Ideal teacher

ESSAY

AN IDEAL TEACHER

“Who is an ideal teacher?” this monotonous question has aroused in the minds of thousands of minds and has been discussed innumerable times. It has been asked as essays in schools, colleges and is a very familiar topic in any other exams. People, in this topic, can express their thoughts in a million ways. It can be based on their personal experiences with teachers, their fondness for a particular subject that enhances their liking to the teacher or even the attractiveness to the teacher (she looks wow!).
I was having great difficulty in expressing my view about the issue. It was because my opinion kept changing. You like the qualities in a teacher for a while and then you abhor the same qualities in the teacher another time. For example, you like teacher who are lenient but it can be a pain in the backside when no one pays any heed to the teacher and you aren’t able to concentrate and get low results.
But I found this topic a piece of cake when a teacher came to teacher social studies to us in the eight class. Surely, she to had her bad qualities, like being a bit partial at times but there were so many good qualities in her that could overshadow her cons and make her my ideal teacher. Her name is Mrs. Deepa Gurtoo, who is my truly ideal teacher and I have dedicated this essay to her.
A teacher should never demand for respect. Respect should arise for a person. There are a few teachers and sirs (especially) who actually demand for respect. They are rather bullies than inspirers. We want teachers in our school, not corrupt politicians. ‘Respect’ is something that arises slowly between two people. Respect should be mutual. If there is no mutual respect between two people, then there is no respect between them at all. Addictive game players of the Sims 2 would be aware of feelings and emotions in a better way. In the game, there are 2 relationship levels: ‘Daily Relationship’ and ‘Lifetime Relationship’.
Daily relationship increases and reduces depending upon the moods between the two people. If a teacher is in a bad mood, his conversations with the people around him too wouldn’t be a happy one and it would be vice versa if the mood is good. It only affects the respect or the liking for the teacher for the particular while; whereas lifetime relation is the overall relationship with a person, a teacher in this context.
Lifetime relation increases gradually and so does it decrease gradually. It cannot go high nor drop down low all of a sudden. In the same way, respect is just like lifetime relationship. A person demanding for respect can’t get it; in fact, he would lose his self dignity if he does so. My social studies teacher never asks for respect; she gets it from all the students of the class, even the naughty ones. You would even curse a teacher you like, using objectionable language for her but you would think twice before swearing at a teacher whom you have high respect for.
Secondly, a teacher should show his equality with the students, and then only the students would consider him/her higher than himself/herself. A teacher should see the children through his/her eyes like a person and not like a student. Some teachers consider students a secondary level to them and therefore, they tend to consider themselves superior. I hate the idea of ranks as it differentiates two people considering one high and the other low.
A teacher can do practically anything except murdering a student in many of the schools in India. They beat, shout and don’t hesitate in hurting the feelings of students. It isn’t uncommon as they too are humans but you would like if a teacher whom you have respect for shouts at you. It is at that times when you feel that you have actually committed an error. There was one teacher who called one of my friends a ‘coward’ just because he decided to quit from the ‘narration group’ of our annual school concert. It is then you feel that the teacher is taking undue advantage of being a teacher. Being a teacher, you can’t call anyone a ‘coward’ and the other person cannot reply back just because he/she is a student. A more powerful example of teacher taking advantage of their power is when my sports sir, just because he knew me well, wanted me to do more work for him for the concert dance he was assigned for. He even asked some other children to leave their other work and rather work for him. And you expect to respect him? Never!
A teacher can also be classified as an ‘ideal teacher’ based on little, overlooked facts. For example, it is raining. You, without any aid, make your way through the water. A teacher passes by. Not even looking at you but certainly aware of your presence, he/she passes by and leaves you struggling in the rain. Isn’t it his/ her basic courtesy to stop and give you a lift?
You may fail to notice this fact but it is of importance. My social studies teacher always helps students whenever they are in the need for help, whether it is in school or outside school. A teacher whom you know very well shouldn’t become a stranger to you the moment you leave school. My social science teacher always dropped me home whenever it rained. She didn’t even worry about the muck that I was spreading in her car because of my dirty, drenched in a mixture of mud and water into her car. She knew very well that it was her courtesy to help me at that moment and so she did. Other teachers too would offer help but would normally wait for me to ask for help. Notice the difference.
Even the way of teaching is a fundamental quality for judging a teacher. An ideal teacher doesn’t have to silent everyone all the time. An ideal teacher makes the students remain silent. The difference between the two sentences is that in the second sentence, the students themselves maintain silence. The teacher makes them so engrossed in her teaching that she doesn’t have to ask for silence; she gets it. My ideal teacher converted the usually dull subject into such an interesting subject with her new and innovative methods of teaching that students wanted to listen more of her.
The above sentence crops up into a new way of judging a teacher that is, new and innovating means of teaching. Good teaching doesn’t always involve blabbering something rubbish in the class and leaving. Nor does it involve preparing charts for the students all the time. How much can a student understand from a chart? It is just the same information noted down in the book that is displayed in larger fonts. The best method of teaching is explaining something as a story. It should be like reading a Harry Potter book. You can understand the most important things to know by reading it once. In the same way, an ideal teacher summaries the complex language of the textbook and converts it into a simpler language and explains it to us in a way that it enters our brains the first time only. The troubling objective questions can be memorized afterwards but we should be familiar with the basic idea of the chapter for a long time.
If there is confusion between who has committed a particular crime between a teacher and a student, who shall be blamed? Obviously, the student. No one would blame the teacher and put the blame on the child blindly, even though the teacher is at fault. An ideal teacher would never let that happen. If it is his/her mistake, he/she would admit it without worrying that much about the consequences that he/she could ace later. Most of the teachers have the shameless habit to put the blame on the students whenever they have committed a mistake, just because they want to be in the good books of the other teachers or higher authority. If a teacher teaches the children to admit their mistakes, why can’t they infuse the same things in their lives’ too?
Last but not the least, a teacher should understand and appreciate the hard work done by the students. It takes the students a lot of effort to perform certain tasks. If a student has not done any work, then the teacher has the full right to scold the student. But if the student has contributed in an activity, then the teacher shouldn’t overlook his/her hard work. For example, during our concert practice, even after putting tremendous effort, a friend of mine was to be removed from the dance just because he couldn’t dance well. That would’ve been fair if he was removed at the beginning of the dance. But, even after practicing for a fortnight, he was removed in the end, was it fair?
My social science madam opposed and made him dance at the concert, fighting to give him justice. Most of the other teachers wouldn’t have done that, giving an excuse that the child didn’t belong to the class or that that they had no power. But an ideal teacher wouldn’t accept that and would see that the child isn’t deprived of his hard work.
These are the qualities present in an ideal teacher. If you ask me if I can be classified as an ideal teacher for my sister at the age of fifteen, I myself admit no. I have none of the above qualities. I can’t tolerate my sister’s fidgety behavior; I shout at her and call her names nor can I make her engrossed in my teaching. I guess it is incredibly hard to be an ideal teacher, and I salute my social science teacher for explaining the true meaning of an ‘ideal teacher’.