If I asked you to name your favorite teachers from kindergarten through graduate school, it would be easy to answer,wouldn't it?I bet you still remember those special teachers with fondness.Think about it for a moment.What did they all have in common?That's easy,right?They all loved what they were doing with an unusual passion that other teachers did not share.
I love my job.Always have.I've been dreaming of being a teacher ever since ...for ever!Other girls played house,I played school,teaching,marking homework,etc.I even used to give names to my imaginary students,just as others girls used to give names to their dolls.
I've been teaching for 20 years,ever since I was still a student.In fact,I've never ever worked as anything else other than a teacher.My first job was teaching English in the private school that I myself was tought English.The owner of the school,a very cool lady-still around in business-who also happened to be my teacher,knew how passionate I was about teaching and trusted me with my first classes in her school.Just imagine a 20 year old teaching 15 year olds!Boy,I still have nightmares from the time back then!That experience taught me a great deal about humility,about the importance of developing class management techniques but also about the fact that the most important part of teaching is passion ,which can compensate for a lot of shortcomings in a teacher.
What I mean with passion is simple really and it holds true for just about any and all professions and jobs:it is also what separates the great teachers from the not-so-great.The word is FUN! Good teachers, along with working very hard, almost always have fun with what they are doing.Research does bear out that enthusiasm is a special quality that all great teachers share.And guess what?The more enthusiastic you are about something,the more likely you are to have fun when doing it!
I know that for some people teaching means a dull,uninteresting way to waste your life in a roomful of unrully kids.And I bet that the majority of those who think so are the teachers themselves,who started out as eager and enthusiastic advocates of teaching only to become disillussioned and embittered pretty soon.
Actually,teaching is so much a reflection of life,that it cannot be seperated from life.Teaching means giving of yourself.But you cannot give what you do not have.Your teaching style,your whole teaching experience,is determined by who you are.You simply cannot teach something you are not.What you are in life is what you are as a teacher as well.Your personality shines through in everything you do as a teacher,from explaining a question to disciplining (or not) to correcting homework to establishing rapport to inspiring students.
Get a notepad and do this quick test:what words spring to mind when you think of your job?Write down as much as you can think of.S top only when you run out of things to say.
Here's my list:
Invigoration,energy,excitement ,zeal,zest,encouragement,giving,fun,learning,ideas,enjoyment,creativity,enthusiasm,passion,creativity,sharing,eagerness,originality.
My job is all those things and much,much more.It is my calling.And I feel blessed for doing what I love in life.But also,at the same time,I am aware that ultimetely nobody can teach anything to anyone,unless they want to and are ready for it.A teacher is nothing more than the instrument that God and the students themselves choose,through which they raise their levels of awareness and learning in life.Teaching is nothing more than channeling what God and the students themselves (or rather their higher selves) know it's time for them to lovingly explore and discover within themselves:
Kahlil Gibran puts it so nicely in ''On teaching'':
''No man can reveal to you aught but that which already lies half asleep in the dawning of your knowledge.
The teacher who walks in the shadow of the temple, among his followers, gives not of his wisdom but rather of his faith and his lovingness.
If he is indeed wise he does not bid you enter the house of his wisdom, but rather leads you to the threshold of your own mind.
The astronomer may speak to you of his understanding of space, but he cannot give you his understanding.
The musician may sing to you of the rhythm which is in all space, but he cannot give you the ear which arrests the rhythm nor the voice that echoes it.
And he who is versed in the science of numbers can tell of the regions of weight and measure, but he cannot conduct you thither.
For the vision of one man lends not its wings to another man.
And even as each one of you stands alone in God's knowledge, so must each one of you be alone in his knowledge of God and in his understanding of the earth.'
Eirini
pictures from here
Δεν υπάρχουν σχόλια:
Δημοσίευση σχολίου