I made this comment elsewhere not so very long ago, and I'm going to make it again here. I think, because you find this comment/truism/whatever frustrating, it may be worth a little reframing of it.
I think there is wisdom in it, when you consider it to mean this:
Those who can, right now, do this thing, should do it, and those who cannot (but previously could), because they are either past their prime, or injured, or whatever, should teach others how to do it, and maybe even have, socially, the obligation to do so.
That is, one meaning could be is that when one has a skill, and is not able to use it, one ought to pass it on. See: most professional coaches of sports, or grandmothers overseeing the season's canning of food, or even grandfathers teaching their grandkids to whittle and over time the skill passes on or shifts focus, when Grandpa's hands are arthritic but he can still tell little Johnny or Janey what could be done differently.
Anyway. I'm not saying this is what people mean by it all the time, nor even that this was the origination of the phrase. I'm only saying, if it is frustrating to hear it and hear only the condemnation of teachers, then it might be worth trying to hear it to mean this. I know a lot of folks hear it to mean "if you can't do anything worth a damn, then whee, be a teacher," and I suspect some would-be teachers understand it this way as well, and therefore expect this to be an easy job, but those of you who do take the task seriously, I choose to think that's not what it means to you at all.
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momijizukamori
no subject
Date: 2008-05-02 05:02 pm (UTC)I made this comment elsewhere not so very long ago, and I'm going to make it again here. I think, because you find this comment/truism/whatever frustrating, it may be worth a little reframing of it.
I think there is wisdom in it, when you consider it to mean this:
Those who can, right now, do this thing, should do it, and those who cannot (but previously could), because they are either past their prime, or injured, or whatever, should teach others how to do it, and maybe even have, socially, the obligation to do so.
That is, one meaning could be is that when one has a skill, and is not able to use it, one ought to pass it on. See: most professional coaches of sports, or grandmothers overseeing the season's canning of food, or even grandfathers teaching their grandkids to whittle and over time the skill passes on or shifts focus, when Grandpa's hands are arthritic but he can still tell little Johnny or Janey what could be done differently.
Anyway. I'm not saying this is what people mean by it all the time, nor even that this was the origination of the phrase. I'm only saying, if it is frustrating to hear it and hear only the condemnation of teachers, then it might be worth trying to hear it to mean this. I know a lot of folks hear it to mean "if you can't do anything worth a damn, then whee, be a teacher," and I suspect some would-be teachers understand it this way as well, and therefore expect this to be an easy job, but those of you who do take the task seriously, I choose to think that's not what it means to you at all.