Best teachers in America

Doc finds four leaders for change at nation's schools

'Most of the people I make movies with are so excited to be making a movie with me," says director Davis Guggenheim, with a laugh. "These teachers cared more about their students. We were not their first priority."

Guggenheim, who won an Oscar for "An Inconvenient Truth" and made waves with "Waiting for Superman," tackles what it's like to be a teacher at a district school in the new TV documentary, "Teach," which airs tonight at 8 p.m. on CBS.

Queen Latifah, whose mother is a former teacher, hosts the special, which also features bites from Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Anna Faris, Jon Cryer, Jerry O'Connell, Paul George, Allison Janney, and Rashida Jones.

Despite having covered the subject of public education before in his work, Guggenheim says "Teach" is not a rehash. Whereas "Waiting for Superman" exposed the system's flaws, "Teach" focuses on teachers finding solutions.

"But at the core, they're about a similar thing which is: why can't we do better for our kids?" says Guggenheim. "What is a teacher? What is a great teacher? We all know that that's important, but it's amazing how few of us know what it actually that means."

Guggenheim started production on the film by following more than 50 teachers. Ultimately, he focused on four and filmed them throughout one school year, clocking in about 100 days of shooting among two schools in Denver, one in Idaho and another in LA.

"I really wanted to find those teachers that were becoming great," says Guggenheim. "It's interesting because some people think they're very deft teachers and some people think they're teachers that aren't quite there yet. I don't think they're the perfect model of teaching. I think they're teachers that are becoming great and becoming the perfect model."

In the film, each of the four teachers — Matt Johnson, Shelby Harris, Joel Laguna and Lindsay Chinn — struggles to overcome common problems in the education system, such as teaching classes of mixed-level students and catching up students who are already testing below grade level.

"The phenomenon is that most people feel like our schools are failing, but they think their schools are fine. So there's a block," says Guggenheim. "Now people realize our schools are in trouble, [but] they feel like it's just too complex, too confusing and they don't know how to solve it. The reason why I made this movie is we can all agree that great teachers are at the heart of great schools.

"On the surface, it seems like a s—-y job," he adds. "But what you get from [the teachers] at the end of the year is an incredible satisfaction when they reach these kids."