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Heightening Teachers' Awareness about their Profession acknowledged that all good teachers have dwelt mostly on the psycho-social aspects of teaching than on the material returns on it. Good teaching is basically a function of a peculiar temperament: a temperament that considers service to human beings above other things, a temperament that enjoys the pleasures of intellect for more than those of the body; and above all a temperament that looks upon learning as an infinite process, most expansive and deeper than the unfathomable oceans. Good teachers do not expect to be paid adequately for their labour, not because they abhor to be paid but because they know that the type of service rendered by them can never be paid for adequately. They are selfless persons who give out of themselves far more than they ever expect to get back. It is because some people know that some one should take up this job in which joy comes more in giving than in receiving that they become teachers. The peculiarities and idiosycracies of human nature are strange indeed. Just as many would go to any (yes, any) length to enjoy more to earn more, to get richer, quite a few would go the other way, to any length, to serve their fellow-beings and to share with them. At one extreme, we have Andrei Chikatilo, Billa and Natwarlal and the other, we have a few like St. Francis of Assisi and Mother Teresa. Exceptional teachers may come from the upper extreme but most teachers come from the upper-half of the continuum. We know that people do not and would not pay as much and as readily for developing their potentialities as they would for deliverance from physical dangers or maladies. Highet rightly believes that teachers' contribution lies in this area, the area of developing potentialities :
"It is our task to show them (i.e., the people) what they scarcely realize; their enormous potentialities, intellectual, aesthetic, spiritual and those of their children. That is our task. To accomplish it even in part will be our best reward” (Highet, 1976, 56)-italics mine.
Christensen (1984, XIV) too exalts over the joy of our profession when he say's,
“Welcome to a joyous profesion. Teaching is the greatest of all vocations, for it keeps one well-anchored to the world of youth, growth, ideas, search and learning.... The opportunity to open minds, to develop lines of reasoning, to debate points of view provides one with the opportunity to be an everyday alchemist”.
When we remember that these words were written by Highet as well as Christensen not at the beginning but at the fag end of their careers, we can easily appreciate that both these great teachers were conscious of and had experienced the hazards as well as rewards of the profession. -
It would be wrong for any one of us, as novices often do, it arrive at the conclusion that teaching is all fun sans drudgery. The other extreme that it is sheer drudgery and no fun would be equally wrong. To highlight just one hazard of
January-March 1993
Jain Education International
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
| SR No. | 524573 |
| Book Title | Tulsi Prajna 1993 01 |
| Original Sutra Author | N/A |
| Author | Parmeshwar Solanki |
| Publisher | Jain Vishva Bharati |
| Publication Year | 1993 |
| Total Pages | 156 |
| Language | Hindi |
| Classification | Magazine, India_Tulsi Prajna, & India |
| File Size | 9 MB |