Willian Gibson, the American-Canadian writer, father of the cyberpunk (subgenre of science fiction) and the man who coined the term cyberspace in 1982 wrote, “The future is already here - it's just not evenly distributed."

What this implies is that there is always someone out there practicing and living the life we could be preparing for.

Since experience is the best teacher, we could attempt to meet these people who are living now the future we dream of. Hence, this article is first in the series of four articles covering informal conversations held with four distinct teachers from various schools across the kingdom of Bahrain.

The context refers to the initial year in the teaching career. These articles are mainly devoted to serve those who consider joining the educational sector as teachers. The purpose of these articles is to broaden the teachers’ minds regarding most common and immediate challenges in education.

The articles overview key learning points, challenges encountered with students’ behavior management, and challenges amongst co-educators by shedding light on the experiences from the initial period in the profession of four practicing schoolteachers.

Starting with the first article, teachers reported a serious concern when dealing with students’ behaviour. As a result, they experienced burn out and frustration.

For the lessons learned, they claimed that accompanying strict rules with forging positive relationships in their interactions with students is the key for tackling such behaviour.

Educators need to understand the significance of establishing a functional teacher-students relationship. Ensuring such rapport will give pupils the privilege of having a secure positive environment set up primarily to serve the teaching and learning process.

During these conversations with teachers about their first year in the profession, a lack of supportive sentiment has been described regarding their environment.

A common obstacle that teachers addressed was how they faced challenges in dealing with colleagues in the field. Undeniably, for quality learning to take place for students’ benefit, such collaboration needs to be established.

There is no doubt that cooperation between teachers will lead to great contributions to the school improvement and students’ success.

Managing a positive relationship among colleagues also results in the mutual benefits for both parties.

Two of the teachers we talked to, emphasised the significance of self-evaluation in promoting their teaching, which makes the role of reflections vastly relevant for being proficient in this field.

Undoubtedly, “A relevant part of the educational literature portrays reflection as a wholly beneficial practice for practitioners” (Gould & Taylor, 1996; Johns & Freshwater, 1998; Mayes, 2001; Smith, 1992).

Honestly, it is not easy to serve this profession to the fullest, especially when one commences the first year as a novice teacher. Yet, knowing ahead what teaching is about will prepare us to a great extent.