On Teaching: "Ego-less Teaching"

One of my most important goals as a teacher is to remove the ego from my teaching. The more I think about it, the more I realize that the presence of the ego – the voice inside me that tells me I’m a separate, isolated, powerful entity – causes serious damage to my work in the classroom. It sets me over here and the students over there. It turns teaching into a subtle war when it should be a graceful dance. I don’t mean to suggest that my students and I are constantly engaged in conflict. No, if you visited my room you would see a fairly peaceful atmosphere, one where the learning appears to be happening in a harmonious manner. Compared to other classrooms, mine probably holds its own as a productive and serene place. However, if you could look into my thoughts, you wouldn’t see quite as much serenity. You would see a mindset of “me” against “them”— the teacher leading and the students following, me pushing and the kids being pushed. You would see my ego, a relatively large one, proudly calling out directions as my students perform in various ways. Most obvious of all, you would see that I am proud of my work, as though it is me, the ego, that is causing the learning to happen. You would see that I’m happy the kids are learning, true, but I am even happier that I can enjoy the credit. This is a sorry state of affairs, one that I am determined to change. Teaching and learning is an infinitely mysterious enterprise, one that no isolated ego can hope to understand or have any effect on. No truly great teaching can happen until the teacher removes his pompous but puny ego from the work, and allows the learning to proceed in its grandest and most influential manner. My ego has grown large over my 64 years, but I’m determined to beat it down so that genuine teaching can do its vast and harmonious work.