Leadership and Values in Language Education - Al Akhawayn ...

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58Proceedings of the 27 th MATE Annual Conferencepower to their students provided that these students have been trained in doingsuch tasks or using such power.A third quality in this portrait of a teacher as a leader is the courage to teach. Inhis book, The Courage to Teach¹, Parker Palmer maintains that “we don’t trustthe people behind know it all masks. The people with whom we have the deepestconnections are those who acknowledge their struggle to us.” Studies have alsoshown that the students usually follow those teachers who struggle to cater fortheir needs and those who have the perseverance and courage to teach. This viewis based on the ground that effective teaching cannot be downgraded to meretechniques. Teachers, by the same token, are not to be reduced mere technicians;they are agents of change. Moreover, effective teaching comes from the identityand honesty of teachers. More importantly perhaps, effective teaching involves alot of sacrifice on the teachers’ part. Leadership, in other words, can only beachieved if it is initiated by, and coupled with, ‘the courage to teach’. Mydefinition of the ‘courage to teach’ is that a teacher who has this couragea. knows that teaching is not about teachers. It is about students.b. believes that students take risks, which is necessary for learning,when teachers create a safe atmosphere for learningc. has the passion for all that he does and knows how to contaminatehis/her students.d. strongly believes in and instill in his/her students the idea thatlearning is not how much you get in, but how much you get out.e. identifies his/her strengths and those of his followers and build onthemf. looks forward to being observed and receiving feedbackg. identifies in his/her teaching areas of possible change anddevelopment since our teaching competence will not improve unlessit undergoes periodic in-service training. This can be achieved bytaking an active interest in current ideas in the world of languageteachingh. regards the class as a teami. finds solutions for problems before asking for helpj. has an ardent desire for distinction and works hard to achieve thisk. identifies and acts on the challenges ahead.There are other characteristics or ingredients in this recipe of ‘the courage toteach’. Likewise, though the list above seems to be long, it is not by any meansexhaustive. It is not also far-fetched or inhibiting. I believe that once teachers
59Proceedings of the 27 th MATE Annual Conferenceacquire some of these skills, others will be added effortlessly. Accordingly, I doalso believe that there is a mix I would like to call Teaching Leadership Mix(TLM) that ‘great’ teachers have. This mix is certainly made, among other things,of the love for the job, the strong will to be better , the wisdom to makeinformed decisions and the vision to meet the two targets : the teacher’s and thestudents`. This mix is not known. It is not in books. It resides in the practice ofthose ‘great’ teachers that have created other leaders. They have the recipe, but ifyou ask them about it, they won’t give you a satisfying answer. Therefore, it isimportant that their practice, which much of it unfortunately goes unnoticed,should be studied. The results of this study will help us draw a clearer picture orportrait of the teacher as a leader that we are looking forward to seeing in oureducational settings.It would be naïve to believe that the achievement of success depends only onpicking up positive qualities. Negative ones are also important stations on theroad towards TLM. They are not to be acquired. They are to be identified, foughtand eventually unlearned. Two negative qualities seem to be shared by a largenumber of teachers and have to be eradicated to pave the way to excellence inteaching. Perhaps the most serious one is the negative attitude towards a numberof learning and teaching–related issues. There are teachers, for instance, whodevelop negative attitudes towards a textbook without any obvious reasons. Suchbehavior undoubtedly blocks development by killing that ardent desire to teachwholeheartedly. The second bad habit is the reluctance to risk-taking that someteachers might suffer from. Taking risks means the opportunity to err, withoutwhich it is almost impossible to achieve improvement. Once teachers get rid ofthese two obstacles and others, they will be armed with the courage to teachefficiently.ConclusionI wish to reiterate that the paper has dealt with only some aspects of teachingleadership. There are of course other qualities that are not less important than theones mentioned above, but it is important to note that competent teachers orleaders are those who, while teaching, always attract attention, ceaselessly arouseinterest, professionally turn their followers' interest into desire, andenthusiastically make sure action which is learning takes place and in a very goodway. Once again there are teachers who are doing a great job. We do want themto contaminate as many teachers as possible. They have the recipe we need, butunfortunately it seems very difficult, if not impossible, to get to the rightingredients of this excellent practice. While educational experts are trying to find
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