Sophomore, cla 2, No.10Echo吴霞蔚
A Student & a Teacher
I have been a student for many years and I am destined to be a teacher in the years to come.This period of time of being a student of how to become a qualified teacher is quite different from the previous years.
I was merely a learner.I absorbed knowledge without questioning and tried to be a good student.I tried ways that my teachers recommended and followed my teacher’s ways of conducting my learning.Yet now I have another role to play.
I start to think what it is that makes me a good English learner and what it means to be a good teacher, and a good English teacher.First, I am fully convinced that the way you learn will greatly affect the way you teach.I believe I can be a good English teacher provided that I have been a quite efficient English learner and I enjoy the proce of learning English very much.I have been doing some tutoring lately.And I heard many students complaining about how boring English learning was.Back in my junior and senior years, I heard similar complains from my clamates, too.And moreover, I felt exactly the same way when I was asked to follow our English teacher’s instructions of memorizing words and sentence patterns.Something was wrong! And I think it’s not only the teachers that are to blame.It’s the rigid educational system! Students mainly learn in order to pa exams rather than enjoying the proce.That is exactly why they lose interest.We seem to have forgotten that life, in and of itself, is more about experiencing.The leading character Rancho in the wonderful film 3 Idiots embodied this life philosophy quite excellently.
I have a dream.I want to make English learning an enjoyment rather than a daunting tusk.I want my students fully experience this proce and enjoy it.I want them to be confident and become efficient English learners.To achieve this, I have been observing what my English teachers have been doing and carefully evaluating the different methods according to my own feeling and my clamates’ feedbacks.I tried out different ways of teaching on my own tutoring and observed the outcome in my students.Once in my tutoring, I had this student who showed no interest in studying at all.His mother tried to persuade me into using a method of instilling, to elaborate which she even used a wood metaphor for her son and me, the water, with the intention of wood absorbing water.How absurd it was! In my opinion, what I was supposed to do is exactly the opposite.We should inspire students to become a sponge and absorb the water zealously and with much higher efficiency.
I came to know the Pygmalion Effect *1 and related it to different
phenomena in my own learning experiences.Apart from that, I think of my favorite teacher and find out what make them respectable and popular.I read many books of excellent teachers and see the miracles they made.I love miracles.They are great examples of eminence.From Marva Collins *2 to Carle Witte *3, every prominent educator can teach us many things that have been neglected by the majority of us in daily life.Moreover, I get in touch with some of my excellent teachers and discu with them about teaching.It’s really fruitful.For example, once I wrote a thank-you letter to my favorite teacher and expreed my gratitude to him.We were both so grateful for the time we spent together.What a precious experience! We talked about excellent books and activities that can be applied to teaching.For example, I suggest he do the merit-finding activity among students.“Believes are often self-fulfilling prophecies.” Harvard profeor Tal put it.I got the idea from an excellent novel named
*4 Christmas List .And he did it! What an encouraging gesture! And I believe
both of us benefited a great deal from it.
It’s like that I have a purpose now.So I can see more things related to being a good teacher, thus I see more and learn better.By and by, those tiny pieces in different aspects come into one.It is indeed one remarkable advantage of entering a normal university.A teacher is indeed a bleed career.
