Student-Teacher Relationships

Posted by teacher on January 11, 2010

It is important to remember that every child`s relationship with his or her teacher can influence its academic success. The important dynamics to consider are whether or not there is a real communicative difficulty between the children and their teachers, and how do you begin to intervene to resolve those difficulties. As children learn and grow, expectations also grow. However, some children actually find themselves in vulnerable and sometimes even unfair positions since sometimes teachers actually do have personality issues with their students.

A unique aspect of such a relationship is that the student is, at the same time, both student and colleague. In a healthy student-teacher relationship, the student is encouraged and expected to be candid in responding to the teacher`s ideas, methods, or words. Part of a teacher`s role is to acquaint the student, not only with the specialized field that is shared, but also with the other leaders in the field and with the ways of professional and academic life.

In an academic environment, the mentor must also serve as an evaluator of the student`s performance. This role may be reflected in relatively immediate functions, such as grading, or in more temporally indefinite functions such as the writing of letters of recommendation for advanced training, licensure, or career opportunities.

Teachers like Guru Kelucharan Mahapatra, Pandit Jasraj and others resurrected the arts from the morass of moral turpitude and created a pool of young talent. We need teachers like them who understand the sanctity of the guru-shishya relationship and are able to inculcate the love of knowledge in their students.

The student-teacher relationship traditionally has held special problems for women. Female teachers have been particularly scarce. And when a man becomes interested in guiding and advising a younger woman, there is usually an erotic interest that goes along with it. What follows from that are many combinations we can easily recognize: producer and star, professor and graduate student, doctor and nurse, director and actress, and so on. There is also a necessary limit to the personal, social, or even sexual interaction that may be experienced between student and teacher without compromising one`s professional responsibilities.