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What is a teacher?

Teacher is a person professionally engaged in teaching and educational work.

The teaching profession, as well as the medical profession, is one of the oldest. It has accumulated thousands of years of experience in the continuity of generations. In fact, the teacher is a link between generations, the support of social and historical experience. 

The work of the teacher consists of the awakening and setting in action the mind of the pupil, the arousing of his self-activities. All explanations and expositions are useless except as they serve to excite and direct the pupil in his own thinking. If the pupil himself does not think, there are no results of the teaching; the words of the teacher fall on deaf ears. So, my first advice is: the teacher should excite and direct the self-activities of the pupil, make your pupil a discoverer of truth- make him find out for himself. True teaching is not that which gives knowledge, but that which stimulates pupils to gain it.

In our real life we meet three categories of teachers:

  • Teacher, the explainer,

  • Teacher, the involver,

  • Teacher, the enabler.

Many teachers know their subject matter very well, but have limited knowledge of teaching methodology. “The explainers “ rely mainly on explaining and lecturing. Done with enthusiasm these lessons can be interesting and informative, but not all students are involved. The students work individually as a rule. “The involvers” also know their subject and try to involve the students actively, they try to find interesting activities and techniques to do this. “The teacher- enabler” knows his subject and methodology, but also has an awareness of how individuals and groups are thinking and feeling within her class.

This teacher is confident enough to share control with the learners. Decisions made in her classroom may often be shared or negotiated. In many cases she takes her lead from the students; seeing herself as someone whose job is to create the conditions that enable the students to learn for themselves.

This simple categorization may help you reflect on what kind of teaching you have mostly experienced in your life. I met many young teachers whose initial image of a teacher is based on “the explainer”, but who are keen to move to becoming an “involver”. And there are no many teachers who are keen to move to becoming an “enabler”.