Note：
1.皮格马利翁效应(Pygmalion Effect)，也有译“毕马龙效应”、“比马龙效应”、“罗森塔尔效应”或“期待效应”，由美国著名心理学家罗森塔尔和雅格布森在小学教学上予以验证提出。暗示在本质上，是人的情感和观念，会不同程度地受到别人下意识的影响。人们会不自觉地接受自己喜欢、钦佩、信任和崇拜的人的影响和暗示。而这种暗示，正是让你梦想成真的基石之一。皮格马利翁效应（Pygmalion Effect）指人们基于对某种情境的知觉而形成的期望或预言，会使该情境产生适应这一期望或预言的效应。你期望什么，你就会得到什么，你得到的不是你想要的，而是你期待的。只要充满自信的期待，只要真的相信事情会顺利进行，事情一定会顺利进行，相反的说，如果你相信事情不断地受到阻力，这些阻力就会产生，成功的人都会培养出充满自信的态度，相信好的事情会一定会发生的。这就是心理学上所说的皮格马利翁效应。
“皮格玛利翁效应”留给我们这样一个启示：赞美、信任和期待具有一种能量，它能改变人的行为，当一个人获得另一个人的信任、赞美时，他便感觉获得了社会支持，从而增强了自我价值，变得自信、自尊，获得一种积极向上的动力，并尽力达到对方的期待，以避免对方失望，从而维持这种社会支持的连续性。
2.Marva Collins: 在上课第一天，她对学生们说：“我们好好树立自己的信念。”她不厌其烦地传达着这一信息。她坚持对学生说——我相信你，你能成功，自己承担自己的责任，别再埋怨，成功与否全在你。她不厌其烦地传达着这些积极的信息。同时她对学生满怀期待，把目光放在他们的优点和长处上，并加以培养。奇迹就这样发生了。
Marva在学校里教一年级到四年级，慢慢地，事情真得如她所说的那样有了改观，她的学生，那些认为“不可教”的学生，到了四年级就可以读爱默生和莎士比亚的作品了，十岁的学生就可以做高中的数学。”
“但是有人嫉妒并恶语中伤她。Marva便离开了这所学校，开办了自己的家庭学校。给学生上课就在她家的厨房里，一开始只有四个学生，其中两个是她自己的孩子，渐渐地更多的学生来到了她的家，来的学生很多都是从公立学校退学的，还有很多街头的小混混，学生越来越多，她就在外面租了一间房做教室，冬天寒冷无比，夏天酷热难耐，但是学生们的学习热情很高。奇迹在Marva的学生身上发生了，Marva所有的学生从小学一直上到高中毕业，接着，所有的学生，注意，是所有的学生都上了大学，然后大学毕业，没错，就是那些“不可教”的学生。”“Marva数十年生活贫困，然而她努力平衡学校开支，因为很多学生都缴不起学费。这些日子还是熬过去了。1979年，情况一夜之间发生了变化，CBS
《60分钟》栏目的制片人得知了Marva的故事之后，制作了15分钟的节目，她一夜成名，1980年，美国新当选的总统里根打电话给Marva请她做教育部长，但Marva拒绝了他的邀请，她说，我太喜欢教师这个职业了，八年过去了，新当选的总统老布什再次打电话请她做教育部长，她再一次拒绝。1995年，一位慈善家捐赠了数千万美元给Marva，现在全国都有Marva的学校，今天Marva的学生有政治家，著名律师和医生，但更多的是教师。
3.卡尔?威特（Karl Witte）1800年7月1日出生于德国萨勒河畔的哈勒市洛赫小村，是19世纪德国的一个著名的天才。他八九岁时就能自由运用德语、法语、意大利语、拉丁语、英语和希腊语这六国语言；并且通晓动物学、植物学、物理学、化学，尤其擅长数学；9岁考入莱比锡大学；10岁进入哥廷根大学；13岁出版了《三角术》一书；年仅14岁就被授予哲学博士学位（事实上，卡尔目前仍然是《世界吉尼斯记录大全》中“最年轻的博士”记录保持者[1]）；16岁获得法学博士学位，并被任命为柏林大学的法学教授；23岁他发表《但丁的误解》一书，成为研究但丁的权威。与那些过早失去后劲的神童们不同，卡尔?威特一生都在德国的著名大学里授学，在有口皆碑的赞扬声中一直讲到1883年3月6日逝世为止。卡尔?威特能取得这番惊人的成就，并不是由于他的天赋有多高超——恰恰相反，他出生后被认为是个有些痴呆的婴儿——而是全赖他的父亲教育有方。卡尔的父亲把小卡尔长到14岁以前的教育写成了一本书，这就是《卡尔?威特的教育》。书中详细记述了这个父亲的核心理念，一个人最终能否有所成就，其禀赋起着一定的影响，但最主要的还是后天的教育。教育得当，普通的孩子也能成长为天才。教育不当，即使再大的天才也会被毁掉。他记载了他
的孩子成长的过程，教育心得、方法，提出了早期教育的理念。
4.《圣诞节清单》：小说源自互联网上盛传的故事。明尼苏达州的一个修女在她教的班上，让每个学生在一张纸笺上写上自己的名字，然后让其他同学每人写下一句对这个学生欣赏和赞美的话。这份写满同学对自己真挚评价的清单被许多人一直珍藏着，成为其人生道路上披荆斩棘的魔法石。当他们的生活及事业受挫感到沮丧甚至失去生活的勇气时，清单给予他们无穷的力量，甚至改变了他们的人生。
