(25-28) On Teachers’ Day, we thank our teachers for their hard work. We also celebrate
this day to remember Confucius, the great Chinese teacher from 2,500 years ago.
Well, that’s everything we’re taught about Teachers’ Day. But, the first Teachers’
Day was not on Confucius’s birthday, and it was not about thanking our teachers.
In 1930, Mr. Tai Shuang-qiu and other teachers celebrated the first Teachers’
Day in Nanjing. But there was nothing to celebrate. Teachers were paid very little
and not respected. These teachers took this chance to shout out their problems. They
had Teachers’ Day on June 6 because the date was easy to remember and near the
end of the school year. This action by Mr. Tai and the other teachers was welcomed
and followed by teachers from other cities. In 1939, the government made Teachers’
Day a national holiday. However, it was on August 27, the day when Confucius’s
birthday was celebrated. Not everyone hailed this decision: Teachers’ Day was never
about Confucius, and Confucius couldn’t speak for all the teachers either.
One funny thing was that the government was wrong about the date of
Confucius’s birthday. In 1952, people found out he was in fact born on September
28. That was when we started to celebrate Teachers’ Day on Confucius’s real
birthday.