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Prabhakar Krishnamurthy

Professor - Management, IIIT(D&M)

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Who is a great teacher?

After going through different dimensions of teacher and learner; i am yet to find an answer to the following questions;
Who is an effective teacher?
Who is a great teacher?
What qualities make a great teacher?
How can we develop to be a great teacher?
What is the role of a teacher if everything is available in Wikipedia?
Why there is a need for a teacher?
We find teacher in non teachers like Buddha~ How do we explain?
Are we polishing pebbles and dimming diamonds in classrooms?
We find non teachers in class room who just take it up as another avocation to put bread on their table.
Please see Clifford Stoll's lecture ~ is it possible for us to do like that everyday?

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Topics: teacher
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    Nicholas Lukowiak 50+

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    Apr 16 2011: A teacher that holds true to a "trial and error" discipline at all times constantly and forever. Always adapting, always changing from does and does not work, adaptability, and awareness of what type of environments the students are subjected to outside of the classroom (maybe at home, with friends, or in the community as a whole).

    Wikipedia gives information and does not tell you how to take it in, the education of how to to absorb and to handle information SHOULD be in an educators job. Even in a democratic education system a teacher is needed to suggest topics, ideas, and as well as confrontational input on the subject at hand. Need a teacher even if it is just to start the original question.

    "Are we polishing pebbles and dimming diamonds in classrooms?" involving the academic system? No further conversation needed, yes.

    Buddha was a teacher my friend, anyone and everyone sharing ideas, asking question, sharing opinions about a topic, and challenging anthers thought is a teacher or educator. TED is full of them without most people realizing it.

    Remember where education comes from; environment, examples, lessons, experiences, questions, the list goes on. A teacher must be the person(s) that allow an individual(s) someone to reflect upon where we learn from.

    Why did you ask 'who' and not 'what'?

    • Prabhakar Krishnamurthy

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      Apr 17 2011: Thanks for a thoughtful reply. In my opinion a teacher is a great teacher if he raises more questions than he answers, if you permit me to summarize your thoughts. The most important question i missed as you rightly pointed out "What makes a great teacher?" is it possible to share thoughts?
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        Nicholas Lukowiak 50+

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        Apr 17 2011: Indeed a great educator questions and never allows the easiest answer to be the best one.

        A teacher should share thoughts but never preach them, by doing so they have to include all the different angles in which the topic is involved in.

        What makes a good teacher is a teacher willing to say I am wrong and let's figure out why.
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          Tim VandenBrink

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          Jun 8 2011: Occam's razor is the first thing that popped into my head when I read your first sentence, but the easiest answer isn't necessarily the simplest one.

          What I find about education is that no matter how lofty your ideals, or how profound your thoughts, they are inevitably lost if you don't present them in a way that makes people want to learn.

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