The unofficial toolkit for teachers

There are a few essentials one needs to survive in the profession. These include:

• 30 hours in a day
• An extra pair of eyes to spot what's going on in all areas of the room at once
• Strong arms for carrying piles of books home to mark
• A BS detector for when students try to bluff their way out of something
• Thick skin so their offhand comments about your appearance/intelligence etc don't hurt
• A big heart so you can care about even the least lovable students
• A well-developed sense of humour
• Plenty of friends your own age!
• A slang translator with an auto-update facility (so you know "sick" now means "cool" and "long" now means "boring")
• A taste for cold tea
• A supersize cast-iron bladder
• A microchip in your ear so you can surreptitiously listen to music during meetings!