youthful chapter: becoming a teacher for the first time | cai lichao: from a teacher in training to a middle school teacher, realizing the ideal of education
2024-09-12
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editor’s note
they dedicated their youth to the podium and left their love to their students. they became teachers for the first time and dedicated their first job in life to the cause of education. they love this profession and are working hard to write a brilliant chapter of youth on the land of the motherland. on the occasion of the 40th teachers' day, the paper launched a special plan of "brilliant chapter of youth·the flourishing youth" - becoming a teacher for the first time, to pay tribute to these new forces who have firmly chosen the cause of education.
during high school, cai lichao attended xiamen foreign language school, a high school that many students in xiamen dream of attending. after graduation, he was recommended to study english at beijing foreign studies university. after graduating from university, he decided to become a teacher.
he said that when he was in high school and college, he participated in a teaching group organized by the school and went to baisha middle school in shanghang county, longyan city, fujian province to teach.
this teaching activity broadened his understanding of the profession of teacher.
"i saw the children's very innocent and inquisitive eyes. their reluctance to leave made me feel needed for the first time," said cai lichao.
while in college, he also went to teach in the impoverished mountainous areas of gansu. this teaching experience strengthened his determination to become a teacher.
after graduating from beijing foreign studies university, he went to lancaster university in the uk to pursue a master's degree.
in 2017, cai lichao returned to china after studying abroad. his first job was not as a teacher, but as a teacher in an overseas education and training institution. however, he soon realized that he was not suitable for the job because he "could not fully gain a sense of value."
"educational training institutions are more like utilitarian short-term sprints, or the extreme form of exam-oriented education." cai lichao said that in the long run, he felt that his body and mind had reached their limits.
in 2023, he decided to become a formal teacher and was admitted to xiamen no. 6 middle school to teach and experience what real education is.
cai lichao, a young teacher at xiamen no. 6 middle school. photo by han yuting, a reporter from the paper
“don’t just focus on the results, focus on the process”
the coaching experience over the past year has made him feel that his choice was "absolutely correct."
"my sense of value is constantly improving." cai lichao said that teaching and being a class teacher in school are far more challenging than working in a training institution.
he believes that educational institutions and schools have two completely different value systems. when teaching in an educational institution, one is only responsible for the children's grades, while when teaching and being a class teacher in a school, one's focus is on the overall growth of the children.
"don't underestimate the word 'growth', there are so many things behind it." cai lichao said that it is related to the child's learning ability, moral character and life value direction.
it's very simple. when faced with a mischievous student, the education and training institutions and schools have two different ways of dealing with him. in education and training institutions, teachers do not have to pay attention to students' moral education issues because they do not bear the responsibility of correcting the moral quality of students. however, being a class teacher in school is completely different. not only do you have to care about students' grades, but you also have to pay attention to the balance between individual students and the class collective. you cannot allow students' personalities to expand arbitrarily and affect and squeeze the growth space of other students.
"we are responsible for coordinating the relationships between students and classes, and between classmates, to ensure an overall healthy atmosphere in the class," said cai lichao.
as a result, the work requirements for being a class teacher are more stringent. not only do they have to teach, but they also have to build and design a set of systems to manage the class. this is undoubtedly a big test for young teachers who have no previous experience.
although cai lichao's previous teaching experience in educational training institutions enabled him to master the methods of dealing with students, it is not easy to be a good class teacher, gain the support and trust of students, and manage a class well.
he remembered that there was a student who lived in the school dormitory and was very talkative. after 12 o'clock in the middle of the night, when all the lights in the dormitory had been turned off, he still liked to lead his roommates in chatting. this behavior had affected the normal rest of other students. as a result, he was registered as a violation by the dormitory manager many times, and he refused to change his behavior after repeated warnings. the school had no choice but to let him move out of the dormitory and change from a boarding student to a day student.
his parents took his actual situation into consideration and rented a house near the school for him to prevent him from being late, but he often overslept and was late many times.
in order to correct the student's behavioral habits, cai lichao spent a lot of effort, communicated with him many times, and used both soft and hard methods to make an example of him, so that other students would not mistakenly think that school discipline was empty and they would not be punished for making mistakes. at the same time, in order to prevent the student from developing a rebellious mentality, he talked to him during breaks many times, presented facts, and reasoned with him, pointing out the profound impact of lack of self-discipline on the workplace and life, and used heart-to-heart emotional communication as an auxiliary means of "soft management" to stimulate students' active thinking ability.
this move achieved very good results. finally, the students realized the shortcomings of their behavioral habits, took the initiative to make improvements, and became better day by day.
compared with students with bad behavioral habits, students who lack motivation to learn are what give him the most headaches.
