By: Nadeem Mirza
Mind is the biggest blessing of Almighty Allah. It absorb, assimilate, and understand knowledge. Our conscious mind is active and it’s our front-liner. The reflective process of our conscious brain develops and strengthens the mind. All the while, our subconscious is constantly looking around, absorbing everything it can, and formulating our reality.
Many studies highlights that our conscious mind is the tip of iceberg. Our beliefs are the biggest treasure of our subconscious, based on the information we see the conclusions we draw, and the way we compare it to the rest of our reality. We do this constantly which influence us in each matter in each decision
Coming to the Education discipline which is quite a dynamic in its nature. Moreover, the requirement of present age in a typical classroom and its chores has put many hats on teachers head in order to help their students. This discipline has adopted many changes, still new thought arising every day. Therefore, a teacher need to develop or trained her/his subconscious according to good and effective teaching practices. Most important is to see that our student community is not coming from the same environment, they are not learning only from us, students may exposed to different media, sources ,communities etc so dealing with students should be taken serious on all levels either in classroom or policy making.
Secondly, to break this mindset that being a teaching is instinct. Ok fine many from us may follow the same notion but if a person with education and learning gain a competency to be a practitioner. As Blooms said our skill, knowledge and competencies are the result of teaching or practice. Therefore, teaching discipline requires the belief in this possibility: that people who don’t have teaching instinct” can be taught and thus improve. So, freeing yourself from self-limiting beliefs or doubts is the first step to being primed for action.
Thus, moving forward teachers have to develop a routine of retention without remembering in teaching learning process. Although there is much routine in school but as a teacher or for effective teaching routine is the key to open a door or to take students to a new level.
There is no single best way for everyone to awake subconscious. If we are going to meet the educational challenges of this century, then we must bring applied learning science to every classroom. This will require massive change on every level. But it all starts with a simple commitment: We should no longer consider teaching by instinct to be “good enough”.
Thus, reflecting on your teaching practices is one way to break your mindset accepting new dimensions of learning. You can talk to a colleague about a challenge you have teaching a concept in one of your classes. Read up on a teaching technique that interests you. Browse a journal. Go to a conference.
Become curious about your classroom failures and unafraid to talk about them. Science requires hypotheses, which are guesses that must be tested and can be wrong. If you are truly engaging in the science of learning, then you are testing enough hypotheses to be wrong about your guesses some of the time. You can choose to see those as your failures as a teacher, or perhaps as the failures of your students.
Hence, there might be challenges in your way because your subconscious mind causes you to feel emotionally and physically uncomfortable whenever you attempt to do anything new or different. It goes against changing any of your established patterns of behavior.
You can feel your subconscious pulling you back toward your comfort zone each time you try something new. Even thinking about doing something different from what you’re accustomed to will make you feel tense and uneasy.
One of the biggest habits of successful men and women is always stretching themselves out of their comfort zones. They know that complacency is the great enemy of creativity and future possibilities.
So, tap into your subconscious. Remember, for you to grow and get out of your comfort zone, you have to be willing to feel awkward and uncomfortable doing new things. If it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing poorly until you get a feel for it. Keep trying until you develop a new comfort zone at a new, higher level of competence. That’s why making a habit of positive affirmation is very effective in daily life for teachers.
Last but not the least I would accept this new era of e-learning have opened new horizons towards this subject. Subconscious development would be new pedagogical challenge in this phase, because medium is totally changed. To break mindsets and accept new endeavors that will surely bring out all of us from our comfort zone.
The writer is a journalist based in Islamabad