Chu Zhaohui: Be friends with mentors and become mentors
Chu Zhaohui Teachers' Expo
Thank you Teachers Expo for giving me a chance to speak from my heart.
40 years ago, in 1981, I was influenced by Tao Xingzhi, determined to engage in education, and under the inspiration of Tao Xingzhi's "holding a heart, not taking half a blade of grass to go", I wrote a self-encouraging oil poem: August 1 Autumn Wind Awakens Thoughts, And Aspires to Create a New World through Education. Throw away half a blade of grass around you, and human beings will teach at this time.
In the blink of an eye, I have been on the road of education for 40 years, and I have encountered many temptations in the middle: to enter politics, to get rich, to get awarded, to become famous... Fortunately, I have experienced so much, but I have basically not been delayed by various temptations, or in accordance with the original determination of "education as a profession, research as a life, to do education better" life direction slowly towards the end of my career.
In recent years, more and more people have applied for teacher qualification certificates, and even many people who have obtained doctoral degrees have chosen to become teachers in primary and secondary schools. It is not because they will be my peers, but because this choice is the need for the healthy development of society. Although such a choice is related to the overall phenomenon of employment difficulties, it is ultimately a choice that everyone has weighed in their hearts.
In the first few years of the education career, many people will still waver in their hearts: Have they really chosen the right career? Of course, different criteria will lead to different conclusions, and I think the most important criterion is: can you realize your strengths and potential? Does society really need it? Is it a realistic and feasible choice for yourself? If you measure it by these three criteria, most or completely incompatible with your own situation, you can still choose elsely; if most of them are in line, you need to make longer-term plans. Whether a person can become a competent and excellent educator needs to go through 3 to 5 years of tempering and testing in the workplace. For those friends who are obviously unqualified, they also need to reconsider their choices; if they pass the test, they need to make longer-term plans for their educational careers.
Taking a good career path in education is related to the following key factors.
The first, of course, is love. Tao Xingzhi's teaching that "love is all over the world" is to cultivate love. Love needs to be accumulated in life, and although it is difficult to hope that love will fill the world, it can still be worked hard to see what more and more people have lost in their education and what has not been done. The love of teachers is not abstract, but concrete, and it must be felt, understood, and interacted with students. Teachers should care for students with love, serve the growth and development of students, and strive to solve problems in the process of students' growth.
Second, we must have an educational mission. Those who educate for the sake of education can only become teachers, and those who engage in education in order to build a more ideal society can embody the mission of teachers. "Shi Zhi Dao, Ming Dao Ji Shi" is the classic expression of the mission of ancient Chinese scholars, that is, to discover the truth, to use the truth to solve social problems, and to create a happy life with the truth. Taking education as one's life mission and not just a career and a job bowl can make education life more exciting.
Third, we must safeguard our autonomy. At present, the common problem in Chinese education is the lack of autonomy of teachers and students. Of course, this situation is directly related to improper education management and educational evaluation. If both teachers and students form a passive personality, then education cannot achieve the goal of cultivating sound people, and the value of the teaching profession is greatly reduced. For teachers, maintaining the autonomy of teaching is the most important, which determines whether students can learn independently and also determines the quality of teaching. Therefore, teachers should keep the bottom line of their own teaching autonomy in the environment, clarify the boundaries of rights and responsibilities, fight against various behaviors that damage the autonomy of teaching, do not let themselves become a gap in the loss of teaching autonomy, and understand that maintaining teaching autonomy is to safeguard the right of students to grow.
Fourth, we must have the ability to be logical. It's about ability, not knowledge. Logical ability plays a fundamental role in the formation of a person's sound personality. The seven basic disciplines identified by UNESCO include logic. The lack of basic logical awareness and ability is a common shortcoming among today's young people. The Internet is full of emotional catharsis that lacks basic logic, and many people regard metaphors as reasoning regardless of the situation, so they fall into the trap of binary opposition between black and white or left and right; some people ignore facts and logic when they hear different opinions, and rise to moral criticism, causing too much confusion in teachers, students, parents, and society; plus it seems that everyone can judge education, and all kinds of information about education will flow massively, stirring up education. "Habit education", "whole brain development", "smart classroom" and various new bottles of old wine, pattern renovation of educational concepts are pervasive, directly causing harm to the growth of children. Teachers must have strong logical discernment ability and a clear conceptual system in order to distinguish between true and false, right and wrong, conventional theories and professional opinions, so as not to lose their way and follow the crowd.
Fifth, we must improve our scientific literacy as much as possible. Survey data show that the low scientific literacy of teachers is still a problem to be solved. No matter which discipline you teach, you need scientific literacy and ability, you need scientific spirit, you need original thinking ability, and you need empirical thinking and hands-on ability. Young teachers should seize the opportunity of vigorous energy and quick thinking to lay a good foundation for scientific literacy.
