Welcome to new teachers

Fresh crop of educators face a challenging and fulfilling career in noblest of professions

IN A TIME of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act – George Orwell’s greetings to all new teachers. In the past week or so, you would have had your first experiences as a teacher and been thinking of the ways in which you’re able to put into practise all that you have learnt.

You would have thought about what type of teacher you want to be. The learners will watch you closely. Your interest in them will have a lasting effect on their minds.

They will imitate your habits so you will have to lead an exemplary life. So, within a few short months you will be critically assessed by your learners, colleagues, parents and principal. How will they sum you up?

There will be the constant need to know that you are investing in teaching with sound overall purposes and imbuing your learners to go with you along the path that you will map for them.

Besides having a firm grasp of the subject knowledge and good communication skills, you need to have the characteristics of punctuality, commitment to a given task, integrity and have principles centred on making ours a better society.

Education must always be one of the fundamental objectives in the struggle for a truly free and equal society, free of oppression.

A progressive classroom is one which is comfortable not only in physical terms but in its atmosphere in that learners feel free to discuss critical information given to them by you, the teacher, or which they themselves have acquired from the communities they come from.

Encourage your learners to read widely.

Several of you find yourselves in poor schools. These schools are beset by many problems, most of which are caused by factors beyond their control.

Government policies have for decades played havoc with the country’s education, and therefore with the lives of the majority of South Africa’s children.

They are the victims of poor resources, inadequate facilities, overcrowded classes, the effects of low teacher morale.

All these undermine the vital role that education has to play in any society. Many schools have become sites of strife, conflict and physical danger for both learners and teachers.

The schools at which acts of violence have been reported are all situated in sub-economic, under-privileged communities where many social disabilities – unemployment, crime, gangsterism, drug dealing and abuse – are a way of daily life.

You need to be conscious that the majority of children in the country are subjected to all the oppressive conditions of abject living conditions, invariably poor, badly fed and clothed, susceptible to illness and lacking spirit. They have had little contact with books and ideas and have had few opportunities to enjoy anything of cultural value.

Have you thought about what you will do to broaden their experiences and open their eyes?

It is important to do your daily preparation thoroughly, to teach diligently, conscientiously and competently. It is important to ensure that in your classroom an atmosphere is created that will encourage and stimulate the learners to learn, to feel the need to study and to extend and deepen their knowledge.

Make your learners aware of the social and cultural realities of the world, raising their social consciousness. Inculcate in them the norms and values that are not tainted by concepts of “race”.

Instil in them a powerful acceptance of the truth that they share a common humanity with all people both in this country and throughout the world. Make them aware of the social, economic and political disabilities suffered by a whole people here and in other parts of the world.

See them as individuals, each with their own peculiar talents and abilities.

You need to stand together with your colleagues against some bureaucrats who, knowingly or otherwise, contribute to debase our education.

They will try to turn the learners’ school experience into an indoctrination exercise.

They have lowered standards in order to retard progression of learners and thereby reducing the majority of our learners to the dust heap of unskilled and semi-skilled labour.

This perpetuates the inequalities in our society.

They are the ones that believe that tertiary education is meant only for a chosen few.

They are the ones who are closing the schools of the poor. And they are the ones who are ill-treating, dismissing and degrading progressive teachers who, under difficult conditions, are trying to make their poorly-resourced schools workable.

These education authorities would quickly blame teachers for the breakdown that occurs in schools when in fact their own anti-educational policies are responsible for the schools’ being dysfunctional.

Have in the back of your mind that every child has a right to free and equal quality education and that that right needs to be defended at all times.

You have on your shoulders one of the highest social responsibilities and the most noble and humane of all tasks.

The smiles and affection of the learners that you will educate, the gratitude of their families and the profound admiration of all of society will live forever in your memory.

Let us live for our children. We wish you a challenging and fulfilling career in this noblest of professions.

LEARNERS must be made to feel comfortable in the classroom, not only in physical terms, but also so they feel free to discuss critical information given to them by the teacher or which they themselves have acquired from the communities they come from, the writer says.