The art of teaching "If you want to build a ship, don't drum up people together to collect wood and

don't assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea." Antoine de Saint-Exupry Looking for a common denominator among the few excellent teachers I've had, I realized they all share the capacity of sharing their passion or interest, depending on the pupil's receptivity for the subject they teach. Knowing that a great deal of my knowledge, interests and beliefs derive from the teachers who created that bond with me, I myself would like to influence other people. My biggest professional endeavor at the moment is to find the way to share my interest in learning foreign languages. What does it take to succeed? In an ideal academic world, students would be intrinsically motivated and teachers would constantly train to improve their teaching skills. The former would spend a significant part of their free time to studying and the latter to preparing their classes. The class dynamic would favor everyone's participation and the teacher would attend to everyone's needs. Far from that, we see a large amount of classes full (or if the system allows it, as in most European universities empty) of students whose only aspiration is passing the course making the minimum possible effort, and teachers that impatiently wait for their pay day, neglecting thereby their performance. Under such conditions there is mere interested obligation on the one side, weariness and rigidity on the other. No wonder this outlook discourages many potential teachers, not to mention the unfavorable economic perspective of the teaching career. A source of motivation for foreign language teachers is that students will almost always find objectives and, consequently, sources of motivation that transcend getting a certificate: for some, learning a foreign language represents a project with affective and personal value (possibility of a more intimate communication with native speakers and integration in a foreign society; speaking the language of relatives; understanding their partner; feeling able to rise to a challenge). For others, it has a ludic value (enjoying books and films in the original language; writing and speaking in foreign languages; travelling in a different way). In any case, the teacher should be a guide through the theoretic difficulties of the language (grammar, phonology, vocabulary), an interpreter of cultural differences (the cultural dimension is decisive for successful communication), but above everything a source of inspiration. I consider inspiration essential because any teacher's reach is limited: the guided work hours are negligible compared to those of a motivated student that has incorporated learning into his daily life. Having said that, what is the mechanism behind inspiration? "The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires." William Arthur Ward

Take, for example, the first philosophy course I attended at my university. With his faultless speech and clothes, his deep knowledge of the studied corpus and his willingness to dissipate any doubt through dialogue, Professor de la Isla inspired respect and admiration in the whole group. I give him all the more credit taking into account it was a group of freshmen with different majors, so that philosophy was something unknown to most of us. At no time did he recur as opposed to some of his colleagues to strict supervision methods: he had enough experience to unmask liars, encourage the underachievers and reward outstanding performances. Despite of his advanced age, he had a contagious sense of humor and was strictly punctual. He insisted on certain concepts that we had to learn almost mechanically, but he only did so so we could establish a solid basis upon which we would build a dialogue. In one of his essays, called "The University: the society's critical consciousness", Professor de la Isla claims that the essence of higher education is to teach how to think. Technical knowledge has a very short life and its expiration constantly accelerates. In light of this reality, who would not agree that a solid analytical and critical formation is more important to assimilate new things, to learn how to unlearn what has lost its validity, and to order and make decisions in front of the unsuspected? Analogically, I would say that a language teacher's main task is to teach how to learn. This involves helping to find and foster sources of motivation and putting useful learning tools at the learner's disposal, which, in turn, requires a lot of flexibility, since the learner's needs and aptitudes vary greatly. One of the main causes of boredom in class is the lack of clarity as to to the utility of the studied content. A possible answer to the question "Why should I take a philosophy course if I want to become an accountant?" is arguing that any decision-making process requires a set of ideals and moral values. However, this doubt doesn't only arise in subjects generally perceived as abstract, but also in most of them, no matter how "practical" their focus is supposed to be. Languages, by contrast, have an almost immediate practical use, for everything that's been learned can be easily put into practice. Besides, the progress is palpable except for the first few weeks, when the basis is set, which discourages many a student and goes on indefinitely. Another important task for the teacher is to recognize this progress and make it visible for his student. Finally, I would like to point out the contemplative aspect related to learning: the fact itself of observing how a passionate person discusses or shares the subject he loves awakens, through an empathic reaction, interest in the observer. On that account I believe that one of the teaching maxims is that we ought to love what we want to teach.

I would love to read some of your most memorable learning experiences. What made your teacher special? "Own only what you can always carry with you: know languages, know countries, know people. Let your memory be your travel bag." Alexander Solzhenitsyn