Personal and Professional Commitment of teachers

In one of my teacher’s reflection, she spoke on the good teaching, on how teaching has been joyful for her. I will like to follow up on this topic of good teaching and how some teachers after many years of weaving the “fabric” of our nation with their students and the subjects they teach, tension begins to show. I know that teaching is connected to our hearts as we connect with our students, especially when teachers project themselves onto our students – the more one loves teaching, the more heart breaking it can be as well.

Sad to say, I see some teachers losing heart as years of teaching goes by. Now, the teachers get by on a day to day basis, doing the minimum teaching requirement, looking for loopholes not to be involved, all these are in part I think because teaching is a daily exercise of “personal commitment”. In my teacher’s reflection, she spoke of personal and professional fulfillment – both of which I find it important for good teaching. I now make sense of what my principal previously mentioned about “personal and professional mission”. The reason is because teaching is done at the intersection of personal and professional life. As teachers try to connect themselves with students, teachers are vulnerable to the judgment of others, particularly our students. Hence, there are teachers who disconnect from the students so as not to be in such vulnerable state. Instead, they play-act the teacher’s part with words are like “speech marks in cartoons” without real commitment.

How can then teachers take heart in teaching once more? Methods, I do not know of any. However, I believe that there is a need to understand our condition that makes us want to take up teaching in the first place. If our personal mission about who, and how we are still stands for teaching, then such personal mission will redirect us back to do what all good teachers do professionally – give our heart to our students!