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Can you tell us about yourself? 

"Hello. My name is Anna McIntosh and I've been teaching at Anatole Avenue Elementary school for 20 years. Uh, Anatolia is located in Van Nuys, California." 

Why did you start a career in education?

"Started a career in teaching in education because I always wanted to be a teacher. I always enjoy working with children and wanting to teach them a love of education. I wanted to teach them how to read and write. I remember being a young girl and, uh, we bought age six years old and playing with stuffed animals and pretending I was a teacher." 

If you could have any other job what would it be and why?

"Uh, have any other job I would choose, uh, working at a daycare center, uh, because it was still allow me to work with children. Uh, I would be able to, uh, teach them, uh, not in, not necessarily academics, but in a fun way where we'd be able to take them on field trips and we'd be talking about nature and we would be, would take them. I would be able to take them to museums and teach them about art. Um, I would prefer working with children ages five to 12 younger children. Um, because that's the age I love to work with kids." 

How are kids different now than 30 years ago?

"Um, because that's the age I love to work with kids. I noticed kids are different now 30 years ago because their attention span seems to be shorter. They tend to get bored easily and some project based lessons they also want to use to college" 

How is teaching different now than 30 years ago?

"Teaching also is different now than from 30 years ago. Teachers are actually required to, um, integrate technology in their classrooms. They're also, uh, test scores are, are relieved, uh, looked at in depth and there's less play time in younger grades. Like in kindergarten, uh, children are focused more on learning their alphabet rather than having playtime." 

What would you tell someone who wants to become a teacher?

"If I found out that somebody wanted to be teacher, I would tell them that teaching is tough but still rewarding in a sense that you are still, um, making a difference in children's lives. I would tell that person to be patient and not to give up, but uh, seek support, uh, keep on learning. Um, reading lots of uh, uh, books about discipline. I would also tell the teacher to be open minded and also to make sure that they take care of themselves and they take rest times seriously. Uh, uh, so they can fully recover and be ready to work with children when the school year begins." 

What is one thing you would change to help kids learn better?

"I think I would change, um, is to help children learn better is I would remove the emphasis of, uh, testing the test results. Um, especially in elementary school when there's still learning how to socialize, how to make friends, how to, uh, really they're learning their foundation skills. So I will remove, uh, emphasis on test scores and, uh, instead I would focus more on hands on activities, taking children outside the classroom on field trips. And that's also thank you for your attention. And again, this, this animatic compassion."