All great teachers love their students. Just ask their spouses, who hear about their students every day at home! Caring for students is the basis of connecting with students, whether you find this easy or difficult. You might not always like students’ behavior—for example, when they decide to put the dead mouse they found on your desk. But despite their behavior, you choose to love them. It is a choice, often a difficult one. To choose to love a student who is, say, constantly physically hurting others, including you, takes sacrifice. This book is a call to love the students you find difficult to like.

At this point, it’s good to remind yourself why you became a teacher—to make a difference. Loving students makes a difference. You can be the teacher your students remember as the one who made a difference in their life. The one they shared their lottery winnings with (one can always dream…). If we wanted an easy job with lots of money, we would have become sky-diving instructors instead of teachers!