domingo, 9 de febrero de 2014

Mexico and education. What do you think?

Mexico is the country where I was born; we have so many beautiful places to be proud of. We have a hymn that is considered one of the most beautiful around the world, and our typical food, well, nobody resists to it. Even though we can presume of these characteristics and more, I have to be honest, there are some situations which I feel really sad about. Most people in Mexico are conformist. Why is it wrong? Because we live in a country where you can see only two social classes; people who is in the power earns too much money,  and people who does not have a job in the government literally “tries to survive”. Even worse, it is the fact that Mexicans do not do anything about this situation.  Many people complain on social networks, but just a few do something to change. In the book of Juan Sánchez Andraka “Un mexicano más” (2005), he expresses many of the situations we face as Mexicans. I consider most of the problems we face are product of the “bad” education we receive. Mexican government does not want Mexican citizens to think. Why? Because smart people is not “conformist”. The Mexican government does not want a new revolution. They do not want problems, they do not want fair people to take their places. But  let’s leave the political situations on one side. On the other hand, we have the educational situation. We have parents, and teachers who are not worried about  their children’ education. We have teenagers who do not see future in their lives. As Sánchez says “they do not speak about progress”. How can we ask them to think about the future if the actual situation they are living does not give them the opportunity of think about a better future? Why do parents force them to go to school if they do not see the point to study? I am teaching in Teziutlán, Puebla, in Mexico. I have talked to my students, and they ask me: teacher, why we have to study? We can receive more money if we sell drugs. Sometimes, this makes me feel like if there were no  more options. I always tell them, from the bottom of your heart: Is that what you really want? Because I do not earn too much, but I am really happy doing what I do. 
I really love teaching, for this reason; I do my best for my students to learn. But what happens when people who are called “teachers” do not want to be professors? , or they became teachers because they did not have another option?. They do not even care about their students. They go to classes, and pretend to teach something they do not even know. Sometimes as Sanchez (2005) mentioned teachers do not explain the topics, just because one student answers all the time, you think that  all your students understood. Some teachers go to the classrooms and spend the entire class dictating, they invent things they do not really know, they go drunk to school (teachers teaching with the example).  If you consider yourself as an “strict” teacher, you forbid many things (you must not speak in class, you must not run in the classroom, you must not throw things, etc). Why do we have teachers like this? Because we have principals who are the same way. They have power, and they waste it, they think they know too much. They presume of their experience (which is what they have being doing wrong) Do you really think with this you are going to have intelligent students?

Sadly, we have changed our values. Some teachers have lost their professional goals, which is helping to others, some have lost the interested in doing dynamic classes, some more have lost the interest in learning.

Let’s think about our role in the mexican society. Let’s change what we have been doing wrong. Let’s not expect someone to recognize our work. Let’s be a good mexican, in order to have “many good mexicans”. I want to share this phrase from Sánchez (2005):


“The education of one  person, it is the education of generations".

Bibliography

Sánchez, J. Un mexicano más. México, D.F  Costa- Amic, 47ª edición. 2005

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