Thoughts to you from yours truly - ( 45 ) - November 18, 2010

Thoughts to You from Yours Truly - ( TYYT ) - ( 45 ) - Teaching ( 教與導 ) - Nov., 18, 2010

Teaching is of course a very noble profession. In Chinese the word teaching has two elements in its meaning - instruct and guide. I like the latter element much more than the former simply because it is far more effective than the former. " To instruct " implies more of a one way traffic like from teacher to student or the learned to the unlearned. On the other hand, " to guide " is more personal and implies giving more weight to the feeling and perspective of the student. In short, " to guide " is a more human approach and in most cases more effective. The reason is easy to understand because the latter element keeps the student relaxed and hence he or she will be more receptive to information and, therefore, more conducive to intellectual reasoning. Treat people, anyone as a human being and everything falls in its right place.

教育當然是一行高尚的專業。在中文裡，to teach 包含教與導兩種元素。我喜歡後者多於前者，全因為後者比較前者有效多了。教暗示單向的交通，知識由老師傳授到學生，由有識之士給予無知者。在令一方面，導則 較近人情，以學生的感受和觀點為基礎。換言之，導是較人性化，因此亦比較有效。這是很容易理解的。學生精神鬆弛了，他們對認識的吸收，以及思考的運作也會 更有效率，自然事半功倍了。把每一個人都作為一個有血肉和感受的人看待，所有的事情都易辦了。

JKHC.