Attributes of an educator
Inspiring lifelong learning, through lifelong learning
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Passionate
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Often for content, normally for children, but always for the power of education
to transform individuals and allow full and wholesome lives in those granted
a passionate teacher. Passion runs like an undercurrent through teaching, an
electric pulse that gives life to subject matter, relationships and the long journey
of learning. Out there, in the eyes of the fortunate many, is a flame that was lit
by a teacher many years before.
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Empathetic
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Educators remind themselves that while every child wants to appear to be coping, many are not. While frustrations are frequent, the reality of being a safe haven in a storm is a nourishment for teachers and understanding that everyone faces their own battles is a rigour of the role. The many skills, attributes and experiences that each child brings to the classroom ultimately enriches not only each learner but the teacher themselves.
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Engaging
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Competing demands make holding the attention of distracted students harder than ever before. But computers can not compete with a canon of knowledge, nor a caring word or thought, and students continue to seek solace and learning in our schools. The human interactions are what sustain us and no place offers so many chances to engage the curiosity and needs of so many as a school.
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High efficacy teachers
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In their seminal book Making a Difference, Teacher's sense of efficacy and student achievement, Ashton and Webb showed that "high efficacy attitudes (confidence in one's teaching), were related to a belief that all students can learn and want to do so; efforts to establish warm and encouraging relationships with students; the conviction that students will behave well if treated fairly, firmly, and with consistency; a reliance on personal authority; the use of direct, non-emotional management techniques; a reluctance to embarrass students; an effort to treat all students as trustworthy and capable; an emphasis on instruction and the importance of learning; an effort to keep students on task, aware and interested in their individual accomplishments; a willingness to teach all students in the class, to push them and to monitor their work; and the determination not to accept student failure."
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Commited to something bigger
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Around the world, education continues to grow as more and more children are given the privilege of learning. By bringing these children into the world with a respect for knowledge and actively aware of their surroundings, the future retains hope. As educators, we act as servants to the generations to come, and of those who paved the way before us. By combining the ways of the past with the demands of the future, educators provide the link that sustains our communities from a local to a global level.
