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Teacher: The One Who Made the Difference
In 1969, Mark Edmundson was a typical high school senior in working-class Medford, Massachusetts. He loved football, disdained schoolwork, and seemed headed for a factory job in his hometown—until a maverick philosophy teacher turned his life around.
When Frank Lears, a small, nervous man wearing a moth-eaten suit, arrived at Medford fresh from Harvard University, his students pegged him as an easy target. Lears was unfazed by their spitballs and classroom antics. He shook things up, trading tired textbooks for Kesey and Camus, and provoking his class with questions about authority, conformity, civil rights, and the Vietnam War. He rearranged seats and joined in a ferocious snowball fight with Edmundson and his football crew. Lears’s impassioned attempts to get these kids to think for themselves provided Mark Edmundson with exactly the push he needed to break away from the lockstep life of Medford High. Written with verve and candor, Teacher is Edmundson’s heartfelt tribute to the man who changed the course of his life.
When Frank Lears, a small, nervous man wearing a moth-eaten suit, arrived at Medford fresh from Harvard University, his students pegged him as an easy target. Lears was unfazed by their spitballs and classroom antics. He shook things up, trading tired textbooks for Kesey and Camus, and provoking his class with questions about authority, conformity, civil rights, and the Vietnam War. He rearranged seats and joined in a ferocious snowball fight with Edmundson and his football crew. Lears’s impassioned attempts to get these kids to think for themselves provided Mark Edmundson with exactly the push he needed to break away from the lockstep life of Medford High. Written with verve and candor, Teacher is Edmundson’s heartfelt tribute to the man who changed the course of his life.
288 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2002
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 30 reviews
September 9, 2020
I thought this book would be inspirational and kind of a tear-jerker but it really wasn't. It ends up being mostly about the author and growing up in the 60's. I'm glad the teacher in the book was an inspiration to him but it left me wondering why the teacher was inspirational. There didnt seem to be anything unusual about him.
November 26, 2021
'... The great teacher is not always just a bringer of sweetness and light. Socrates often did not like what he saw when he looked into the lives of his students. In fact he was demoralised by it. He fought against their worst side, kindly, with their souls' interest at heart, all the while admitting that he too was fallible. Lears, like Socrates, can remind us that a great teacher is not necessarily a friend, much less a "facilitator". He can be a spiritual antagonist and goad as much as an ally. (...)
So I have written this book to make Lears and his kind a little more visible when they do manifest themselves in the world. And I have written it, too, to give teachers who see their job as a combination of care and provocation a measure of encouragement at a time when many forces are trying to make them members of the service economy - people who provide skills, marketable knowledge, negotiable habits, but not inspiration, not the wherewhithal to change a life around'.
At first, the book irritated me because the author relies heavily on American Football as a vehicle to paint the background of his education. I have no interest in and certainly no knowledge of the sport so that made it heavy going. It doesn't help either that Edmundson sidetracks from the main storyline regularly, using a lot of words to describe circumstances and people to minute detail. However, the main storyline of how he changed from an uninterested, beer-drinking boor to a literature-loving youth, because of the influence of one inspiring teacher makes it all worthwile. It's exactly as Edmunson says in his introduction; we need teachers who go beyond the teaching of skills and marketable knowledge. We need teachers to light the fire in their pupils and students.
January 15, 2018
As a teacher, I came to this book looking for tips, looking for insight into how to be "the one that made a difference." Edmundson says that there are two kinds of great teachers: ironists, like Socrates, who ask rather than lecture, who admit that they do not know, rather than insist that they do. Their agenda is not to convince the student of a particular view, but to convince the student to live thoughtfully, mindfully, and honestly by his own lights; and truth-tellers, like Freud and Jesus, who have a truth to impart to the world and attract disciples who become convinced of this truth.
If, in writing this memoir, Edmundson is a kind of master teacher - teaching teachers how to teach - he's not half bad in blending these two roles. And, as any reader of this book will see, that's quite a compliment.
I expected to see more of Frank Lears - the philosophy teacher who turned Edmundson's life around - and less of football, high school social dynamics, and Johnny Carson, but those things are an essential part of who Edmundson was-is. And as a tribute to Lears, a teacher who seemed to want nothing other than to see people think and become reflective about their own lives and worlds, this kind of thoughtful engagement with life is a fitting homage. It shows not only the teacher, but the teacher's fruit, the harvest twenty years later.
Teacher had the beneficent effect of inspiring me in the short-term - "how can I change my 101 class to get students to take these ideas seriously?" - and sustain me for the long run. I have to remind myself that teachers are a little like Wendell Berry's Mad Farmer: they "invest in the millenium: plant sequoias"
If, in writing this memoir, Edmundson is a kind of master teacher - teaching teachers how to teach - he's not half bad in blending these two roles. And, as any reader of this book will see, that's quite a compliment.
