Being
a good teacher is as tough as walking on a razor’s edge
Being a teacher
is the easiest of things we can do as many would think. They say teaching is
the first thing to opt for when one is still not decided about his / her career
path. There is an easy access to teaching and one needs to have just a
willingness to do it. Want it, and it is available in schools that you find in
every other street in your own community. This is partly true, especially for
those who teach just for the shake of teaching or make it a stepping stone to make
a bigger leap into the career of their choice. It is, however, not as easy as
it sounds if you want to adopt it as the profession of your life.
Being a good
teacher is increasingly becoming tough. It is even tougher when it comes to
teaching the modern day teenagers. There are new confrontations in classrooms every
day and most of these confrontations concern not projects and assignments but
behavioral anomalies. Most of the modern day students are adamant and
aggressive. Ranging from upper primary to undergraduate level, students are
intolerant of teacher’s authority. They don’t entertain it when their teacher
tells them what to do, and what not? They take it as interference in their
freedom to learn. They prefer to be left free to do whatever they choose to
even during the lectures. Some don’t even value the presence of teachers in their
class and continue to display their disrespectful attitude towards the
teachers. They don’t show any respect that their teachers
ethically deserve. Instead, they misbehave with them.
They view teachers merely as people who have been hired to assist them, and who
live on the money paid by them. Anything, as simple as inquiring about
assignments or
chiding for disturbing the class, can trigger a verbal exchange between the
teacher and the student. Consequently, the teacher has to suffer insult and
humiliation
Impatience and
disobedience are the most visible behavioral deviations in modern day students.
They have lost the patience of listening to their teachers. Time and again,
they get diverted and you should keep reminding them. Even a forty or forty-five-minute lecture is
too long for them to sit through. They begin to show the signs of disinterest
shortly after the teacher has started the delivery and it is clearly visible in
their body language. Their facial expressions and emotive reactions clearly
reveal that they are not enjoying what you are delivering to them. One of the
most common and immediate reactions to this is they start dozing off right
through the lecture. Some others react by creating distractions such as using
their cell phones under their desks, whispering to each other and passing
cheats to communicate with one another.
Today’s
students want shortcuts. They have no patience in listening to hour long
lectures to derive a short conclusion at the end. They don’t want to read the
voluminous textbooks to find answers to a couple of questions they are confused
about. They want readymade solutions to everything without having to work hard.
Unlike students in the past who went to schools and colleges to gain knowledge,
students in modern days go there to pass their tests. Even students pursuing
their graduation courses want exam capsules. They are worried more about their
grades than the amount of knowledge and skills their courses are likely to
offer them. Self-studies and research oriented readings are rare even among
university students.
Amidst these
odds and difficulties, being an effective teacher is challenging. As the saying
goes “An mediocre teacher tells, a good teacher displays and a successful
teacher motivates”, it’s even tougher to become a motivator. With the advent of
new pedagogical dimensions, teaching has now gained a new definition. If a
teacher fails to keep pace with these changing contexts, he/she is likely to
fail. Unlike in the past, only being academically sound does not attribute to
being a good and successful teacher today. Teaching has gone beyond the text
books in terms of both form and content. Syllabus and the text books are now
only the means but not the ends. So, only teachers who can transcend this traditional
boundary and teach their students the values of life are likely to get better
appreciation, and this is easier said than done.
Modern day
classrooms are not merely the groups of passive listeners. They are neither the
groups of inquisitive knowledge mongers and creative enthusiasts. They appear
to be more like a group of troublemakers who care more about their rights than
their duties. Having to cope up with such aggressive and irresponsible mass of
youths, teaching has been as tough as walking on a razor’s edge. A modern day
teacher, therefore, has to play a number of roles at the same time. He/she is a
teacher, friend, psychiatrist, counselor, actor, joker and most importantly a
good human being, the last of which is sometimes the most difficult of all.
Durga Gautam
Buddhanagar, Kathmandu
