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In the past two years, when conducting research in towns and villages in many provinces, I visited local schools and talked with teachers, students and other groups. The general feeling is that teachers have become Buddhists. There are many reasons for this. One is that they actively become Buddhists, and the other is that they passively become Buddhists. The causes are complex. The following is an analysis from the two aspects of teaching practice and teacher management:

From the perspective of teaching practice

Emotional value is hard to come by.With the in-depth development of the migrant economy and urbanization, more and more people are leaving the city. The emphasis on children's education by farmers' families has led to spontaneous education in cities. Families with good conditions buy houses in cities and let their children receive education in urban schools. Families with poorer conditions send their children to county towns or above even if they rent houses. A teacher said that children with similar family conditions and children with good academic performance are all sent to county towns by their parents because their parents are afraid of delaying their children's future. As more and more children move to cities and high-quality students are lost, rural schools have become "care centers" for the remaining children. A principal said that there are many children with good grades and good behavior among the remaining children, but they are a very small minority. Most of the remaining children are problem children, either with poor academic performance or physical and mental problems. It is difficult for teachers to listen to these problem children in class, such as those with ADHD and naughty children, and it takes a lot of energy to maintain classroom discipline. Teaching and learning are mutually beneficial. Without the questions and knowledge-seeking of children in the classroom, it is difficult to achieve high-quality interaction in the education process. This means that it is difficult for teachers to obtain emotional value. Some questions have been asked many times but still no one responds. Some classroom designs have no participation. It is difficult for teachers to contribute efficient lesson preparation. This cannot be blamed.

The power relationship between teachers and students has been reversed.On December 29, 2020, the Ministry of Education promulgated the "Rules for Educational Punishment in Primary and Secondary Schools (Trial)" to make clear provisions on teachers' disciplinary powers. However, it is still a common phenomenon for teachers in front-line classrooms to not dare to use their power. Many teachers told us that it is common for "the leftover children" not to complete their homework and not to abide by classroom discipline, but they dare not punish them. On the one hand, children in school threaten teachers through performances. Some children, because they are exposed to the Internet too early and understand the policies, will even threaten teachers through verbal threats, lying at home, and extreme behaviors (such as self-harm and jumping off buildings). In this case, the teacher can only coax the children.

On the other hand, when faced with their children's lies, parents who accompany their children to school will not listen to both sides of the story, but will immediately find the leader or call 12345 directly to ask the school to give an explanation. A teacher told the story of her colleague. Two students were fighting with each other in class. She tried to stop them verbally many times but failed. When she stepped forward to stop the naughty students, she kicked the child's butt. As a result, the child went home and told her mother that the teacher had abused her. The parent immediately called 12345 and asked the school to give an explanation, and proposed that the teacher must apologize to the child. In the end, in order to calm the situation, the school asked the teacher to apologize. The teacher could not bear the humiliation and chose to resign.

In other words, it seems that the right to discipline students has been made clear. However, outside the classroom, how students view discipline and parents are not always reasonable, so teachers are always vulnerable to being unprotected in the choice of schools to "calm down public opinion."

Through the interaction between home and school, “teaching and educating” becomes “taking care of children”.Most of the students in rural areas are accompanied by their grandparents. The family education function is lacking due to the low education and low digital technology mastery of the older generation. Some teachers said that the children are fine in school, but they play with their mobile phones after returning home and cannot be controlled. Because the children always ask for their mobile phones in the name of doing homework. Even if the homework has been completed in the school's after-school classroom. Children will also ask for mobile phones in the name of being bored and wanting to play with friends, using their tried-and-tested "crying and making trouble" to act like a spoiled child to their grandparents, and basically nothing is not asked for. After playing with mobile phones, they are trapped in mobile phones and their grades are getting worse and worse. The school wants to find parents for analysis meetings and emphasize the issue of home-school co-education. What they often face is the low participation rate of parents in the meetings. A teacher said that the class has held several parent meetings, and less than 1/3 of the parents can attend the meetings. Even if they attend the meetings, they do not realize the importance of family education. Even if they realize it, it is difficult to do it. Some parents clearly told the teacher that the most important thing for their children is to be happy, and they don’t care about their children’s grades. They ask the teacher not to interfere too much in their children’s learning and to pay attention to their children’s mental health. Even regarding the children’s grades, they cannot comment on them in class and can only communicate with the parents. In addition, the school requires that the children’s rankings not be announced. Some parents who are concerned about their children’s grades always call their families outside of work hours.

