Most of us have heard the quote, “Winners don’t do different things. They do things differently.” The outliers or professionals who excel in their fields often do some things differently than the rest. In the field of education, a teacher’s success is measured by how well their students perform. A multitude of factors goes into achieving a high student learning outcome, the knowledge level of the teacher, being just one of them. Today, online teaching has become the norm in education. Achieving success in teaching on an online live classes app requires a different set of skills than those needed in traditional offline classrooms. The quality of students’ learning generally centers on an individual connection with the educator who inculcates curiosity and passion in the student for their subject. Certainly, a teacher’s knowledge and proficiency in the subject do play a pivotal role in his success, but the first and most vital question that needs to be asked is: Are the educators able to engage their students? Here are a few things that a successful teacher does differently….
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Successful teachers Have Well defined Goals:
We can’t hope to reach anywhere by embarking on a ship without any sense of direction. In order to reach somewhere, we need a navigation system and a GPS. In the field of education, the goals which a teacher sets for his students act as the navigation system which ferries them to their destination. A teacher’s plans are the maps on the GPS. In other words, making a well-defined plan provides a framework that guides students’ creativity and learning.
Successful teachers give their students genuine praise-
Praise and encouragement from his teachers go a long way in boosting a student’s morale. However, in order to help students in reaching their potential, it is equally important that the encouragement is authentic. It does more harm than good if you praise their work when it is clear that it is less than half of their actual potential. You don’t want to reward mediocrity in your students and teach them to live up to their true potential.
Successful teachers are well trained and seek help themselves-
We never stop learning and neither can we ever achieve perfection in anything in the truest sense of the term. We can only work relentlessly towards perfection. A successful teacher understands the need to continuously improve and update oneself. There are numerous teacher training courses available for educators to upskill themselves in each area of pedagogy. Moreover, everyone needs a mentor, someone a wee bit older and wiser than ourselves to support us in times of aimlessness and distress and provide us a different perspective. A successful teacher ensures that he has good mentors in his life.
Successful teachers love teaching-
A teacher who enjoys their work is often successful in achieving a high student learning outcome. It is often said that love what you do and you won’t have to work for another day in your life. If you don’t enjoy teaching, it will reflect in your teaching. If you don’t enjoy teaching, try to figure out the reasons for the same. It might have something to do with what you expect from your students and from your job. By properly managing your expectations, you might start to enjoy your work and eventually become damn good at it.
Successful teachers encourage active learning-
It is well established direct instructions are not an efficient way of creating that understanding in a student’s mind which you wanted from your class. Compared to instruction-based learning, active learning is highly effective in terms of promoting student learning outcomes. An active learning environment involves students at the center of the learning process, thereby encouraging student engagement. Successful teachers find ways to make their class as engaging as possible to help students to take away more from their class.
Successful teachers make their class fun and enjoyable-
As a teacher, your supreme goal is student learning. Therefore, you should try to keep the environment in your class natural and a bit fun as opposed to being serious and grumpy all the time. Successful teachers let students have their moments of enjoyment in the classroom so that students don’t get bored and disengaged with the material.
These are some things that successful teachers tend to do differently. Anyone looking to become a teacher can apply these tips to become a more popular and successful educator.