I expected to see more of Frank Lears - the philosophy teacher who turned Edmundson's life around - and less of football, high school social dynamics, and Johnny Carson, but those things are an essential part of who Edmundson was-is. And as a tribute to Lears, a teacher who seemed to want nothing other than to see people think and become reflective about their own lives and worlds, this kind of thoughtful engagement with life is a fitting homage. It shows not only the teacher, but the teacher's fruit, the harvest twenty years later.
Teacher had the beneficent effect of inspiring me in the short-term - "how can I change my 101 class to get students to take these ideas seriously?" - and sustain me for the long run. I have to remind myself that teachers are a little like Wendell Berry's Mad Farmer: they "invest in the millenium: plant sequoias"
April 8, 2016
I have heard Professor Edmundson speak several times with pleasure and read another of his books "Why Read?". As a retired teacher myself, I'm always drawn to books about teaching, teachers and learning. This one surprised me. The title seems quite clear but the book is more an account of a less than inspiring working class high school, a working class family and a senior with little love for learning and few dreams for his future living in the late 60s in the U.S. where accepted values were being challenged.
I stayed with Professor Edmundson and was drawn into this account of his intellectual coming of age -- so radically that he was catapulted into a new life, away from his family, his school friends and all he had previously known, thanks to a young, inexperienced and iconoclastic teacher. I would have liked to know more about Lears but it is quite probable that Edmundson himself didn't know much about him -- except the effect of the books Lears introduced him to and the confidence Lears gave his young student in his ability to comprehend and learn from them - and in their value to help a young man change his life.
You don't expect an established Professor of English in a major university to have come from such a background. You don't expect such a life-changing teacher to leave after just one year and change his life and career path so completely. So, though it wasn't the book I was expecting to read, it was a very good book and it enriched me.
I stayed with Professor Edmundson and was drawn into this account of his intellectual coming of age -- so radically that he was catapulted into a new life, away from his family, his school friends and all he had previously known, thanks to a young, inexperienced and iconoclastic teacher. I would have liked to know more about Lears but it is quite probable that Edmundson himself didn't know much about him -- except the effect of the books Lears introduced him to and the confidence Lears gave his young student in his ability to comprehend and learn from them - and in their value to help a young man change his life.
You don't expect an established Professor of English in a major university to have come from such a background. You don't expect such a life-changing teacher to leave after just one year and change his life and career path so completely. So, though it wasn't the book I was expecting to read, it was a very good book and it enriched me.
August 11, 2008
I really enjoyed this book. At first I was a bit disappointed that there wasn't more about the teacher that Edmundson sets out to honor, and it took me a while to get into the book. But in the end, I really got absorbed. I like books that are set in the 60's, and I like to read different points of view about the war and the protesters and the hippies. This was a pretty good memoir of that time (as judged by me, who wasn't even born then) - what it was like to be a normal, slightly confused, mostly disinterested high-schooler during a really tumultuous time. I also loved the author's description of his relationship with his father, especially their time watching Johnny Carson together. His father was a smart, tough, not entirely easy man, and his discreet shows of affection for his son were really moving. I loved the part of the book where Edmundson discovers the love of reading - there's a really great scene where he and his friends go out for an evening of drinking, and he is so absorbed in The Autobiography of Malcolm X that he brings the book with him. His friends eventually drop him off at his house because he's so involved in the book that he's not paying any attention to them. And then he goes inside and keeps reading! I admire the courage of a high school jock who is willing to be seen as a newly-minted bookworm.
November 22, 2016
I want to share this book with my brother, my dad, high school teachers, and my Medford neighbors (especially the Medford Public Library folks).
Edmundson's writing conjures an unflinchingly honest portrait of his school--the teachers and students, his family, and the Cambridge-Boston-Medford American community during the late 1960s. I suspect that his personal narrative draws criticism from readers who expected a more didactic, prescriptive treatment of Lears and his teaching style. But I rather enjoyed, relished the opportunity to get a window into the facts of Edmundson's time in Lears' classroom. . . what I gathered is that Lears put good quotes/books in front of the students, provoked them, listened to them, but most striking to me, Edmundson seemed to be struck/touched by the man's character (not necessarily his convictions).
There is much more that I could say in recommending this book to others, but I fear it will spoil the joy of discovery. . .
