Challenging the teaching… challenging the teacher…

Not a day goes by without me hearing one teacher or another complain that students don’t want to learn… or don’t work at what they should learn… which is too often true but again not a day goes by without me seeing that most teachers start their career and finish it exactly as they started it !

And those people expect their students to change ? When they never venture into new approaches ? Never buy any now books ? Never scout for new tools ? Not on your nelly ! I would even say that those people have no right to complain… not to mention those teachers who never question themselves and always think they are right… a teacher is only right until proved wrong…

Times changes… and we’ve all got to move with the times… starting with teachers… teachers should be at the forefront of change… on the frontline… without going as far as some at the other end of the spectrum who will try anything and change all the time… thus only resulting in confusing their students…

I see a lot of good effort all over the world in people who, like me, try and offer new support and new material… often to remain unchallenged… most of the mob go for comfort, and when they do use material, go for what the big publishing houses stuff them with… which we know is not the answer as that’s precisely what those publishers have been offering for donkey’s years and send the students back to studying year after year for decades on end… and when those students arrive beaten face to face with a teacher that teacher proffers exactly the same –or the same kind of- material ! What and how much will it take for teachers to understand ?

People and teachers developing new and original teaching and study material should be snowed under with requests from teachers… but no… not in the least…

I have had 2 major publishing houses ask me if I would agree to have my material tested before they think about publishing it… or not… material I had been using year after years for 5 years with 300 students every year… and that, not only worked very well, but was used and remembered for years on end ! Some of those students I met again 15 years later in my university teaching… who remembered how much they enjoyed my teaching and my material ! None of them could remember a single teacher or book they had used in the 15 years gap !

And those two publishing houses asked ME whether I would agree to testing ? had they been listening to me ? Not one of them –like any other publisher and often author- had ever been near a student ! And they ask ME if I would mind ? Without thinking twice about their own policies…

It’ll come as no surprise when you hear that those big publishing houses who rule the roost yield material that completely fails to meet their targeted audiences and fail commercially altogether… those big publishing houses have even pushed it to reediting collections in new editions… and have now for years not yielded anything new… My books sell ! My only trouble is I’m the only one to sell them… and I can only wish the same for people like me… and that one day teachers will see the light… as books and audio material are the number one tool of both teachers and students !

Jesse CRAIGNOU

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http://www.amazon.co.uk/Jesse-CRAIGNOU/e/B00CMJY4HM/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_16?qid=1458840606&sr=1-16