I can only make them think

“The teacher who is indeed wise does not bid you to enter the house of his wisdom but rather leads you to the threshold of your mind.”

These words of wisdom are by Khalil Jibran, a Lebanese- American writer, Actor and poet. Jibran is believed to the third best selling poet of all times. Mentioning about Khalil Jibran is just an attempt to increase the importance of what he said because our society has been pushed into the houses of wisdom and has left the path towards the thresholds of our own minds. If this statement sounds amusing that what I’ll ask you is to look around and examine our own lives and surroundings. We respect wisdom only if the person who has it is known as a wise person, we acknowledge theories and philosophies only if they are in “best selling” books, we consider the words to be knowledge if they are being said by an appointed person whom we know as a “teacher”. Student’s are often reminded of their holy responsibilities of respecting and obeying the teacher, with the word teacher here I refer to the people who are appointed to transfer their knowledge to the people who are sent to gain knowledge, whereas this very rarely is identified that respect and obedience do not come by force if the people appointed actually are “teachers”, if respect is being imposed than our common sense indicate that the person himself/herself is not worthy of being respected.

I might sound radical while expressing my views, but actually my views are something which every person would have if the person looks into the matter keeping aside the existing norms of the society. Norms are formed in society for the objective to make the society progressive, therefore norms which are not beneficial can always be replaced with better ones. This has been a function of societies from centuries.

The issue of forcefully making the pupils subservient to the appointed educators might not seem to be an issue for many readers, but if examine the effects it leave upon the minds of the subjects we realize that this has been a major contributor in weakening our society. Majority of the people have become users than becoming inventors, and a major reason behind that is they were never even given a chance to think by themselves. Acceptance of the theories told by the teachers is an attempt to undermine a person’s confidence on himself and his judgment and creates a sense of powerlessness, and actually the students can’t really do anything about it because they fear that consequent behavior would lead to social failure and economic collapse. In this parents too are responsible for eliminating the self confidence of their children, who if disagree with any prevalent theory are discouraged, because they too feel that if their child does not adopt the approved rules they too would face social failure. But this view has based on short term benefits, whereas if a change is brought in the benefits would be everlasting.

If we look into the matter than the person whom I would blame the most is the teacher, who due to the prevalent mindset of the society believes that he “knows it all”, rather than becoming a partner with the student in the learning process. This makes him ignorant with alternate views and disagreements, and the examination system then compliments the powers that the teacher has to push the students back who do not confirm with his ideas. Examination system is a complete topic in itself; let this piece focus on the roles of teachers alone. This in turn makes the teachers knowledge becoming stagnant, and the teacher remains inside the walls of his own cottage, which he wrongly believes to be the whole world.

To my observation, the positive teachers, students, school administrators should look into this matter to bring the society back on track, this elementary issue if addressed would be a step towards a progressive society. And this only be achieved by keeping aside the existing norm of being submissive to teachers and promoting freedom of speech and freedom of mind. A student may not confirm with what the educator says if he does not believe it to be right, whoever the educator might be, then only can we rebuilt the collapsed society of ours.

“I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think.” ~Socrates