I had a confrontation with one of my classes the other day which amounted to a power struggle to determine who was boss. The difficulty in teaching a group of 20 six and seven year olds who are raised to believe that they are in reality angels and whose every desire is instantly fulfilled by their doting parents, is that it is difficult for them to conceptualize an existence beyond their own.

Coming from small families of one or two children, they invariably perceive themselves as the centre of everyone's universe, as they are in their own households. Beyond respecting themselves, the notion of respect has limited application in relation to others. And, in the type of school in which I teach, where teachers are paid professional servants, at best, respect for teachers is at times an optional extra.

There seem to me to be two main reasons for this. The first is that parents do not instill in their children the concept of respect. They gossip in front of their children about other parents and children and criticize, also in front of their children, the school and the teachers. These children cannot discern for themselves the validity of their parents' comments and therefore carry these unedited attitudes with them into the classroom.

Secondly, while most of the Chinese teachers I have worked with are incredibly professional and dedicated in their approach to their classroom responsibilities, the same cannot be said of the foreign teachers. Teaching, to most of the foreigners in Taiwan's schools it seems, amounts to being a classroom clown and trying to compete for the populist title of "Best Teacher", which means the teacher who is the most fun and plays the most games in the classroom. Such teachers are breathing jungle gyms who have all kinds of time consuming tricks up their sleeves, which leaves them less time to teach real content and therefore they also prepare less real content. Preparation time is not paid for, so the less time "wasted" on it the better. How do children learn to respect teachers when the teachers themselves do nothing to warrant, or teach, such respect?

Respect for teachers is not an entitlement, but a necessary classroom tool for conducting effective and efficient education. Without it, teachers are under no obligation and students are an ignorant barbaric horde.

21 November 2002

Dion Marc Delport

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