It is World Teachers’ Day. The teacher is celebrated across the world under the theme ‘Teachers: Leading in Crisis, Reimagining the Future,’ a befitting rallying call in a year of unprecedented disruption inflicted by a virus that unhooked more than a billion school children from classrooms.
Teachers have changed the world beyond imagination using simple but indisputable tools like books, the ubiquitous red pen, a piece of chalk, and talk.
It is not hard to appreciate the depth and sophistication of what teachers do round the clock. At the foundational stages, the teacher’s touch is magical, nurturing people who can barely recognise their environments until their cognitive aptitude saves people. Though slighted and blamed at every ugly incident in the past, the society now understands the all-important role the teacher plays in transformation.
The deliberate effort by the teacher revamps a nation’s values, attitude, and overall growth. From the initial ‘tabula rasa’ the usual child is, the teacher is often the unrecognised frontline soldier in fighting ignorance and bettering knowledge.
When a nation is faced with tough choices like the leeching corruption, good people keep reviewing education system and values in search of what is wrong and right. If the young ones are socialised into a dysfunctional value system, the society experiences massive failure.
If professionals misstep, they are judged against the backdrop of education they got and teachers who instructed them. Indeed, when graduates lack creativity and exhibit weak curiosity, it is education that comes under the radar, and for good reasons. Ideally, all these imperatives are hinged on the teacher. Of course, it is possible that other factors could be a positive disaffection. But on the whole, the lion’s share of blame rests with the teacher.
Teachers are critical to the reorientation of attitude. Fostering a creative faculty and the prevention of complacency are, to a great extent, dependent on the teacher and teaching styles. It is the teacher who reorders the patterns of social relations right from the time a child reports to school to the day he vacates and moves to the next class, step, or course.
School teachers are to a great extent influenced by the social system. In other words, the teacher lives the society. Teachers are actively involved in developing a nation since they are the silent architects of development goals, policies, and aspirations. Like they say in the graphics world, the teacher is involved in crucial pencil work, meaning the rough sketches that eventually become a masterpiece.
For a country like Kenya to be self-confident, it has to answer the question: “What are teachers for?” In particular, teachers require more training so that aside from grades and academic performance, the would-be teachers can acquire dependable skills and learn a set of strong values which they use to propel positive change and fall back to during crises.
Problem-solving skills are the rainmaking nuances required as challenges get more complex by the hour due to actions of man or force majeure cases like the ravaging Covid-19 that stopped the global economy.
For students of teachers who excelled in discipline seen in factors like time management, obedience to authority, and endless learning, nothing has been lost. By their words and habits, they became role models whose footprints great people follow in the wild sands of life that keep shifting. Discipline is a tough glue that holds the society and the teacher ranks top among its manufacturers.
Many teachers who are committed to the noble call have been known to leave behind responsible people prepared who make and repair the world from the bottom of their hearts. Oftentimes, they are workers who require minimum supervision, citizens who understand the essence of freedom, and those who appreciate the true meaning of independence, interdependence, human rights, and the general appreciation of the environment.
Just as we always call for patience with the learner, a similar patience is required for the teacher. A willingness to listen to the teacher is important because like every other human being, they make mistakes. It is only wise that they are given time to self-correct and, where necessary, hold to account those who persistently misbehave.
As this year’s theme says, the teacher has the potential to not only reimagine the future, she creates troops who eventually transform.
aplainteam@gmail.com
