Why Every Teacher Needs A Mentor
Every teacher has goals. The goal can be a promotion, mastery of a subject, increasing student engagement or even setting up a school. With a mentor’s guidance, you’ll be on your way to taking the right steps - here’s why:
1) We all need a person to just talk to
“Mentoring is a brain to pick, an ear to listen, and a push in the right direction.” - John C. Crosby [1]
Sometimes, simply talking it out turns a big problem into a very small solvable issue. Having a mentor means you have a person to share both the good and bad, without any judgement or fear of feeling embarrassed about your mistakes.
2) We need a second opinion
You’ve got a list of out of the box homework ideas, video clips and games but not sure how your class will react to them - a mentor can help you figure what will work and what won’t for your particular class. This will help you to confidently teach your class and try more interactive teaching methods in the future!
3) We need a little push from time to time
Like any other profession, it is important for teachers to constantly upgrade themselves and learn new things. A mentor from time to time can keep you updated with the latest tools and resources you need to keep yourself updated with. You can also go up to them for doubts or to clear the concepts that you have read about.
4) We need inspiration
Once you’ve got that push, you will need solid inspiration. Seeing your mentor pass an EdX course with flying colours is just the inspiration you need to get in front of your PC and take up a course during weekends or free weekday evenings, enabling you to better your skill set and move up the career ladder.[2]
Your mentor can be another teacher, your senior or an assigned mentor, just make sure that every meetup helps your goals. The best way to achieve the big goals is to take small steps, such as teaching with one interactive activity every week and slowly increasing the frequency. For clarity on the small steps, assign yourself the mentor and set up those meetings!
Dell Aarambh Team
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Aarambh is a pan-India PC for Education initiative engineered to enhance learning using the power of technology; it is designed to help parents, teachers and children find firm footing in Digital India. This initiative seeks to connect parents, teachers and students and provide them the necessary training so that they can better utilise the PC for learning, both at school and at home.
