Bring back the teachers of yesteryear

Today’s learners might find this hard to believe, but once upon a time in Namibia, teachers were not merely educators.

They were an institution of authority. A roaming disciplinary committee with chalk dust on their shoulders and justice in their eyes.

A teacher could silence an entire classroom simply by clearing their throat. Today, you might need police boots on the ground to achieve classroom order. How times have changed!

There were no PowerPoint slides. No smartboards. No “interactive learning platforms”. Just a blackboard, a stubborn piece of chalk and a stare so sharp it could slice through teenage nonsense like a hot knife through butter.

These were the teachers of yesteryear – merchants of orderliness and wholesalers of discipline.

Their classrooms looked like small military academies.

Desks aligned with geometric precision. Exercise books wrapped in brown paper covers so perfect they could pass a national quality inspection. If your book was not covered properly, the teacher did not simply see negligence. They saw the collapse of civilisation.

Order was not requested. It was enforced.

Their classrooms had no internet. The only “network coverage” was the occasional goat wandering past the window.

If you wanted information, you consulted the only search engine available at the time: a textbook written in 1973.

English fluency was also a collective adventure.

Lessons were delivered in a heroic cocktail of English, Otjiherero, Afrikaans and pure academic determination.

Yet learners learned.

They memorised multiplication tables like sacred Catholic hymns. Parents were also fully aligned with the system.

If a child complained that the teacher had been strict, the parent did not rush to school demanding answers and the teacher’s dismissal. They doubled down on the teacher’s actions against the learner.

Today, such action would trigger a national summit on child protection.

Because now we live in the age of the ‘highly sensitive learner’.

In this modern, woke educational ecosystem, teachers must now approach academic questions with the caution of diplomats negotiating a fragile peace treaty.

Gone are the days when a teacher could simply ask: “Where is your homework?”

Today the correct phrasing must be something like: “Dear learner, in the spirit of inclusive academic exploration, what is the current geographical location your homework?”

If the teacher asks too directly, the learner might feel intimidated or, you know, ‘triggered’.

If the teacher raises their voice slightly, it could be interpreted as psychological pressure.

If the teacher looks disappointed, it might qualify as emotional bullying.

Modern teachers now walk through classrooms like people crossing a minefield.

“Have you done your assignment?”

Careful… that sounded accusatory.

“Perhaps you might consider doing your assignment?”

Better… but still risky.

“Assignments are beautiful things… some learners enjoy doing them…”

Perfect. Safe. Non-threatening.

Meanwhile, the learner looks up calmly and says:

“I’ll submit it next week.”

Next week arrives.

Nothing.

Another week arrives.

Still nothing.

Eventually the teacher must apologise for the inconvenience of expecting academic work.

In the old days, the teacher had a ruler.

Today the teacher has a policy document.

And policy documents, as we all know, cannot chase a learner around the classroom.

None of this is to romanticise the past too much. Corporal punishment deserves its place in the museum.

But one cannot help noticing that somewhere along the way the pendulum swung so far that authority itself became suspicious.

The teacher used to be the captain of the ship.

Now the teacher sometimes looks like a passenger asking politely whether the ship might consider sailing.

So perhaps we should not bring back the ruler.

But maybe – just maybe – we could bring back the stare.