It is often said that teaching ability is more necessary for a teacher rather than ability to relate well with students. Some people might support this statement in that conveying knowledge is the primary purpose of education. However, I disagree that teacher should focus more on improving their teaching ability than on establishing a good relationship with their students. This is because a teacher who related well with students motivates students to study hard and to develop their social skills.
To begin with, students are stimulated to concentrate on their studies by a friendly teacher. It is common that people tend to meet the expectation of others who they care about. In this context, students are likely to pay attention to the class with a friendly teacher. Therefore, they would improve their grades. For example, when I was in middle school, I met a new mathmatics teacher. Althogh I always received poor grades on mathmatics, she never blamed me for my poor grades and she kindly encouraged me to be confident. Thus, I started studying mathmatics hard in order to make her happy. Finally, I greatly improved my grade on mathmatics. If it had not been for such a teacher, I would not have achieved the high grades.
In adiition, a friendly teacher helps students nurture their interpersonal skills. Of course, learning knowledge is important. However, what is actually more essential in a society is the ability to relate well with others. Students are able to learn how to establish and maintain good human relationship by interacting with a friendly teacher. To be specific, according to recent studies conducted by the Ministry of Education of Korea, students who experienced friendly relationship with teachers tend to be more confident and to have more outgoing personality and better communication ability than other students who did not experience a friendly teacher. This indicates the importance of a teacher with good ability to develop good relation with students.
In brief, I firmly believe that being related well with students is more necessary for teachers than having good teaching ability. For students who is still growing mentally and physically, well-rounded educaion is more required than learning knowledge. In other words, teachers are reponsible for not only teaching knowledge, but also developing students' social skills. |