My post on my failed attempt to create a
legacy met with a "sound" response - pun intended and I am sorry for
the same - from one of the people to whom I had emailed the post. He is a dear
friend and so I shall not reveal the identity.
His response essentially raised the following three questions.
His response essentially raised the following three questions.
- In my account in that post was I trying to lay the blame for my failure entirely on the "prospects", P1 and P2? As a corollary was I wallowing in self pity?
- Was I not being facetious in imagining that I could turn someone into an heir to my intellectual legacy, as I termed it, having come so late into their lives?
- What did my relationship with P1 and P2 say about my views on my relationship with my students as their teacher?
These
are valid questions. I shall deal with 1 and 2 briefly and expound a
little more on the third since it is close to my heart.
No. I was not blaming P1 and P2. On the contrary I believe that I am entirely responsible for the way it went with both of them, although it followed different trajectories.
Yes, I was being facetious to expect that I could influence the world view of young adults over a short period of time. Although I did not mention it in my post, it was one of my worries and the eventual reason for giving up on my effort to build that legacy.
Now, on to the third question involving teacher-student relationship.
When I started as a teacher in 2000, my style of engagement with the class was that of a martinet. Needless to state, that did not work well. Apart from a not so pleasant impression on the majority of the class it also made me less effective as a teacher. And above all it resulted in poor teaching ratings although I worked hard to be a good teacher.
Somewhere along the way my friend and colleague Professor Prakhya once explained that the best teachers who always got great feedback succeeded in the classroom because they were full of love for the teacher. Like with many things that he used to say, I did not understand this well either. I dismissed it as one of those many things that he keeps talking about that sound somewhat impractical, if not unrealistic.
Not a long time later I saw this quote attributed to HH Sri Sri Ravishankar-ji in the school that we went to for enrolling our twin boys. It said: Teaching is a vocation of love. Those who are incapable of love should not be teachers.
The same day we were met by a teacher in that kindergarten school. She was so full of warmth and affection that she put at ease my four year old sons who were sobbing inconsolably at the thought of being put into a school. They answered her questions peacefully after that. It was the power of love at work, to use an often used but perhaps not well-understood expression.
At that moment I recalled what Professor Prakhya was trying to tell me. And I resolved that going forward I would attempt to change the way I engaged with the class as a teacher.
Years of habit and a core vasana don't yield ground easily to new ways, especially if they are exactly contrary to what one has been doing for years. But I prayed to God and worked on it. I am happy to say that I have changed since then, for what I think is the better.
I lose my cool a lot less often since then. I am able to put down to childishness and overlook many instances of in-class conduct that I used to frown upon. While I take the setting and grading of exams and other tests as seriously I used to previously, I approach it with a lot more empathy.
Underlying all of this is a basic change in disposition where I now see all these students as being in places where I would see my sons before long, in whatever institution of higher education they enter by God's Grace. That makes it easy to see the element of love that Sri Sri and Professor Prakhya were talking about.
I talk to many of my students about their career dilemmas. Some talk about their family backgrounds in that context. Some of them confide matters of concern to them that are extremely personal in nature, including affairs of the heart.
I do not seek out such conversations. Nor do I actively encourage them. But when they seek a pair of patient ears that can also provide them solace at least, if not workable counsel, give my new view of the teacher-student relationship I do not turn them away. Without meaning to be self-congratulatory I seem to have, in the process, made a difference to a few people at the least.
I do not know whether that is an appropriate approach to a student-teacher relationship. My take is that there is nothing wrong as long as it does not compromise academic integrity and rigour. After all the shishya in the traditional India gurukulam looked upon the guru and his wife as his parents.
My evolution as a teacher is still work in progress. I have a long way to travel on this path.
What is the relevance of it all to this discussion?
The point I want to make is that my relationship with the two prospects is essentially the same as the one that I have with my students, although neither of them was my student. Instead they worked with me in an academic role. Unfortunately revealing further details might entail the risk of giving away their identity and therefore compromise their privacy.
I adopted the same approach to building my relationship with both P1 and P2. I did so in the belief that my academic relationship with them was less strait-jacketed than that with my students. I had no responsibility for assessing their academic performance. They were merely supporting me in some academic endeavours with loosely defined deliverables.
Given how young they are I will look upon them as my own children. There are / were no other motives beyond that. And to that extent I see no inconsistency between my relationship with them and that with my students.
At the same time I did not do anything that compromised or called into question my dignity. I have been fiercely mindful of my dignity all my life. I conduct myself with great dignity with my students, notwithstanding my warm affection for them.
In the case of P1 and P2 too, the moment I realised that I could potentially jeopardise my dignity and stature as a teacher I stepped back gracefully.
