To Give or Not to Give by Claudio V. Tabotabo, MA (October, 2005)

A student's mind is hardened by idleness. Motivation alone lubricates it. And it is the lubricated mind that is capable of learning.

At home there is no learning environment. There are no books or any forms of reading materials. What is at home is a TV. set where children try to impersonate the stupidity of some personalities. Parents cannot motivate them. The parents are busy and the contact hours between parents and children are too narrow. Gone were the days when parents and children eat together and talk about matters that concern life.

Aware of their in-accessibility to the children, parents sent their kids to school in the hope that the "experts" there can open the minds of the children.

To open the minds of the children is a need and to touch their hearts is itself a teaching the basic reason why a teacher is there in school. This means that if a teacher feels he is incapable of touching the children's heart, then he must pursue another occupation. He must give way for others who can inspire the students to wander the world of wisdom.

A series of seminars tells us always to give what we have. It sounds very ordinary and boring that even the sidewalk vendors are tired of listening to it. But we cannot motivate the students to read if we ourselves are not readers. We cannot simply tell the students to buy and read the books of Dumas, Zola, Steinbeck, and Shakespeare.

Teachers must always be readers. A businessman with the kind of his profession makes no difference if he reads or not. But a teacher who does not read is like a rower who does not row or a carpenter who goes to work without a hammer, his basic tool as carpenter.

A student' brain is dry. The teacher must water it with motivation but let the teacher motivates himself first.