Three decades ago, driven more by the compulsion to earn a living than the urge to pursue a ‘noble' profession, I started what turned out to be a career by default in teaching. But when I started facing 50-odd pairs of eyes that noticed every twitch of the mouth, I knew I had to present my squeakiest best or be judged. Thus pretty much consistently and confidently I discharged my duties ….walked into a hundred heads… left a bit of myself and walked out to the next session…no problem. With two more years of career remaining, I am suddenly afraid of making it to the finishing line unscathed.
R. Uma Maheswari of a Chennai school fell to the slash of the knife for having failed in her duty as a teacher by not being perceptive enough to know where exactly her student would snap. So the question is — who is the accused and who the victim? One may argue she should not have written adverse comments in her student's diary seven times, but what difference does that make? Once or many times — the teacher has to get the student to turn around and do his work any whichway.
In the present situation when a blanket instruction is in operation that no teacher should give the guardian of her student any reason to drag her to court, I cannot help wondering whether the whole exercise of trying to impart knowledge is worthwhile at all. As a member of a delegation representing the Forum for Teaching and Non-Teaching Staff of Private Schools, West Bengal, I went to meet Union Minister for Human Resource Development Kapil Sibal in April 2011. I told him that teachers in such a big high school as the one where I teach — 55 students per section and 12 sections in a class — needed some specific and alternative guideline on disciplining our students. His reply was a touching and simple one — we should deal with them with love and generosity! As things have turned out, such emotions are the last ones on a teacher's mind at present. Like soldiers at the front, she considers herself lucky if she survives another day to see the sun rise.
The teaching community on whose shoulder lies the task of building future citizens of the country is confused. Not one of them condones corporal punishment. Why should they? After all, they too are parents and not aliens from the Mars out to destroy a generation of earthlings. At the same time, their resentment at being clubbed together and put in one basket with the rotten apples, I feel, is justified. Sadly, now, they have to be part of an institution where habitually coming late, academic non-performance, cheating, vandalising school property and violence against fellow students (and lately teachers) are the order of the day due to the reluctance of the school authorities to take any disciplinary action for fear of incurring the wrath of society.
There was a time when I used to say I teach in a school — now I say I work in one. For, these days teachers spend most of their time in the class screaming for silence rather than discussing a subject. That needs physical labour — stretching one's vocal machinery to the utmost! When a teacher is given the task of getting her students to learn a subject, it is expected that she holds the authority to make an assessment of how much has been received by the student and impose a pressure of sorts to ensure maximum intake. Now the question is — in whose interest?
It is obviously the student's. But as things stand now, this reason has become pretty blurred. The teacher is instructed not to worry about how much she has been successful in ‘teaching,' as long as there is no complaint against her methods.
That brings up the question again of the futility of the whole exercise. To resort to a cliché, it is like shouting from the rooftop, hoping somebody would hear you.
A cursory survey of the state of discipline in schools in general is certain to paint a gloomy picture. The pressure on the teaching community has reached unprecedented proportions. A collective sense of despair is in the air. Self-discipline, morals, respecting your peer, teachers and elders are issues that need to be constantly addressed in classroom teaching, besides History and English — for that is what total education is all about.
In tandem with parents, teachers have always tried to instil these basic values in their students. To teach anything, values or subjects, some disciplining is required and therein lies the problem. How can a child be taught to practise discipline if disciplining is not practised upon him?
(The writer's email ID is: sumana.dam4@gmail.com)
