A teacher's experience!

A cycle locked and left on the way side!

That is how I felt when an undergraduate class I was taking yesterday had to be abandoned half way through the class, as about ten students sat in the back and disturbed by talking to themselves which became louder and louder raising the decibel level to distract me and some other students. 

Both students and teachers are people on a journey for advancing their learning. It is the students who enable the teacher to be resourceful and an enabler. It is the teacher who can help the students to unlock the path to learning by sharing their experiences and providing the keys to engage concepts for clarity!

In medical profession there is a fraternal relationship between the students and teachers as they both constitute the health care team for reaching out to patients in need. They are collaborators because the students are the first level of contacts with patents in a  medical college and the teachers are resources to provide the lead to develop their clinical competence for students to become worthy colleagues in the health care team!

I had a sense of anguish when I had to abandon the class as it became too difficult to stay focussed on my presentation when one gets distracted and feels emotionally weary due to a negative feed back. I felt the need to recover rather than act impulsively!

Incidentally, I realised that it was thirty seven years ago I gave my first lecture to the final year medical students, some of whom accompanied me after the class to converse about the subject. The lecture was about convulsions in children. It was the same topic yesterday! The only difference was that I was substituting for my professor 37 years ago at a short notice to take the lecture to batch of students with whom I had limited contact. Where as yesterday, I was asked to give the lecture to a batch of students, whom Anna and I got to know during the last four years and we had lot to do formally and socially! My first lecture 37 years back was by using a black board, but yesterday's was by using about seventy or so clinical photographs and pictorial illustrations!

What do you do when you feel waylaid by deliberate effort to stop you from what you are recalled to do!  A locked cycle needs to be open... some students came to talk over the matter and it was their way of opening the lock to restore relationship. 

Teachers too suffer when the students you are keen to reach out show a red flag to you! But in the medical profession, we exist for others in their service. There is no exception to this. This consciousness refreshes me and leads me to a journey of recovery to prepare for whatever awaits me next week when I have to resume the lecture! Whatever it might me, a teacher is for students no matter what is the return you receive for the offer of your friendship!

M.C.Mathew (text and photo)