Inspire More than TeachFernie V. Bucang

While it is true that most of our students come to school each day with the hope in mind that they will go home in the afternoon bringing with them education at its best and knowledge at its finest, it could not be denied that there are those who come to school for the sole reason that they have to come to school – or else. On the one hand, there are students who come to school intent at unraveling even the depths of the oceans in search for wisdom. These are the students in whom we can pin our hopes for a better future – the students who define us as teachers. On the other hand, there are students who come to school so they could avail of their allowances, or worse so, there are those who come to school without necessarily knowing why they do so. These are the students who, before they could be made to learn, must first be inspired – the students who refine us as teachers.The academic community is a melting pot of various students with various intellectual capacities and inclinations. Well actually, it is a melting pot of various students, period. Some of these students have intellectual capacities, while others have none. For these reasons, the school should serve not only as a venue where lessons are taught and learning is advanced but also as a haven where attitudes and lives are refined, redefined and molded.In which case, our task as teachers becomes two-fold. While we are expected to advance the edges of learning in efforts to provide the best instruction for our intellectual students, we must not take for granted our responsibility to go down to the level of our students at the opposite end of the spectrum and prod them all the way up until their capabilities commensurate to that of a student – not necessarily an intellectual student, but a student nevertheless.In the surface, this two-fold task may seem very laborious and taxing and many might frown at the mere mention of it. At a closer glance however, it is pretty simple. It would start with our recognition and acceptance of the fact that not everyone is the same. Individual differences exist everywhere. This existence did not spare the academic community. Students are different and so are their needs. There is no denying this truth. It is right in front of our faces, taunting us and demanding that we look into the reconciliation of these differences. That being the case, our teaching methodologies must be designed in such way that they cater to the needs of these individually differentiated students with individually differentiated capacities and needs to ensure that everybody gets benefited by whatever goods the academe has to offer. This is in consonance with our government’s encouragement that all approaches at instruction must be such that it makes learning a wonderful experience for all students – advance, average or slow. I shall not, however, lecture on how this endeavor is to be undertaken. I leave that as everyone’s prerogative, again with all due respect to individual differences. Suffice it that I have lifted the stigma and taken the initiative to alleviate the academic community’s awareness of these verities into a height high enough to inspire every member to go on and take the same course of action and effect changes. And I shall not, as well, render this write-up as a wake-up call for I know that, in one way or the other, educators are aware of these transparencies. Instead, let this inkblot be a reverberating noise that would keep everyone alert and vigilant to be ready whenever there is a need to. Take head therefore, brothers and sisters in the profession. Shun not away from this calling for whether we like it or not, this is the very essence of our existence. For when the curfew tolls the knell of parting day, we will not be remembered as the teacher who taught as much as we will be remembered as the teacher who inspired.