When I first went to instructor training, about the first words out of my instructors mouth was that, in order to teach, the teacher must motivate the student. That is to say, before any student will learn he must want to learn. Indeed, the rate at which any student will learn will depend on the motivation of the student.
That, however, is only the beginning. The second thing, at least to some degree, the teacher must take what he knows and place it in the students mind. This, to be sure is an art within itself. There are a myriad of things standing in the way. For the young man, perhaps baseball, football and basketball. A few will be thinking about cars, and of course girls. Young girls, of course, have their own distractions such as that good looking quarterback.
Before lunch, everyone thinks of hunger and what they will eat. When they get back from lunch, it is a matter of keeping them from falling asleep. As it nears the end of the day, there are hundreds of things which distract child and adult alike. They are anticipating their afternoon plans, whatever they might be. This makes Friday afternoon one of the most difficult times to teach.
Teaching and learning is not just passing information from a teacher to a group students, though. It is easy to think of it as such, but it is so much more. Ultimately, it comes to a point where the teacher teaches, not what to know or think, but how to learn and think. In the end, the student will know so much more than the teacher. It is the way knowledge grows in a society. After we finish school, we must know how to teach ourselves. It is the ultimate thing that a teacher can teach. I suppose close to 95% of what I have learned, I learned from doing or reading. I only learned about 5% in school.
It certainly starts with reading and writing. The person unable to read and write is seriously hampered in our current society. It is not enough for the cobbler apprentice to learn the craft of making shoes. Nowadays we make machines that make shoes. Then too, some people must occasionally repair those and other machines.
It means thinking beyond knowing our current world but what it will be decades from now. The current teachers might teach Edgar Allan Poe, but more important, how to write even better than Edgar Allen Poe. It must be new, different and, of course a joy to read.
At one time, society didn’t believe that bridges could be made from steel. One day, someone built a bridge from steel and they’ve been doing it ever since. I would hope the really great teacher would prod people into such things in a wide variety of various fields far beyond the knowledge of the teacher’s knowledge.
However, the basics cannot be overlooked. The things a child learns in the first 6 grades may very well determine the success of the students later. Indeed, the teacher that teaches the more advanced subjects relies very much on how well the teachers teach in the the lower grades.
Then too, just how great a teacher might be somewhat based on what is expected of him. Is he supposed to teach physics or how to fix an air conditioner. Each has his own problems and each has its own methods. Each student is different and presents a different challenge. For instance, try telling a sixth grader learning algebra the importance of being able to represent values with letters. Quite frankly, I am still at a loss of knowing the importance of knowing anything about the fictitious character of Silas Marner. Let’s face it, for some teachers, their task is simply improbable at best for some students.
Perhaps two of the biggest requirements of the really great teacher is really strong determination and very thick skin. I’m sure a love of teaching and the subject they teach is important.
Then, oddly, occasionally, you see a student react to something you teach and you see that little light inside their mind come on. As an instructor, I have seen it happen. It makes the difficulty and frustration worth it.
