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Musings on Training

In the education circles especially amongst academicians, you will get your head bitten off if you say that good teachers have to basically just be good people. Vociferous and often long-winded and boring explanations follow, mostly justifying the skills that teachers need to develop that these people earn their living building.

I agree with the skill part, but want to make a case for the attitudes that must come with, and the basis of these attitudes in a therapeutic experience of self discovery and reflection. Common sense tell us that our roles as workers, just like all the other ways we manifest our Selves is dependent on how developed that Self is. The more work done on the Self, the more potential is actualised and reflected in the roles we play. And thus, any hindrances to actualisation there might be, will also be reflected in the quality of the roles we play, including the work we do.

Supervision, mentoring, managing, ongoing capacity building, training and support are all words on the same spectrum that mean very different things to people in the business. To cut to the chase, the work done with an individual that stays through the lifetime to be used as an ingredient of change and growth by him or her, through any of these processes, only happens when these processes include robust work with the Self.

The only way to reach the Self is to accept it. The processes that must be undertaken to get to the point where one can reach the Self broadly come under the purview of therapy. Unless the process of supervision, mentoring etc etc do not specifically include as their mainstay, processes of therapy which can provide the opportunity for the learner to get in touch with their Selves and therefore attempt review and revision of the attitudes that are the foundations of skills and the use of knowledge, the learning process will not sustain.

Teachers (whether of children or adults) need to be in a position to identify the learning that is worth offering because the learner trusts then with a time-bound contract to do so. They need to identify and articulate the opportunities that need to be in place for the learner to construct their own learning. For this, they must have great insight into the learner - amongst other things, his or her motivations to learn, in other words into their Self.

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