It is true that I may not experience with any of my students the pain that I do, even as I write this post about the failure of the legacy project and P2 walking away without announcing the intent to walk away in as many words. (I am being assured, inaccurately I believe, that there is no intent to walk away and that my role as a mentor is highly valued.) In fact I wonder if it is the disappointment over the manner of P2's walking away that hurts me more than the walking away itself. But that is another matter.
I sincerely believe that none of that casts a shadow of any kind on my approach to student - teacher relationship.
Nanni....Namaskaaram...
No. I was not blaming P1 and P2. On the contrary I believe that I am entirely responsible for the way it went with both of them, although it followed different trajectories.
Yes, I was being facetious to expect that I could influence the world view of young adults over a short period of time. Although I did not mention it in my post, it was one of my worries and the eventual reason for giving up on my effort to build that legacy.
Now, on to the third question involving teacher-student relationship.
When I started as a teacher in 2000, my style of engagement with the class was that of a martinet. Needless to state, that did not work well. Apart from a not so pleasant impression on the majority of the class it also made me less effective as a teacher. And above all it resulted in poor teaching ratings although I worked hard to be a good teacher.
Somewhere along the way my friend and colleague Professor Prakhya once explained that the best teachers who always got great feedback succeeded in the classroom because they were full of love for the teacher. Like with many things that he used to say, I did not understand this well either. I dismissed it as one of those many things that he keeps talking about that sound somewhat impractical, if not unrealistic.
Not a long time later I saw this quote attributed to HH Sri Sri Ravishankar-ji in the school that we went to for enrolling our twin boys. It said: Teaching is a vocation of love. Those who are incapable of love should not be teachers.
The same day we were met by a teacher in that kindergarten school. She was so full of warmth and affection that she put at ease my four year old sons who were sobbing inconsolably at the thought of being put into a school. They answered her questions peacefully after that. It was the power of love at work, to use an often used but perhaps not well-understood expression.
At that moment I recalled what Professor Prakhya was trying to tell me. And I resolved that going forward I would attempt to change the way I engaged with the class as a teacher.
Years of habit and a core vasana don't yield ground easily to new ways, especially if they are exactly contrary to what one has been doing for years. But I prayed to God and worked on it. I am happy to say that I have changed since then, for what I think is the better.
I lose my cool a lot less often since then. I am able to put down to childishness and overlook many instances of in-class conduct that I used to frown upon. While I take the setting and grading of exams and other tests as seriously I used to previously, I approach it with a lot more empathy.
Underlying all of this is a basic change in disposition where I now see all these students as being in places where I would see my sons before long, in whatever institution of higher education they enter by God's Grace. That makes it easy to see the element of love that Sri Sri and Professor Prakhya were talking about.
I talk to many of my students about their career dilemmas. Some talk about their family backgrounds in that context. Some of them confide matters of concern to them that are extremely personal in nature, including affairs of the heart.
I do not seek out such conversations. Nor do I actively encourage them. But when they seek a pair of patient ears that can also provide them solace at least, if not workable counsel, give my new view of the teacher-student relationship I do not turn them away. Without meaning to be self-congratulatory I seem to have, in the process, made a difference to a few people at the least.
I do not know whether that is an appropriate approach to a student-teacher relationship. My take is that there is nothing wrong as long as it does not compromise academic integrity and rigour. After all the shishya in the traditional India gurukulam looked upon the guru and his wife as his parents.
My evolution as a teacher is still work in progress. I have a long way to travel on this path.
What is the relevance of it all to this discussion?
The point I want to make is that my relationship with the two prospects is essentially the same as the one that I have with my students, although neither of them was my student. Instead they worked with me in an academic role. Unfortunately revealing further details might entail the risk of giving away their identity and therefore compromise their privacy.
I adopted the same approach to building my relationship with both P1 and P2. I did so in the belief that my academic relationship with them was less strait-jacketed than that with my students. I had no responsibility for assessing their academic performance. They were merely supporting me in some academic endeavours with loosely defined deliverables.
Given how young they are I will look upon them as my own children. There are / were no other motives beyond that. And to that extent I see no inconsistency between my relationship with them and that with my students.
At the same time I did not do anything that compromised or called into question my dignity. I have been fiercely mindful of my dignity all my life. I conduct myself with great dignity with my students, notwithstanding my warm affection for them.
In the case of P1 and P2 too, the moment I realised that I could potentially jeopardise my dignity and stature as a teacher I stepped back gracefully.
It is true that I may not experience with any of my students the pain that I do, even as I write this post about the failure of the legacy project and P2 walking away without announcing the intent to walk away in as many words. (I am being assured, inaccurately I believe, that there is no intent to walk away and that my role as a mentor is highly valued.) In fact I wonder if it is the disappointment over the manner of P2's walking away that hurts me more than the walking away itself. But that is another matter.
I sincerely believe that none of that casts a shadow of any kind on my approach to student - teacher relationship.
Nanni....Namaskaaram...
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