Friday, September 4, 2015

Happy Teachers Day

Who is a teacher ?
Before one gives a specific definition, I would like to mention that just like a mother can only be good, a Teacher can also be only good.

Anyone who can urge others to overcome their shortcomings and become a better person is a teacher.
This is how I identify a Teacher from among  the spilling multitude of humanity.

And saying so I can't help but remember  Mummy
She was a graduate in English Literature and loved Urdu poetry.
She was a passionate and intense reader of books in both languages.
And she was a natural teacher.
"Natural" I say because anyone who has been in touch with her has learned something good from her because she preached through practice ....

By a fortunate chance she got an opportunity to teach in the school where we siblings used to study.
Instead of teaching English, she chose to be a teacher of Moral Science.
Yeah! Back then, in the good old days there used to be a subject called "Moral Science"...

Trying to keep pace with the ever-changing Time, and being nothing but another rat in the race of life one never realised when, but surely quite a  long time ago Moral Scinece books vanished from school bags ...
Now one hears that in the days to come  schools will replace character certificates with aptitude certificates ...

Sometimes in a glittering world of insatiable materialism, it becomes difficult to find morals ...

However some of the Teachers are now better paid.

Happy Teacher's Day

7 comments:

Unknown said...

Tks for remembering your mother/teacher on this Day I am among those fortunate who have studied Moral Science and do have a Character Certicate .Yes i still have a copy of the certificate issued by my school in 1970 if i remember it well, I can assure all that i was a student of good moral Character then and now Ha Ha sundeep pahwa

Zohra Javed said...

:-)
Ji ... Ji ... Bilkul :-)

words-n-motion said...

Quite true, Zohra. Moral Science vanished from schools, and parents of the next generation didn't even notice, eh? I recall, we too had Moral Science being taught in our school. :)

How interesting that your Mummy opted to teach 'values' rather than language... Angrezi, Urdu can be learned even apney aap, likhney-padhney se, and anyone with the right skills (and degrees) is qualified to teach these (bonus: would be viewed with high regard among the elite - English & Urdu speakers). However, high standards in morals don't come with a bachelors, masters or doctoral degree. Yet, to teach these requires the teacher to be a person with immense grace, humility, honesty, and inner strength to be able to impart these values to young, impressionable school children.

So hats off to your Maa. It's not hard to guess who learned the most and was her best student in the school she taught at; and among her kids as a parent at home. :) Happy Teacher's Day.

Zohra Javed said...

Thankyou so much .... You are always so kind and generous
God Bless

Zohra Javed said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
sujata said...

Just reminded me of the way i was brought up, the influence of my mom. A mother is the first teacher and some teachers, subsequently, leave delible mark over me!! As always a touching article.

Zohra Javed said...

Thanks a bunch Sujata .... You are right .... a mother's influence on her children is always strong and unfading