1. A Bat-like Sense of Hearing
The old cliché is so true. I HEAR EVERYTHING. And I don’t mean being able to hear the kid with a naturally loud voice over everyone else; I mean being able to hear a student mutter something under their breath on the opposite side of the room during a fire drill. It is uncanny.
2. The Most Powerful Inner Clock Known to Humankind
When 40 hours of our week are lived out according to a strict bell schedule, it’s only normal for teachers to develop a superhuman understanding of time. Fellow teachers, here’s a challenge for you: Start a timer, then leave it and go do something in under an hour (fold laundry, give the dog a bath, eat two servings of Pop-Tarts, whatever). Estimate how long it took you, then check your timer. I’ll bet you weren’t more than a couple of minutes off in your estimation. I’ve only been teaching for five years, but the accuracy of my internal timer totally freaks me out on a regular basis.
3. Titanium Bladders
I guess this is more of a super fact than it is a superpower, but the point I’m trying to make is that the bladders of teachers are not involuntary muscles, like they are for other people.* Teachers tell their bladders what to do, and sometimes that message is, “Sorry, buddy. You’ve got another hour and a half until my conference period, so you’re just going to have to hold it.”
4. Bionic Lie-Detection Sensors
I remember having this conversation with a veteran teacher during after-school duty my first year:
“I can’t believe it,” I said. “Five of my students had distant relatives pass away last night. What are the odds of that?”
The veteran teacher gave me a small smile. “Let me guess,” she said. “You had a project due today?”
My mouth dropped open, both from realizing how easily I’d been duped and how effortlessly she’d detected it.
5. Superhuman Fearlessness
Teachers fear nothing. Okay, maybe not nothing. Grading deadlines are always terrifying, as well as the idea of Valentine’s Day falling on a Friday. But other than that, there is very little that can shake a teacher.
We give improv performances for 40 hours a week for the world’s toughest critics. We get sassed. Kids throw crayons at our heads. We’ve heard every insult known to man. Kids barf in our hands. Our hands!
And yet every day, three-and-a-half million of us march up to the front lines—fearlessness or insanity, I wonder sometimes—and get the job done.
Source: We are Teachers