Sixth, we must develop the awareness and ability to constantly reflect on ourselves. "If you can't do what you want, you can ask for yourself" is a form of learning in which human beings have entered a higher stage of development. At present, the large number of test evaluations that use standard answers in education and teaching makes students form standard answer thinking, and also squeezes the space for teachers' reflection. This evaluation system is difficult to exercise people's ability to think critically, resulting in teachers and students only copying and pasting and poor application ability, damaging or losing original thinking, and forming a huge gap with real life needs. To this end, teachers need to consciously correct their thinking through introspection, and they should have more questions in their minds, rather than only standard answers, so that the education they are engaged in returns to health and common sense.
There are also some tricks to achieve your own educational dreams, the most effective tips are to be friends with good teachers, take good teachers as your goal of pursuit, and strive to become a good teacher.
Regarding mentors, I have discussed them many times in other articles, but I will not repeat them here, but only introduce you to the double helix growth model that has achieved remarkable results. The double helix growth model refers to the pairing of one's inner mentor with the development of one's own advantages and abilities, and then spiraling forward to promote one's own continuous growth and development.
To this end, teachers should establish a good teacher in their hearts as early as possible, and take him as a teacher for a long time or even for life. I myself began to learn Tao Xingzhi in 1981, and for a long time I took Tao Xingzhi as my teacher and Tao Xingzhi as my friend. In my opinion, we should follow the most effective principle of Tao Xingzhi taking the way of friends as a teacher—living with the principle of being a teacher and a friend, rather than bowing down to Tao Xingzhi and worshiping Tao Xingzhi as a god, a banner, a tool, or an unattainable goal. I believe that this is the way to truly learn Tao Xingzhi, rather than to learn Tao Xingzhi in a way that violates the basic spirit and ideological concepts of Tao Xingzhi. To learn Tao Xingzhi, it is more important to practice Tao Xingzhi's thoughts to solve the problems encountered at present; I often combine practical education problems with Tao Xingzhi to conduct dialogues. Hu Shi and Tao Xingzhi took Dewey as their teacher, Plato took Socrates as his teacher, and Kant took Rousseau as his teacher, all of which have similar connections.
Teachers also need to discover, identify, and effectively develop their strengths. Teachers need to develop their own advantageous potential, and make their own mentor and their own advantageous potential direction of knowledge and ability development coupled, mutual traction, and constantly generate new life growth goals, so that they can continue to grow for life.
Ye Qisun is one of the most admirable mentors, his sense of education is strong, his educational achievements are high, and his students have made great contributions to the scientific and technological development and progress of Chinese society. Among them, the word "sense of education" is specially created to describe Ye Qisun's unique characteristics when I studied him, and I define it as a professional perception of education, which is embodied in Ye Qisun's ability to understand the advantages and potentials of students, and can find the forefront of all directions of world scientific and technological development, and at the same time can lead students' superior potential to the forefront of world scientific and technological development and cultivate outstanding talents.
Young teachers can identify their own mentors through contact, acquaintance, and experience in real life, and can also set historical figures as mentors. The two options have different characteristics but the same functionality. Choosing historical figures as mentors may be more durable and stable, but not vivid, emotional, and difficult to interact with; choosing people in reality as mentors may be more in line with their actual needs, and it is easier to obtain targeted lessons, which can be consulted at any time, but there are also greater risks. When you find that the person you are a teacher is not enough to be a teacher, you may lead to a break in your own double helix, so you feel that your educational career is meaningless, and it does not matter after that, and your growth will not continue.
It is a very wise choice to invite the good teachers of history to return to the current field of life and education, to choose the right person as the leader and companion of their own growth and development among the recognized teachers in the world, to form a relationship between teachers and friends, to dialogue with them through historical documents, to start from cultivating interests and establishing ambitions, and to let the wisdom, knowledge and experience of the sages in various fields and the wisdom, knowledge and experience of the sages in various fields become the resources for their own growth.
Good human education will not come out of nowhere, not relying solely on technology, but must come from new educational ideas, principles or concepts. Only new ideas and principles can stimulate new technologies and services, and ensure that the harm of new technologies to people is minimized and their benefits are brought into play, and new educational ideas, principles and concepts must come from the continuous and unremitting difficult exploration of pure pedagogists.
I am glad that I have determined the life mission of "human excellence" at the beginning of my career, which is not a goal that can be achieved in the short term, but a goal that no matter how hard I try, I am afraid that I will be difficult to achieve in my lifetime. Because it gives me inexhaustible motivation and a journey without a finish, I can always go down and keep improving. I hope to meet more young friends on this road and work together!
(Author Affilications:Chinese Academy of Educational Sciences)