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Education as inspiration By Yeshayahu Tadmor Tags: Israel News, Education The illnesses of the education system have but one remedy: The system must return to dealing with education. The prescription might seem simplistic and pathetic, but its strength is proven. The recent reports on the low achievement levels of Israeli students, similar to other frequent reports in recent years, raised a brief public storm, which included mutual recriminations by education officials and proposals on how we can extricate ourselves from the crisis. Most of the proposals call for greater teacher expertise, didactic innovation, fresher curriculum materials and stronger classroom discipline. Such improvements will certainly affect the advancement of learning, but only marginally so. When I was a school principal, at the end of every school year, right after the last matriculation exam, I would hold a talk with the fresh graduates about their experiences during their 12 years of schooling. Today I have the same conversation with young college students. Their comments are depressing. Many of the students, even the outstanding ones, say they "did not connect at all" to the subjects they were studying and found them "purposeless." In light of these answers, I ask other important questions only hesitantly: Did the students have formative educational experiences? Did education touch the existential issues of their lives? Did school contribute to their self-awareness? Were their studies perceived as creating a deeper significance? Did they have any uplifting experiences in their classes? Did school inspire in them a longing for spiritual elevation? Did school impart human values and strengthen their sensitivities? Advertisement After they have gotten over their surprise at these questions, their responses are steeped in disappointment and ridicule of the school. They are not being disdainful. Among them I find serious people, deep deliberation and a real search for a life path. They express a longing for direction, but only an infinitesimal few received it in school. Didactics, knowledge, learning materials and classroom discipline are indeed among the components of education, but they are the external trappings. The core of education is the intellectual, psychological and emotional experience that arouses in students excitement about existential questions and which, through the dialogue inherent in this experience, strengthens their awareness, forms their identity, creates the outlines of their worldview, imparts values and formulates their life plans. The teacher faces not only didactic questions, but also dilemmas about values and conscience, which feed into the following question: What educational path will allow students to find in themselves, from a place of freedom, the way to build self their essential selves? If teachers do not deal with these dilemmas, their teaching will be purely mechanical - uninspired. However, when teachers do perceive their educational role in this way, they foster a proper learning ethos at school and help their students to view learning as a main expression of their humanity and self-fulfillment. Students educated in such an environment will relate seriously to their sense of self, their value and their self-respect. Learning, therefore, is not disconnected from education. Curious and investigative learning, the kind that gives purpose and meaning, draws from the wellspring in every person. Education must focus first and foremost on this wellspring. When it does so, achievements in learning grow, in mathematics as well. My experiences with teachers show that when asked about their goals in education or their educational outlook, many relate closely to these concepts. In research carried out on what constitutes a "teacher of impact," responses included: "I perceive students as human beings, with all their personality components, and my goal is to help them find their way in life;" "I see my job as a teacher to assist students in reaching their full self and to uplift their humanity;" "I aspire to increase students' sense of responsibility to themselves and to their responsibility to be a member of the human race." However, this approach, expressed innocently by teachers, remains for many no more than a declaration or desire. There are various reasons that even those who can become involved in education on a deeper level, don't. These are the same people who avoid contact with their own existential reality. Thus they do not provide a response to students on questions involving their existence and they are unable to make learning valuable and significant. And learning that has no value and significance is destined to be shallow, with mediocre achievements. The writer teaches in the Jezreel Valley Academic College. He has served as principal of the Reali School in Haifa and as the head of the Levinsky College of Education. Bookmark to del.icio.us   The Eilat bus crash At least 24 Russian tour guides were killed in one of Israel's worst road accidents. Setting it straight Livni: Syria peace must involve more than just eating hummus in Damascus.

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