Teaching as Mountaineering

[高兴娟]

There have been many metaphors in the mainstream discourse that are
intended to describe the career of teaching. For example, teachers are
engineers of the human soul, or teachers are hardworking gardeners in
the cycle of life. However, I hold the idea that teaching is like the
process of mountaineering, just as Nancy K.Hill narrated in his essay,
“Teaching as Mountaineering”. Nowadays, the classroom is student-
centered instead of teacher-centered. The students are the primary
roles. The process of teaching needs the cooperation between teachers
and students. Just as mountaineers climb mountains, they ma assist
each other in the ascent. If the student as mountaineer is to be
challenged, the students must come to each class session ready and
prepared to assist in scaling the next peak, ready to test his or her
own abilities against those of the master teacher. So the students are
ready to assume the role of guide-well trained in the art of
mountaineering, able to take controlled risks, ready to lead others to
a mountain-top experience. The aim of teaching is not what the teacher
has taught while what the students have learned.