Teachers Should Be Role Models
'A student spends 25,000 hours in the campus. The school/ college must have the best of teachers who have the ability to teach, love teaching and build moral qualities' - A.P.J. ABDUL KALAM
In ancient India teacher was ranked next to God. In the West he is called the "architect of nation", "maker of man", "the maker of history".
Like the gardener, teacher cares for young human beings and looks after their physical, mental, social growth and development. It is said that God has created man after his own image, the teacher fashions the child, after his own image. It goes, "As the teacher, so is the pupil".
According to the Hindu point of views, the child receives a second-birth at the hands of this teacher. First birth, the physical one from his parents. The teacher plays the most prominent role in moulding the habits, tastes and the character of pupils. He turns the child from animality to specialized human form. Books may teach a child, but the teacher educates.
Manu the ancient Indian sage says, "A teacher is the image of Brahma, a father is an image of Prajapati, and a mother is an image of Earth". The famous Indian- prayer runs that "The teacher is Brahma - the creator, he is an Almighty like Vishnu and Mahesh.
Cicero said 2000 years ago : "What greater or better gift can we offer the republic than to teach and instruct our youth ?" His word spoken in Greece about 2000 years ago holds true even today, ‘truly’ the quality of a nation depends upon the quality of its teachers”
Kabir says, "Teachers are literally the arbiters of a nation's destiny"
The Education Commission (1952-53) also points out "every teacher and educationist of experience knows that even the best curriculum and the most perfect syllabus remains dead unless quickened into life by the right methods of teaching and right kind of teachers".
The opening sentence of the Kothari Commission Report speaks very high of teachers, "The destiny of India is now being shaped in her classroom". Whether the teacher is in the best equipped room of a most up-to-date school, whether the teacher is at work with a small group of students or is on a television screen that is seen by many thousands; whether the teacher is a person or a programmed text-book, it is unlikely that the students will get superior education unless the teacher is superior.
To this Mudalier Commission Report states, "We are concerned that the important factor in the contemplated educational reconstruction is the teacher—his personal qualities, his educational qualities, his professional training and the place that he occupies in the school/ college as well as in the community."
Sixteen Qualities Of A Good Teacher
Good teachers are rare. Although some of the qualities of good teachers are subtle, many of them are identifiable. Here is a list of sixteen traits that excellent teachers have in common:
1. Knowledge of the subject matter
You can’t teach what you don’t know. All teachers need not be experts in their fields, but possessing knowledge is important. Teachers must continue building their understandings of their subjects throughout their careers.
2. Patience
No teacher should be expected to have much patience with individuals whose lack of discipline and immaturity interrupts the work of other students. Patience with students who are trying to learn, however, is part and parcel of the teaching profession. Impatience with sincere students is an indication of the teacher’s own shortcomings.
3. Intellectual curiosity
All good teachers are intellectually curious and naturally driven by their interests in keeping abreast changes in their fields.
4. Confidence
Good teachers are confident in their abilities to sense where students are in the learning process and in their students’ abilities to learn material that is presented in a logical and graduated fashion.
5. Compassion
Talented teachers are able to work with students with varying levels of maturity and knowledge. A college professor I know once made the following statement about his experience as a teacher: “Each year teaching is more challenging for me, because I grow a year older and the students stay the same age. The widening age gap forces me to stretch in order to reach them.”
6. Achievement
Experienced teachers have clear thoughts on what their students should know at the end of the term, and they understand what they must do along the way in order to reach those goals.
7. Planning
Teachers must have plans and stick to them. This goes deeper than rigidly following a course syllabus. Effective teachers sense when students need more time to absorb the material and within limitations, are willing to give it to them.
8. Awareness
Teachers must have eyes in the back of their head. They need to be aware of everything that happens in their classrooms and in adjacent hallways. Teachers who are awake are able to stop nonsense before it starts and keep students on track.
9. Mentorship
Teachers often serve as mentors to their students. The desire to influence students positively is a core motivation of many teachers when they enter the teaching profession.
