Do Teachers Always Give 100%?

Whether or not teachers "give 100%" isn't really what should be being asked. The question should include, "100% of what?". Another important question is, "Do all teachers have 100% to give?"

When what is included in that 100% is vague there are only vague answers:

There are teachers who give 100%, and there are teachers who try to give 120%. Some, of course and for whatever reason, do not or cannot give 100% of what it takes to offer excellence in education. Some teachers don't have 100% to give. Others have, and give, 100% of something that doesn't amount to excellence. There are, of course, those who don't quite have 100% of the teaching ability, motivational skills, and/or solid enough understanding of children's minds; but who try to give 100% or more. These are the teachers who exhaust themselves trying, and they're also the ones who may eventually become too exhausted to give even that 100% of whatever skill it is they do have. Giving 100% or more of the wrong thing doesn't do the job, and there are times when the most well intentioned teachers try very hard to offer 100% or more of the wrong type of teaching or wrong material.

Teachers often blame lack of supplies, books, or equipment for the inability to be able to give 100%. Some blame large classroom sizes. The truth is a truly excellent teacher should have the ability to teach with nothing more than his/her words and maybe a good-sized piece of chalk and a blackboard. In fairness to teachers, however, it is also fact that while many teachers do not or cannot give 100% of what is needed to provide excellence in education, there may be far more parents who give far less than 100% as well.

Somewhere in the world of education there are those few rare, gifted, teachers who can almost effortlessly capture the attention and interest of the students and who can impart knowledge in a way that makes those students look forward to returning to class the next day. These are the teachers who have not just been trained to teach, but who have that seemingly innate ability to understand students (and people in general) and to imagine their potential. These are the teachers don't see their students' difficulties as a sign that there is something wrong within the child. Instead, these are the teachers who ask what is wrong in the child's environment - and they don't overlook the fact that each student's environment includes the classroom environment, which is made up of their teaching style and general atmosphere, as well as just a home environment. This type of gifted teacher generally has an unlimited amount of excellent to offer, so it is not possible for such a rare teacher to give 100% of that excellent, no matter how hard s/he tries. Still, of course, even a small percentage of that unlimited excellence amounts to something very substantial for those students fortunate enough to be in the classroom of such a rare teacher.
Among less elite educators, the reality may be that the newest, least experienced teachers start out giving 100% in terms of effort but become disillusioned and exhausted as part of the learning process. Some quit. Some stay and join the legions of experienced teachers, of which a certain percentage continue to give 100% while a certain percentage do not.

In answer to the question of whether teachers are giving 100% or not, some are and some are not. What needs to be asked, though, is whether teachers are getting 100% when they are being admitted to degree programs and whether they are getting 100% over the course of their training. I think its safe to say that they are not. As a result, there are many teachers who have not been adequately prepared, many who have not been offered the full spectrum of the knowledge they need in order to be whole teachers, and many who should not have been admitted to the teaching-degree program in the first place.

In order to have teachers who don't just give 100%, but who manage to get a good portion of that 100% into the minds of their students, teachers need to be given 100% in terms of excellence in screening, training and preparation. They need parents who give 100% to their own child's education as well.

As it has been over the last few decades, however, many parents who do give 100% will tell you that one can send into the public schools a student who is more than anxious to start school, who may be well ahead of his grade level when it comes to skills and emotional maturity, and who still does not receive excellence in education. In fact, I have seen children who began school with abilities and readiness and who have had their whole futures dampened by the way some schools do some things. I, personally, have not had experience with public school teachers who appeared to not be giving 100%. Instead, I've seen (with myself, my own children, and the children of others) that teachers give 100% of something that isn't all that excellent.