So I will end by adding that Edmundson is a worthy guide to philosophers and historical figures: Socrates, Plato, Malcolm X, his dear teacher Franklin Lears. And the book is not merely a philosophical trope--there is much that is personal and he speaks of his grandmother (who prophesied that he would live to see the Red Sox triumph), dad, and his thoughts on faith and God.
Very much to appreciate.
Edmundson's writing conjures an unflinchingly honest portrait of his school--the teachers and students, his family, and the Cambridge-Boston-Medford American community during the late 1960s. I suspect that his personal narrative draws criticism from readers who expected a more didactic, prescriptive treatment of Lears and his teaching style. But I rather enjoyed, relished the opportunity to get a window into the facts of Edmundson's time in Lears' classroom. . . what I gathered is that Lears put good quotes/books in front of the students, provoked them, listened to them, but most striking to me, Edmundson seemed to be struck/touched by the man's character (not necessarily his convictions).
There is much more that I could say in recommending this book to others, but I fear it will spoil the joy of discovery. . .
So I will end by adding that Edmundson is a worthy guide to philosophers and historical figures: Socrates, Plato, Malcolm X, his dear teacher Franklin Lears. And the book is not merely a philosophical trope--there is much that is personal and he speaks of his grandmother (who prophesied that he would live to see the Red Sox triumph), dad, and his thoughts on faith and God.
Very much to appreciate.
November 8, 2013
I enjoyed this book very much, but didn't feel that I learned much from it - maybe because I already knew from my own experience that students often learn more when they are not nailed to their seats.
June 5, 2022
I was hoping that this books would turn out like 'Tuesdays with morrie', but I was sorely mistaken. Sure, this book is about the teacher, as the title suggests, but it is more about author's childhood. Teacher isn't the main character in the book. He is a hook used for telling other stories, that we wouldn't have bothered to listen otherwise. It's not a bad book, but after finishing it, one leaves with a feeling of being cheated out, of being promised something and delivering an entirely different.
August 5, 2020
It's not really innovative but there are some truly great moments in which education, culture and knowledge become the leading characters
May 24, 2025
I've been reading this for a while, and finally put it away. Not that it was boring- I was reading it during some down time at school. But I finished the second half of the book in a single day on the bus and train.
Edmundson writes like someone who is proud that he knows how to write. There is something of the overachieving AP student to him. Why use a short phrase, when a longer one will do? Why use a small word, when a thesaurus is on the desk?
But even then, it feels like he is letting us in on some kind of joke. It is a memoir about a meathead expanding his horizons. So shouldn't Edmundson, who attended Yale and teaches (taught? the book was published in 2002) at UVA, indulge in some flowery language?
Franklin Lears arrives at Medford High during the Nixon administration. Medford is a working class town, north of Boston, with all the stereotypes that might abound- boys who plan to work in the same factories as their fathers; a strong immigrant population; a small, but cohesive Black community. And Mark is a linebacker on the football team, which he sees as his sole identity.
Lears is hired to teach philosophy to juniors and seniors. If it wasn't for Edmundson's self-awareness, this would be a pretty standard "teacher saves students" story. But he mixes it on with healthy doses of biography, not just his, but classmates, and locals.
There are drunks, hustlers and perverts in Medford, and they exert a certain pull on Mark, and his classmates, just like Lears does. From the subtitle, you can probably guess where this goes. But it is certainly worth the read.
Edmundson writes like someone who is proud that he knows how to write. There is something of the overachieving AP student to him. Why use a short phrase, when a longer one will do? Why use a small word, when a thesaurus is on the desk?
But even then, it feels like he is letting us in on some kind of joke. It is a memoir about a meathead expanding his horizons. So shouldn't Edmundson, who attended Yale and teaches (taught? the book was published in 2002) at UVA, indulge in some flowery language?
Franklin Lears arrives at Medford High during the Nixon administration. Medford is a working class town, north of Boston, with all the stereotypes that might abound- boys who plan to work in the same factories as their fathers; a strong immigrant population; a small, but cohesive Black community. And Mark is a linebacker on the football team, which he sees as his sole identity.
Lears is hired to teach philosophy to juniors and seniors. If it wasn't for Edmundson's self-awareness, this would be a pretty standard "teacher saves students" story. But he mixes it on with healthy doses of biography, not just his, but classmates, and locals.
There are drunks, hustlers and perverts in Medford, and they exert a certain pull on Mark, and his classmates, just like Lears does. From the subtitle, you can probably guess where this goes. But it is certainly worth the read.
February 21, 2013
Recommended to me by the headmaster of the new school where I will be teaching starting in August. There are some interesting connections here-- the author grew up in Malden and Medford, just one town over from where I live and have lived for the past 9+ years; he also went to Bennington. Me too.
