The Teachers ABC - Being Ordinary Thoughts of an Ordinary Teacher in an Ordinary Schoolroom #266831

"To be condescending - easy to be spoken to," is not, unfortunately, the hallmark of any profession. But the teacher, if anybody, ought to be" get-at-able.<br><br>With the wide curriculum and the "gang" of children, we must work on clearly defined systems, and it appears as if the old hide-bound "system" were going to give place to numerous equally tying systems, while the teacher becomes a species of "educational engineer" or machinist.<br><br>But what of the child? The struggle for smaller classes must lead to success, and the teacher whose life has been devoted to superintending "gangs" will be confronted by the question of much more plainly marked individual teaching. This is as far removed as possible from "mob-teaching," and new problems will present themselves to him.<br><br>He will have to learn, above all things, the meaning of affability, "to be easy to be spoken to."<br><br>These smaller classes will admit of that freer intercourse which the Board of Education desires. The pupil will have opportunities, which he cannot have at present, of communication with the teacher. Indeed, the teacher and the pupil will be on a far different footing. With smaller classes the serious and enormous difficult of maintaining discipline will be far less acute, and real teaching will take the place of lecturing a carefully-disciplined class.<br><br>But in what way is affability connected with this? The personality of the teacher always is, always has been, and always will be the great factor in education. Under the present conditions the teacher's personality is a great force, but in one point he has to be most guarded. If he allow himself for one instant to be led away by his class, the power by which he holds them in necessary discipline slips from him. If with a large class he allows much intercommunication, or comes down too far from his pedestal, his power is lost.