Wow. We haven't run in to the sour lemon teachers yet. (ouch! and I'm thankful of that!) Our older teachers who are about to retire are the best. Most of the rough edges have been worn away by the hundreds of previous kids that ranged in gifted to non-gifted, squirmy to non-squirmy. But I agree that personality is really the key.
And two notes to add: Do you know that some astounding percentage of new teachers quit after five years? (something like 20%) I think that if anyone survives those first five years, then they have the fortitude to deal with a room full of active kids. I know I wouldn't last 5 minutes!! Also, I saw a statistic that said if a teacher taught for 30 years, with 25 kids in her class each year, then the probability of her having a kid with an IQ over 145 was really small... maybe one kid in all 30 years. Something to remember.
