Letter to the editor

The 8 November issue of Current Concerns is again incredibly good and helpful for understanding world events. This time, I would like to thank Dieter Sprock for his prudent considerations and strongly recommend his article to all teachers and parents. The withdrawals of parents and teachers from their core business, as described in his article, have serious consequences. We must remain as a model, a point of orientation, and as a not to be discouraged bastion of calm in all matters of life for the child and adolescent.
This task is taken over by other “educational assistants” in an unprecedented way. In countless parent-teacher meetings, I experienced as a teacher the deep desire of the parents for recognition and approval through the children as well as a lived partnership. That is a topsy-turvy world.
My request to all teachers is to not join this deep desire of the parents, but to focus the pupils towards the “Rudelführer” (leader of the herd) in a friendly way, to teach the subject matters with great joy and to guide the learning step by step., Of course, the new media have their place in the classroom but in an appropriate manner. The 5 billion digital pact of the German Federal Minister of Education, Mrs Wanka (please sign the online petition at www.bildung-wissen.eu) or the Lernfabrik 4.0 will not solve the deficits in education. Anyone who favors learning coaches, self-organised learning and automated learning programs has something else in mind. The human being learns in relationship with his own kind. So we continue to teach/live with empathy, expertise and joy – a core idea of this beautiful article.

Gisela Schopf