Great Teachers
A Great Teacher Must be a Thinker
A great teacher must indeed be a great person in his own right, though he be less well known outside his forte, the school compound. His influence, however, must know no barrier. It must extend and affect those whom he has had no physical encounters with. Those whose minds he has helped to nurture, if indeed he was great, must be able in their adult lives to remember those idiosyncrasies in him that inspired them, and even try to measure up to his standards, that is if they do not already see in themselves a reflection of their former teacher's points of excellence. Those who caught his fire without reserve may even become greater than their great teacher, either in the same profession, or in another field excel and exceed their teacher's effect, thereby extending that great teacher's influence like a small spark causing an enormous fire. They therefore become several times famous than their teacher for their great achievements, achievements which must greatly add to the welfare of the society. The true value of greatness is measured by the extent to which it has contributed to the promotion of human good.
Though the class is the teacher's platform on which he professes knowledge and from which his children feed on a diet that support intellectual enlargement, a teacher's greatness cannot be confined within the four walls of a classroom, or within the precincts of a school. True greatness bursts the seams of physical limitations and extends its great power beyond its possessor's field of expertise. His students, because their minds brushed shoulders with greatness, must, in some way later in their various professions and private lives, reflect that greatness. A doctor will want to be thorough in his treatment of his patients as his teacher was thoroughly knowledgeable in his subject. A lawyer will yearn to pursue justice to the extent that his teacher inspired in him a sense of fairness, respect for justice, and sanctity of human life. They will, like Sir Isaac Newton, say that they stand on the shoulders of a giant, that their great skills in their respective professions did not just happen, but that a great teacher inspired their superior service to humanity.
In short, a great teacher must be no less great than a great writer, politician, scientist, theorist or philosopher. His thoughts, intelligence and creativity, his temperament, spirit and mien, must be of such sublime quality that they easily distinguish themselves from those possessed by lesser souls. Owing to all these qualities, his lessons will be engaging, enlightening, lively, and, most significantly, morally and intellectually uplifting. He will do his job with great flair, thereby answering Martin Luther King Junior's idea that even if the teacher were a street sweeper, He should sweep streets so well that all the host of heaven and earth will pause to say, yes a great street-sweeper did his job well'. Because of his reputation for excellence, something happens to the soul of the student, inspiring the urge for reaching towards grand and noble attainments, of which the teacher is a fine example, making the learner thirst to drink from that famed fountain of knowledge, and long to use that knowledge for the betterment of the human condition.
A good example is the Greek philosopher Socrates, who was Plato's teacher. Plato, the student, had his imagination so stirred and invigorated by his teacher's greatness that it might be safely concluded that if Socrates did not live, or lived but was not that much of a great teacher, we therefore would not have had Plato and his ideas. Yet it is these ideas which have greatly influenced western thought and consequently much of the world, which subscribe to western thinking. The world of ideas today would be a different place if Plato's teacher, Socrates, was not a great teacher. Plato himself went on to become a great teacher, producing yet another moving thinker in the form of Aristotle, his pupil.
It is therefore reasonable to assert that a great teacher is necessarily a philosopher. There is no greatness without the power to conceive powerful ideas, ideas which move others to action and therefore to change the world, or to greater thoughts. For a teacher to be thus great he must love his subject with passion, for, as Winston Churchill said, Before you can inspire with emotion, you must be swamped with it yourself. Before you can move their tears, your own must flow. To convince them, you must yourself believe.' To extrapolate this to teaching, we may say that by this Churchill meant that for a great teacher to instill in his charges a love for the subject which he teaches, he must deeply love that subject himself. If he loves the subject he will desire to be its good ambassador besides contributing to it in his own way, especially intellectually. Hence we have Plato and Socrates whose greatness as teachers stemmed from their being deep thinkers, bringing forth new insights in an attempt to light the path for the whole of mankind.
However, one need not produce ideas in a prolific manner as the two Greek teachers did. One need, though, to be able to explain deep concepts in a manner that is captivating to the attention of his students, lifting their souls with edifying discourse and thereby leading them to the discovery of truth. The students must not only become lovers of truth, but also its willing servants, servants of the unbiased, the unprejudiced, the pure and the unvarnished truth.
Moreover, because his trade, unlike that of, say, a scientist, demands directly addressing the consumers of his intellectual ware by use of the spoken word, he must be eloquent. Words are his tools of trade. Words are to him as the stethoscope is to the doctor. He must know how to wield them to achieve the utmost effect on his audience of pupils. He must not use force, but the force of his words, ideas and passion must rivet the attention of his audience on what is to be learnt. This way he will stir something in the spirit of his students, he will touch that part of their beings which only the power of words can reach and act upon. This will foster in them a love for reflection, for contemplation of ideas.
He must also know how to encourage in them a love for civilized discourse, as this is the most obvious gift that he will bequeath them and which will remain with them long after they will have parted ways with their teacher. He should therefore endeavour to inculcate in them a respect for other people's opinions, an attempt at trying to see the merit in others' arguments. They should give others credit for views that are supportable and be willing to change their opinions in light of new and worthy information. In short, he must lead his students away from thinking that they know everything and that they are always right. This the great teacher teaches by example. While teaching, he must accept to learn from his students, who if they are intelligent, will certainly form their own opinions which if valid, the teacher must acknowledge even if they differ from his own.
By so doing he will be expressing his respect for, and his confidence in, his students' ability to think, and in effect demolishing the misconception that some people, including the students themselves, can have monopoly of knowledge. Students will, as a result, come out of his able hands liberal in their outlook in life and ready to accommodate views that conflict with their own. The great teacher will thus have fought dogmatism and helped the world become a freer and pleasant place to live in.