The book is a memoir about the author's experience of a philosophy class taught by an inspiring, but mostly very alien and nonconformist teacher in his senior year at Medford High School.
I have to say, I found the prose style of Edmundson kind of inflated. At times there is too much description- every person's facial structure, typical clothing, and parentage is relayed, and even though some of it is genuinely entertaining, it's done too much to really focus well on. There is a lot about football that I found confusing and totally non-interesting. The main story is engaging, but slow to get going, and I suspect it is quite simplified. As a teacher, I wanted to hear more about the teaching. However, the point of this book is to recognize the power of Edmundson's experience, and therefore it's told through his eyes.
The message is that teachers can actually open up the world and new ways of thinking to their students, and don't have to stand on desks or invite students to their houses to do this. Providing provocative resources, encouraging conversation, and modeling openness, skepticism, and critical thinking can revolutionize an adolescent's thinking.
I appreciate that.
The book is a memoir about the author's experience of a philosophy class taught by an inspiring, but mostly very alien and nonconformist teacher in his senior year at Medford High School.
I have to say, I found the prose style of Edmundson kind of inflated. At times there is too much description- every person's facial structure, typical clothing, and parentage is relayed, and even though some of it is genuinely entertaining, it's done too much to really focus well on. There is a lot about football that I found confusing and totally non-interesting. The main story is engaging, but slow to get going, and I suspect it is quite simplified. As a teacher, I wanted to hear more about the teaching. However, the point of this book is to recognize the power of Edmundson's experience, and therefore it's told through his eyes.
The message is that teachers can actually open up the world and new ways of thinking to their students, and don't have to stand on desks or invite students to their houses to do this. Providing provocative resources, encouraging conversation, and modeling openness, skepticism, and critical thinking can revolutionize an adolescent's thinking.
I appreciate that.
July 25, 2010
This book was great inspiration for anyone who wants to become a teacher (espeically if you're male) because for once, the book connected to the reader. Granted it takes place during the late 1960s and early 1970s so we cannot relate to the problems in society but the reader can connect with the author in the experiences that he has. Also, Franklin Lears (the teacher) is one of the most influential people and one of the best literary characters. He makes the kids think for themselves by using off the wall, not by-the-book teaching techniques; a technique that I myself admired greatly. This book is great because it not only inspires the reader but it paints an accurate picture of how one ordinary man changed the lives of fifteen people that we see walk the halls of our high school everyday.
September 16, 2013
Up front: I highly disliked this book.
To be fair in general I don't enjoy memoirs, but this one seemed particularly tedious.
I found the story rambling weighed down by tedious details and superfluous metaphors. While many of them were interesting, when there are a dozen within a page it becomes harder to appreciate them.
As someone training to be a teacher, I did not find this inspiring or educational but terribly depressing. As a student, I found this to be a poor example of high school even though Edmundson seems to think his experience is typical.
To be fair in general I don't enjoy memoirs, but this one seemed particularly tedious.
I found the story rambling weighed down by tedious details and superfluous metaphors. While many of them were interesting, when there are a dozen within a page it becomes harder to appreciate them.
As someone training to be a teacher, I did not find this inspiring or educational but terribly depressing. As a student, I found this to be a poor example of high school even though Edmundson seems to think his experience is typical.
September 11, 2019
I didn't like it as much as I'd expected to. I was kind of left flat.
I wish there had been much more about the teacher, Mr. Lears, because that's what the book was about. While I did enjoy, to an extent, the other characters, I thought there wasn't enough of why Mr. Lears was a great teacher......just a few incidents.
I also thought it got a tad too descriptive and language-heavy at times. But hey....the guy's a college professor, and most of my college professors got pretty wordy from time to time.
Overall, not a bad book. Just not what I'd hoped.
I wish there had been much more about the teacher, Mr. Lears, because that's what the book was about. While I did enjoy, to an extent, the other characters, I thought there wasn't enough of why Mr. Lears was a great teacher......just a few incidents.
I also thought it got a tad too descriptive and language-heavy at times. But hey....the guy's a college professor, and most of my college professors got pretty wordy from time to time.
Overall, not a bad book. Just not what I'd hoped.
May 27, 2015
I enjoyed another book by Edmundson called Why Read, which gives an indepth perspective on what he believes about teaching, reading, and our culture: we need to live out the truth of literature. Teacher was very different because it is written as a memoir rather than as an academic essay. I found it difficult at times to maintain my commitment to it; it is slow and Edmundson does not discuss Frank Lears as much as I thought he would. Edmundson is more interested in portraying the change which he underwent, which is a great idea in theory.
