when we write stories, we can be writers or critics, and when we do math we could be accountants or mathematicians and figure something neat out.  So I always thought that if you have a good class and a good imagination that you could become anything when you were a teacher.”  Ginny smiled, “Maybe not so much with computers, but you get the idea.” 

I thanked Ginny for explaining to me her ideas about teaching.  She said no problem and left the room.  As I was getting my stuff ready to leave, I reviewed her thoughts in my head and I agreed with Ginny that teaching is a very important job and maybe I would consider becoming one myself someday.  I still might study to become a doctor though, just for the money. 

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