Essay – How your teacher has influenced your life
How your teacher has influenced your life Essay: The traditional Indian education system has always been about the ‘Guru Shishya Parampara’, that is the ‘Teacher Student Tradition’. From the ancient times, the ‘Gurukul’ has been a place of gaining knowledge and life lessons from the teacher through practical ways of learning. The Guru or Teacher influenced the life of his students in tremendous ways. Moreover, since the students had to stay in the Gurukuls with their knowledge giver, the teacher often became a parent-like person in their lives.
With the advent of colonizers and the subsequent introduction of westernized education in our motherland, schools in India lost their originality and gave focus to bookish knowledge and competitions with peers as compared to importance given to personal growth in the ancient Gurukuls. The colonizers needed less knowledgeable ‘human machines’ to work under their British masters and not question their day-to-day chores given. Hence the education system introduced in the British Raj was meant to not enhance intellectual, but to make machines out of their human subjects.
The leaders of independent India did not do much to change the way of education. While essence of Gurukul system of learning is seen in Shantiniketan as introduced by the great Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore, the overall system still followed the British way of learning with minor tweaks across states and different vernacular zones of the country. More importance has been given to marking and competitiveness amongst peers and lesser importance to personal strengths. Every student is expected to excel in academics: in each subject, with little questioning about the practicality of the topics being taught to him.
I have been really lucky to be born in a family as mine, where my parents have been open-minded enough to allow me to excel in what I am interested in. I was never silenced on questioning my doubts or never told to get a hundred all the time. When I was in my Tenth Standard, I remember my school Biology teacher to be a bit boring and we students were seldom allowed to question him back regarding certain topics. I found that restricting like some others and we opted for private tutoring, and luckily we got a medical practitioner as our guide.
This is the person out of my family that I can proudly say has changed my life and how. A teacher, a guide and a brother: he has been all for me. He never made us feel that we were his students, hence the communication gap tremendously decreased between us and we never thought for a second time whether we should ask him a doubt. As a teacher, he tried to explain everything we asked: however silly the question might seem to an outsider. Because as he said, “Never control your curiosity, since all the inventions in this world first originated with some seemingly silly questions in the minds of the proven inventors.” This even enabled my introverted self to discuss my issues with him which I could not even share with my best friends. Also, these words always play at the back of my mind whenever I learn something new and try to research things by myself. As a guide, he tried to see what our internal selves actually wanted through our talks, and he eventually tried to suggest us ways to see henceforth. He was such a person who was able to see the inner you. We as students, or as he mentioned us as his brothers and sisters: an extended family of sorts were seldom able to escape his ways of seeing through our souls, he almost knew everything about every individual student he had.
Even now, after about seven years we seized to be his students, he tries to meet us at least once every year. As he says every time we meet, “We live in an isolated world. And irrespective of all the running we do for our goals, we should make time of our loved ones. Who knows whether we can meet ever again?” Hence, even when I feel my lowest and try to isolate myself, I remember his words and try to make time for my parents: my reason for existence.
Also See: Describe your favourite place in the world Essay in 700 Words