10. Maturity
In no profession is maturity more important than in teaching. Students experience emotional ups and downs, and insightful teachers are able to sense the changes and respond to them appropriately. Teachers must be pillars, consistently encouraging students to grow as human beings and to develop academically.
11. Community involvement
Maintaining good community relations is part of being a teacher, and teachers’ contact with parents, administrators, and community leaders enhances their effectiveness in the classroom.
12. Organization
One-on-one tutoring is easy compared to leading a classroom of students in a single direction. Teachers must be able to manage students’ multiple personalities and organize their subject matters so that a maximum number of students benefits from their presentations.
13. Vision
Teaching encompasses far more than passing information from teachers to students. Teachers should be illuminators who provide their students not only with interesting and useful material, but also with visions of where they might end up if they learn well.
14. Context
Every subject has a context, and teachers are responsible for providing it to their students. Since no one learns in a vacuum, teachers must show their students how the information they are learning might be used or might lead to the development of some other useful skill.
15. Mission
Perhaps the most important thing teachers communicate to students and to the community is a sense of satisfaction with their choice of teaching as their life mission. Teaching at its highest level is a calling, and good teachers feel it to their cores.
16. Enthusiasm
Excellent teachers never lose enthusiasm for their profession. They might become temporarily burdened by administrative hassles or isolated problems but their underlying engagement with their work is unwavering. Students feel this energy, and teachers who project it are much more successful than those who do not.
A sense of humour is also essential. Being able to laugh at your self as well as laugh with the students is an essential part of teaching. Laughter or a joke can break the most reluctant student and bring joy back into the classroom.
We conclude that all the above qualities are held by Honourable Dr. Gulhane and above these qualities :
1. He has the ability to bond with his students, to understand and resonate with their feelings and emotions. To communicate on their level. To be compassionate with them when they are down and to celebrate with them when they are up.
2. He is able to think more on the positive and a little less on the negative. He keeps a smile on his face when things get tough, he sees the bright side of things, he to seeks to find the positives in every negative situation and to be philosophical.
3. He acknowledges that the only real constant in life is change. He knows that there is a place for tradition but there is also a place for new ways, new ideas, new systems, and new approaches. He does not put obstacles in ways of others by being blinkered and is always open and willing to listen to others ideas.
4. He is a window through which many young people will see their future.
In the most informal discussion with him we could gather his following views in general -
1. Teacher is the most vital single factor in the system of Education. It is the teacher, who matters most as far as the quality of education is concerned.
2. Teacher is the back-bone of society. He should stand as an outstanding figure among the illiterate and semi-illiterate families. He should be their friend, philosopher and guide.
3. Teacher is a superior guide. At the back of every great man, is a good teacher whose enthusiasm fostered confidence and guided him to the way of progress. He says students should say that, "I owe my birth to my father, but life to my teacher."
4. Teacher is a nations builder. Teacher shapes the children who are potential leaders of tomorrow.
5. A teacher affects eternity. Gulhane sir says "A parent gives life, but as a parent, he gives no more. A murderer takes life, but his deed stops there. A teacher affects eternity, he can never tell when his influence stops."
6. Teachers should command respect. Pupils have their likes and dislikes. They feel that teachers must be humane, friendly and "One of us." Teachers should be good natured, jolly, with sense of humour and should not demand respect from their students.
7. According to him, the teachers should be obedient to duty, hardworking, intelligent, cooperative and hopeful. They should try for best results and raise the status of their schools/collages.
8. Parents like those teachers who are highly sympathetic and who pay individual attention.
9. The teachers should be resourceful even if they are asked to work in adverse conditions, ill-quipped classrooms even without a black-board.
10. The educationists have given a long list of traits and qualities essential for a good teacher. Teacher is also a man; he is not a superhuman being.
11. Teachers must possess a devotion to profession with a strong sense of vocation; teachers should go for a true devotion to teaching. He must work in a missionary zeal. He must be somewhat prepared to sacrifice his self in the cause of education.
12. ‘Once a teacher, always a teacher’ should be the motto. He must not oscillate and make teaching as a stepping-stone to other vocations. Teachers should consider teaching a calling and not a trade.