May 2, 2009
I went into reading this book as others did, as evidenced by the message board, I wanted to find some tips about teaching. Although I did learn a lot and loved to learn about Mr. Lears I thought that the book was kind of misleading. Hidden, and not very well at that, is the author's desire to write a memoir about himself in that year entirely separate from the classroom. Unfortunately, this mix didn't benefit the book- but the rest, the in between was great.
February 21, 2009
The author grew up in the 1960s in working class Medford, Massachusetts, and this memoir is about the high school philosophy teacher that inspired him and changed his life forever. I liked the overall message, but the writing is not very good. The author rambles A LOT, and the book moves very slowly as a result. I had trouble getting through it.
March 25, 2010
I have to concur with most people's assessment of this book: I get the need to describe things in vivid detail, but this is too much to slog through. For being titled "Teacher" there wasn't enough about the actual teacher for me. As the story took place in "Meff'ahd" MA, I had moments of recognition and "hey, I know that place!" But without that, this book is a total pass.
February 8, 2008
Good book. It's a memior about the author (now professor) as a high school senior who was going nowhere before his philosophy teacher came to teach. About both of them. Very real picture of teenage boys in the 1960s - pretty funny actually. Very inspiring story about what a teacher can do.
September 4, 2011
I just could not finish this book. I would not recommend it. He writes like he wants to prove to everyone he is an English teacher, words that are rarely heard are used frequently in the book. Just not my style.
November 14, 2012
Mark taught at my boarding school. He seemed quite intellectual at the time. He had an alternative bent as we all did. This being the case, it was surprising to hear about the background he came from, that of the dreaded jock culture. An interesting story and well told.
October 26, 2008
A memoir by a guy who is an English professor--and a tribute to the high school teacher who influenced his life.
Read
January 15, 2010education
March 14, 2010
I liked this book as far as it had to do with the teacher and the classroom and even how the author was influenced, but it seemed more like a memoir of the author's high school years.
July 19, 2010
Teacher's guidance to help students learn how to separate themselves from 'groupthink' and choose to chart their own paths and adventures in life.
February 4, 2012
A must-read for people in education
January 8, 2013
Dece. Part academic essay, part memoir. Parts didn't always mesh for me, but Edmundson's vision for a successful, power-subverting, teacher saw me through.
March 17, 2016
Okay, I get it, you liked football.
June 16, 2007
I enjoyed reading this but it took me forever to slog through.
March 31, 2017
Initially, I planned to give this book 2 stars, based on an excess of football and shallow high school jock banter and abuse. In the end there was merit, and yes, beauty, in the tribute to an iconoclastic young teacher. Mark Edmundson's scholarship comes through in the prose, and the book is well-written. (I didn't object to the vocabulary as some other reviewers did, feeeling instead an opportunity for personal growth in being exposed to unfamiliar words) It was an odd feeling for me to feel kinship with this alien author, at least in is pre-Lears high school persona, but the following passage on reading is true for me, too. "But I'm convinced-and experience has borne me out-that if the reading of secular books is going to matter, we need to look at them as Lears did: not just as occasions for interpretive ingenuity, for showing how smart we might be, but as guides to future life, as occasions, sometimes, for human transformation." I look to books for comfort, escape (especially in winter in a snowstorm) and truth. And I am transformed, not as much as I'd like, but enough to sustain me. The other passage, also about books, is also true for me. "Those aghast at having only one life on earth are drawn inexorably to books, and in them find the deep and true illusion of living not just their own too short life but of inhabiting many existences, many modes of being, and so of cheating fate a little." I can't help but think of actuarial tables and project at my current reading rate, how many more books I have to read in my lifetime. Pathetic, right? I pondered the title, "the one who made the difference." and thought about my own transformative teachers. There was my third grade teacher who taught me through her cruelty, how not to be. She set me on a lifelong path of trying to be kind. Then there was my geometry teacher, who counseled my mother to let me continue with drama, that I needed to continue to do what I loved and was good at, instead of going for after school geometry help. Love that man! And the biology teacher, who was character. Can't remember any profound lessons learned, but I loved going to class. But the teacher responsible for awakening in me the knowledge that I was a unique organism with thoughts of my own, was my humanities teacher, Mrs. Miller. I have thought of her repeatedly through the years. In 1964, she was a model of how to be a strong, intelligent, but still feminine woman. She led me to think about literature and art deeply, and to cultivate prose that communicated precisely what I wanted to say. Every word counts. I never thnked her. I never told her how important her class was to me. Finally, the inscription, hand-written on the flyleaf of the paperback I had, was to my husband from the family of one of his students: "For Jim Dooner, who makes a difference every day." I couldn't hate a book that started that way!
Displaying 1 - 30 of 30 reviews