Inefficient home-school co-education and one-on-one telephone home visits squeeze teachers' off-duty time. Parents need to be persuaded to attach importance to education and to explain their children's situation at school. A teacher said that if children are wronged at school, many seemingly reasonable parents will go crazy and ask for the school's explanation. She feels that she is not a teacher who educates people, because educators have the right to correct and punish, while she is a person who looks after children and an assistant to parents. The most tiring thing for a class teacher is to explain to parents, and people call at any time and anywhere. The jokes and fights between children are clearly handled well, but parents know about it and have to explain for a long time. She said that her 500 minutes of calls per month are basically used up by the middle of each month. There is no problem with communication itself. What makes her feel meaningless is that 60% of the call time is after get off work, and it is all repeated explanations and repeated work for parents. It is really meaningless but has to be done, but she still has to answer and make calls.

From the perspective of teacher management

A lot of energy is spent on activities that are not related to teaching or formalism.Since the reduction of burdens at the grassroots level, many tasks are no longer done on campus, but the Education Bureau's management of schools itself also involves many formalistic activities. A teacher said that he participated in a reading club activity, which was held at the request of his superiors. During the activity, teachers were required to share their reading reports. The activity was notified that each person had ten minutes, but during the event, it was said that the leaders who came to participate in the evaluation had limited time, so it was changed to three minutes per person on the spot, and the contestants were in a hurry throughout the event. The teachers and students who participated in the event off the stage also had no sense of gain, but in the publicity and summary of the event, they followed the pre-written manuscripts. From the photos, the event was indeed perfect, but for the participants, there was really no gain. Teachers working on the front line said that many tasks no longer enter the campus through indicators, but through verbal communication, and the offline assignment method requires teachers to do it, such as home visits to prevent drowning, patrols, anti-fraud, and medical insurance collection. The task volume is no longer clearly specified, but there are still related tasks that are arranged more covertly. Some teachers said that facing more non-duty work, it is better to be more Buddhist, and physical health is more important.

The teacher management department’s protection of teachers’ rights has given way to “difficult parents”.Some teachers said that after many crisis management, they felt that the school and the teacher management department were not their "mother-in-laws". Obviously, they were exercising their disciplinary power normally, but once they encountered difficult parents, the school would finally persuade them to apologize. For example, the incident of the teacher kicking the student's butt mentioned earlier was not a problem, and the teacher was absolutely right. But the student's parents complained to 12345 and demanded a solution, and said that if the teacher did not apologize, they would not say they were satisfied during the follow-up visit. The education department asked school leaders to do the work repeatedly due to the satisfaction rate indicator requirements. If the parents' work could not be done, they would persuade the teachers and claim that some teachers were hired in the first place. If they really did not consider the overall situation of the school, they would have to be fired. The occurrence of such incidents chilled the hearts of many colleagues. There are risks in teaching and educating seriously, but lying down and accompanying children happily is encouraged and advocated. They are not allowed to manage at ordinary times, but they want grades at the end of the year. Teachers commented that the education department has a two-faced face: "shameless and thick-skinned". The former refers to ignoring the authority of their own education department and educators in order to cater to parents. The latter refers to demanding too much from the teacher, not being able to do it yourself and making demands all the time.

In addition, the stability of the teaching staff gives way to the relational attributes of secondment mobility.There is a high degree of mobility in the teaching staff of townships. Young people are not comfortable with township life and yearn for urban life, so many of them move to the city through various means. The survey found that even for the special post teaching staff, who are clearly required to stay in grassroots education positions for two to three years, there are people who will find a way to transfer to the city. Others will transfer at the appointed time. Many township teachers said that they have worked diligently for several years and have to queue up to apply for teaching in the county, but many young people who have just joined the teaching staff can leave at any time. Many teachers also said that in terms of professional title evaluation, the lower the level, the more emphasis is placed on seniority, and young teachers have little chance of professional title mobility. Many people reflect that the "ability is subject to relationships" in small counties and the vague measurement standards of mobility have destroyed the peaceful teaching mentality of teachers. Positive struggle cannot bring positive results, so it is normal for teachers to become negative.

After the investigation, the overall feeling is that there are many people in the township teacher team who take the initiative to lie down, but most of them become Buddhist because they are constrained by external objective environment. Township education resources are the carriers of the educational hopes of farmers' families who cannot move to the city in the short term, and they have a bottom-line nature. We need to explore effective ways to motivate and manage township teachers.

2024/8/17