"they don't know the value and meaning of learning, and they have lost their goals and direction in life." cai lichao said that after long-term observation, children of parents who are very busy at work and pay little attention to their children are easily lost, lack life goals and motivation to study. some students also have too much study pressure in elementary and junior high school, which eventually causes psychological boredom and resistance to learning.
how to change this situation? parents must be involved in the process to find solutions together.
communication between home and school tests the coping ability of a class teacher and teacher. not only must they discover and accurately analyze problems in a timely manner, but they must also be able to provide solutions that are acceptable to both parents and students, rather than colluding with each other to pressure students.
parent-teacher conference is an important communication platform. usually, young teachers do not know how to communicate with parents. when holding a parent-teacher conference, they do not know what to talk to parents about and how to talk to them. moreover, what should they do when parents ask difficult questions? if there is no experience and no idea, the parent-teacher conference will often become a formality, and even have the opposite effect.
cai lichao's method is very pleasing. he plays the role of communicator and bridge between parents and students.
once, before holding a parent-teacher conference, he sent out a questionnaire to all students in the class to collect what they most wanted to express to their parents. the result was surprising: the vast majority of students in the class expressed a common wish, hoping that parents "don't just focus on grades, but on the process."
this parent-teacher meeting also achieved good results and prompted some parents to think from their children's perspective.
this is indeed the case. because they are too busy at work, many parents rarely have truly effective communication with teachers and other parents. they do not fully understand their children's strengths, personalities, and preferences, and do not know how to identify individual differences. they can only regard test scores as the only criterion and are accustomed to using test scores to evaluate their children. this will naturally cause students to have rebellious emotions, and will create obstacles and cracks in the normal communication and emotional exchanges between parents and children.
at this critical moment, it becomes very important for the class teacher to play the role of a good communicator between parents and students.
"we need to accurately grasp the situation, try to stand on both sides' side, and think from their perspective, so that we can finally mobilize students' own enthusiasm and motivation," said cai lichao.
after more than a year of experience as a class teacher, cai lichao quickly mastered the essentials of being a class teacher.
"teachers have changed their single evaluation of students, and society should do the same"
during his more than one year of teaching as a class teacher, cai lichao not only mastered the essentials of being a class teacher and became an expert in home-school communication, but also established a teacher-student relationship of both teacher and friend with his students.
all this is not just about his amiable behavior, which eliminates students' fear of the teacher. more importantly, through the little things in daily life, he gradually narrows the psychological distance between himself and students, and enables them to understand and appreciate each other.
when communicating with parents, he gave many examples of "forbidden words" in daily interactions that are most likely to cause students to have emotional backlash.
"if you don't do well in the next exam, don't even think about getting your phone back"; "you can only use your phone during the holidays if you rank in the final exam"; "if you can't even get into college, what's the use of it in the future?"...
these scoldings, which are the most common in daily families, are actually a form of verbal violence that hurts children's self-esteem and confidence.
take mobile phones as an example. they do pose a threat to students’ learning and the country has issued clear bans on them, but parents cannot use this as an excuse to tie the value of mobile phones to grades.
"it seems that learning is not for the purpose of seeking knowledge, but for mobile phone games." cai lichao said that how to overcome the impact of mobile phones on learning is another important social issue.
"students who often play mobile games and watch short videos are obviously not as focused in class as other students." cai lichao said, but as parents, they cannot arbitrarily bind values because of this, but should work with the school to find ways to overcome this common problem.
"we must have alternatives to games, preferably competitive activities that are beneficial to children in a real environment," said cai lichao.
during his induction training, the lesson that impressed him the most was how to communicate with students in a positive and affirmative way. as a teacher, he no longer equates academic performance with future life.
from the current subject orientation, it is no longer just about test scores, but is beginning to focus on cultivating students' comprehensive qualities, including cultivating their language ability, cultural awareness, and ideological quality. the previous single evaluation method of students by educational institutions has changed.
there was a female student in his class who served as a class cadre. she had good grades in liberal arts, was an excellent dancer, knew martial arts, wrote beautifully in chalk, and was popular in the class. in the teacher's eyes, this was already very outstanding.
one day, the female student couldn't hold back her grievances any more, so she ran to him and told him her true feelings, crying as she spoke. it turned out that her final exam results were not ideal, which caused her parents' extreme dissatisfaction. they demanded that she not dance, use her cell phone or socialize during the summer vacation, or do anything unrelated to studying. she could only study from morning to night and go to cram school every day for extra lessons.
he fully understood the pain of this female student. this girl had obvious strengths and was inclined towards liberal arts and art, but her parents forced her to choose science. the reason was simple: science students were more likely to find jobs, but this made her study very difficult.
despite this, she still tried her best to study and not let her family down, which shows that she understands her parents, but her parents do not understand her.
seeing this, he calmed the student down and agreed to communicate with the other parent. after communicating with the parent, he did not expect that this move would cause misunderstandings among the parents. on the surface, he promised to change the education method, but in fact, he made it worse, thinking that the child should not "complain" to the teacher.
this put him in an awkward situation, and he once doubted whether he was "doing good things with bad intentions."
when faced with similar parents, he often has a deep sense of powerlessness. he also believes that many students face such difficulties, but they just speak out about their difficulties like that girl.
"we teachers have changed our single-minded evaluation of children, and i hope society should do the same," said cai lichao.
the paper reporter han yuting
(this article is from the paper. for more original information, please download the "the paper" app)
