Summary

of the
book

“The Art of Teaching”

by
Gilbert Highet (হাইয়েট)
Teaching in general:
1) Teaching is a very peculiar job. One of the great advantages of
this profession is having plenty amount of leisure time, as
teachers are not chained to a long hour of desk job.
2) Teachers’ one of the primary difficulties is that it is a very
badly paid profession. The average teacher in every land must be
resigned to/prepared for a life of poverty. It is perennial destiny
of teachers that their job afflicts them with anxiety and penny-
pinching. But this is compensated by some rewards-
 Prestige and respect, as people respect teachers a lot.
 Using their mind on valuable subjects. They are involved
with knowledge and it is genuine happiness.
 It is an incomparable happiness: helping to create a human
being; shaping the minds of half-formed, full of blank spaces
and vague notions and oversimplifications to full-grown and
understanding human being.

The qualities of a good teacher:

1) Teacher must know the subject he/she teaches. Every good
teacher has to learn and keep learning about his/her subject/s
every year, every month, every week, if possible.
2) He/she must have interest in the subject/s that he/she teaches,
he/she must like it/them. That is why a teacher should choose
his/her subject/s carefully.
3) A teacher needs to like the pupils. If you are a teacher and if
you do not like your students, then you should give up learning.
A teacher must enjoy their company in groups. But, after all, a
teacher is related with knowledge, that is why he/she should give
himself/herself a respite, an escape into a cool libray or a little
garden, away from noise and their devilish energy.
4) A teacher must have a wide range of interests of the problems
of the mind. If teacher’s mind is full of lively awareness of the
world, he/she will never be at a loss for new points on his/her
own subject/s. Nine thousand times more pupils have learnt a
difficult subject well because they felt the vitality and energy of
the teacher, it proved its value than because they chose the
subject for its own sake. Teacher should make himself/herself
relevant.
5) A teacher should have humour; it is one of his/her most vital
qualities. But humour must not be used to tyrannize the class
rather the real purpose of humour in teaching is deeper and
more worthy. It is to link the pupils and the teachers.
6) Good and creative memory, to help students in their most
difficult jobs.
7) Willpower. Strong willpower is needed to overcome sundry
resistance from students and imply authority over them.
8) Kindness, not necessarily he/she has to pat on the shoulder to
show kindness, but the kindness should be genuine and should
be expressive, irrespective of how it is done.

Knowing the pupils:

A teacher must know his/her pupils in broad type. He/she must
type/divide his/her students into different types. One of the
typologies is-
a. viscerotonic (fat, lazy, friendly, comfort-seeker)
b. somatotonic (of indomitable energy, vigour, alertness)
c. cerebrotonic (sensitive, clever, ruled by their intellect rather
than by their physical appetite)
This taxonomy is based on the ‘constitutional theory of
personality’ of William H. Sheldon (an example is given in the
last). This type is not absolute. Teacher should keep knowing
their students according to some broad types. But how much
integrate you use never be unprepared nor oblivious about
eccentricities.
“Always keep your relationship with your students
impersonal.”
“Togetherness is the essence of teaching.”
“One function of the teacher is to make a bridge between
youth and maturity.”
Teaching method:
Teaching has three stages:
a) Preparing the subject
 Teacher should give a summary that he is going to cover.
 Teacher should clarify to the students where they are
heading.
 Cut down/reduce monotonous reading and scansion to avoid
“monotonous routine” and “intolerable drudgery”.
 Present the subject matter of the course not as a shapeless
stream of foreign words to be read but as an intellectual
and an artistic whole.
 To be interesting one should be superficial. Do not bother
yourself for not being able to be too much pedantic, initially
(for a succinct gist see pg. 80).
 Teacher should take account of the new problems and
points of view that affect his/her own subject.
 Teacher should take notes what he/she reads/knows.
 Always read original text, additional literature obviously can
help but centre of his/her thinking should be the original
sources.

b) Communicating to the pupils

There are three systems of commucation.
  Lecturing: Here teacher talks continuously, more or less,
and students remain passive learner only.
 Tutorial system: Here teacher does not talk but the
students do, they ask questions. But questions are so
arranged as to make the pupil conscious of his/her own
ignorance.
 In the last system, that is classroom system, pupil learn a
specific lesson and it is explained to them more fully and
clearly.

c) Making sure that they have learnt it

The basis of this method, classroom system, is the study of a
single book or one set of documents or well-marked area of
knowledge. A teacher should not merely be a taskmaster, he/she
should not be a faultfinder. Teaching should not be a co-operative
endeavour. Then it can be expected that students will get
interested and will understand.
Teacher should use competition, because it is ingrained to human
being. But it should not be allowed to take its course without
direction. It should be used moderately with a touch of much
care. It should be resolved into a kindlier co-operation.
Punishment is necessary as a part of teaching discipline and for
establishing order in school. But a student should never be
punished for being failure in learning by blows. It creates hatred,
having a long-term disgruntling effect.
“Never understimate the power of a well-put question to
illuminate the darkness.”

Some overarching principles of teaching:

Teaching is not only constricted to teaching institutions, it is a
ubiquitous phenemenon. We all are teachers, in one way or
another. Here are some general principles of teaching,
1) Clarity. Whatever you teach do it clearly, present it vividly.
Make it firm as strong and as bright as sunlight, not to yourself
but to the people whom you are teaching.
2) Patience. Real teaching is not simply handing out packages
of information. It culminates in a conversation, an actual change
of the pupils’ mind. This change often takes a long time, so
teacher must adopt patience. In this regard it is important for a
teacher to keep out emotions. Whenever we sink to believe
that the more emotion we display, the more effect we shall
produce, we are reverting to our bestial nature and forgetting
that conscious reason is what makes us men/women.
3) Responsibility. Teacher should be cautious about his/her
ideas, it should be measured carefully, before presenting, what
effect it will bring about. This spirit should be handed over to the
students.