MC Le Anh: A teacher must not only smile charmingly and be easy-going, but also be mysterious and 'dominant'.

"A good teacher is like a candle, it consumes itself to light the way for others."That is the famous quote of Mustafa Kernal Ataturk about the teaching profession.

When talking about the teaching profession, people often use many beautiful words, but the Vietnamese mindset from the past to the present is the phrase "respecting teachers and valuing education". Vietnamese folk songs, proverbs, and idioms have the saying:“Without a teacher, you can't do anything”; “If you want to cross the bridge, you must build it/If you want your children to be good at reading, you must love their teacher”; “One word from a teacher is worth half a word from a teacher”... to see the role, importance of learning, and the position of the teacher.

MC Le Anh.

In the digital age 4.0, experiencing the Covid-19 pandemic, with 22 years of working in a professional educational environment, I have observed that the teacher-student relationship is now different from before. First of all, it is the dependence on knowledge.

For levels such as university and postgraduate, the role of the teacher is to suggest and guide students to find their own destination of science and knowledge, the level of self-study is pushed up. At lower levels, the dependence is higher, because it is related to the teacher imparting standard knowledge in textbooks and they also have the philosophy of the knowledge they want to bring. However, at the high school level, there is also a shift to reduce dependence.

Students today have the internet, books, newspapers, and diverse reference materials, which means there are more "teachers". The "monopoly" role of teachers in terms of knowledge no longer exists. Teachers do not simply impart knowledge and methods, but must continuously combine teaching and self-study, updating new knowledge, most clearly at higher levels of education such as master's and doctorate.

However, the students’ independence from their teachers inadvertently creates great pressure for teachers to position themselves and create value. If they fail, they will have to step out of the learning and teaching ecosystem. This is not a story of students rejecting, but society rejecting those teachers. This is a big change in today’s society.

This independence also leads to a change in the teacher-student relationship. Specifically, it is simpler, less hierarchical, active and passive, and the teacher-student relationship seems to be more equal. For students who mature early, after graduating a few years, they get their degrees, then become teachers of new generations, even just a few years older than the students, so this kind of formal equality is healthy.

Therefore, the distance between teachers and students is a sensitive issue.

There is a view that, if we look at it openly, should we erase the gap between teachers and students? This is still a question mark, is it good or not?... Some others think that teachers must still be teachers, must keep a distance from students, to create mutual pressure and maintain a learning environment, and cannot be casual "fish from the same school".

I think that eliminating the teacher-student gap is not entirely appropriate because students need to be motivated in learning, especially self-study. Therefore, they need to be pressured by teachers, not that they naturally become active in learning.

If you want to create pressure on learning, teachers do not always have to smile and be easy-going. Sometimes they have to be mysterious and “overpower” a little to make students respect them, or they will be embarrassed if they do not achieve the desired results of both teachers and students. Only these things can break the laziness of students, eliminate complacency, self-satisfaction with reality and some negative factors that lead to students not liking to study and not being proactive in studying.

Over a long period of time, I have contemplated the distance between teachers and students must be subtle. Many teachers are still struggling to determine how close they should be, or whether they should be close to students or not. In my opinion, this is also one of the issues of the times that needs to be discussed, how to determine the relationship between teachers and students, and what the distance between teachers and students should be.

With limited class time, in addition to professional knowledge, I always try to share with my students behavioral skills and communication situations. Modern students are standing at a crossroads, they want to conquer challenges, to express themselves, but they often struggle with how to do it, do not know what to do or easily make mistakes. Therefore, teachers should be the ones to guide them to find the most suitable path.

Many students earnestly ask me the secret to speaking well and being successful in public. I simply say: Read more! Read things that stimulate us to think long-term, to be aware of our responsibilities to ourselves and society, when the opportunities to live and contribute are not limited, from there we can integrate and become global citizens.

MC Le Anh