While I was once reading a collection of some quotes related to the field of teaching and learning, I came across this quote which from that time on stamped something special on my mind; it runs thus: "He who dares to teach must never cease to learn," said Richard Henry Dann. Now that I have become a teacher, I am able to decide that this statement is undoubtedly valid. More importantly, not abiding by this quote makes teachers all over the world "die" with time, age and experience.
In fact, there are numerous ways whereby teachers lose their competences and in the end "die". Some of them however might well manage to survive only if they do something about their learning and their knowledge about their speciality. I suppose that rarely do we discuss this part of our teachers' professional development simply because we always think that whoever is a teacher must be doing a good job in their classes. Still, we keep asking ourselves why most teachers do not produce something which will benefit themselves at least and their community at most. This is simply how and why some teachers "die".
As any new teacher has experienced, having been trained and thus appointed to teach most of the time makes us change our retrospective attitude towards learning. The main reason why this occurs is that some teachers think that they have started to assume a new and the only responsibility, that of teaching students. And in fact teaching does not not lie only in coming to class and provide students with lessons, but in a far more important activity, which is learning more and new things. Here, I am talking about learning on the part of the teacher. Some teachers should update themselves on the newest if need be. Or at least they should keep reading extra-curricular books, texts, etc.
As we all know, a bad attitude is the worst disability; if we as teachers still adopt the attitude that teachers do not need to read anything in our specialities or revise lessons that are to be taught, I do believe that with the passing of time most of us will be challenged. That the majority of teachers, especially here in Morocco, do not produce or write articles, essays, etc is living proof that the disability I am talking about is taking place.
Of course, if we look back on this thorny problem more seriously, we will certainly find that countless reasons have been behind this. But the problem of note here is that most teachers do not read, do not produce and do not at least even make efforts to make up for their daily losses. As a role, some teachers have become notorious for sitting at cafes, watching football matches one after another, and keeping an eye on passers-by. It breaks everyone's heart to see some of them doing so; if only they would use those cafes for discussing the calamitous eductional system, or for writing something noteworthy for the community to read as so many writers have done before.
How come we are forever talking about this calamity without even taking into account the competence of our teaching staff? For me, this is exactly how our teachers "die" and I have doubted that some people might find this article a trifle critical or shocking. However, every one of us ought to be realistic about this topic, for this is the only way through which we will still prevent more teachers from "dying".
I still remember my teacher of English during my high school who spoke our mother tongue more than the target language English; I might not be against this traditional technique, but what affected me most was that he often did that so that we would raise our hands more frequently to participate. In fact, participating in the class did not neccessarily mean something related to the lessons; strangely enough, some of us raised their hands to tell a joke in Arabic or Berber; mentioning these incidents clearly indicates that this is a means , among other things, whereby teachers "die".
How could you expect a teacher who is not doing a good job in the class to do a better one at home? It might also be queer to say that the same teacher did not take his bag with him after class. He simply used to leave it under the desk so that he would not bother himself to bring it the following day. It is no wonder that the teaching field is full of queer incidents like these ones. But the message behind them is that some of those who claim to dare to teach have already ceased to learn. Therefore, what are we then waiting for?
Omar BIHMIDINE
In fact, there are numerous ways whereby teachers lose their competences and in the end "die". Some of them however might well manage to survive only if they do something about their learning and their knowledge about their speciality. I suppose that rarely do we discuss this part of our teachers' professional development simply because we always think that whoever is a teacher must be doing a good job in their classes. Still, we keep asking ourselves why most teachers do not produce something which will benefit themselves at least and their community at most. This is simply how and why some teachers "die".
As any new teacher has experienced, having been trained and thus appointed to teach most of the time makes us change our retrospective attitude towards learning. The main reason why this occurs is that some teachers think that they have started to assume a new and the only responsibility, that of teaching students. And in fact teaching does not not lie only in coming to class and provide students with lessons, but in a far more important activity, which is learning more and new things. Here, I am talking about learning on the part of the teacher. Some teachers should update themselves on the newest if need be. Or at least they should keep reading extra-curricular books, texts, etc.
As we all know, a bad attitude is the worst disability; if we as teachers still adopt the attitude that teachers do not need to read anything in our specialities or revise lessons that are to be taught, I do believe that with the passing of time most of us will be challenged. That the majority of teachers, especially here in Morocco, do not produce or write articles, essays, etc is living proof that the disability I am talking about is taking place.
Of course, if we look back on this thorny problem more seriously, we will certainly find that countless reasons have been behind this. But the problem of note here is that most teachers do not read, do not produce and do not at least even make efforts to make up for their daily losses. As a role, some teachers have become notorious for sitting at cafes, watching football matches one after another, and keeping an eye on passers-by. It breaks everyone's heart to see some of them doing so; if only they would use those cafes for discussing the calamitous eductional system, or for writing something noteworthy for the community to read as so many writers have done before.
How come we are forever talking about this calamity without even taking into account the competence of our teaching staff? For me, this is exactly how our teachers "die" and I have doubted that some people might find this article a trifle critical or shocking. However, every one of us ought to be realistic about this topic, for this is the only way through which we will still prevent more teachers from "dying".
I still remember my teacher of English during my high school who spoke our mother tongue more than the target language English; I might not be against this traditional technique, but what affected me most was that he often did that so that we would raise our hands more frequently to participate. In fact, participating in the class did not neccessarily mean something related to the lessons; strangely enough, some of us raised their hands to tell a joke in Arabic or Berber; mentioning these incidents clearly indicates that this is a means , among other things, whereby teachers "die".
How could you expect a teacher who is not doing a good job in the class to do a better one at home? It might also be queer to say that the same teacher did not take his bag with him after class. He simply used to leave it under the desk so that he would not bother himself to bring it the following day. It is no wonder that the teaching field is full of queer incidents like these ones. But the message behind them is that some of those who claim to dare to teach have already ceased to learn. Therefore, what are we then waiting for?
Omar BIHMIDINE
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