Professor Elite Oshtine from Teacher’s College, Colombia University.
Back then I was a teacher and a student at the same time, it was very rough, but Professor Oshtine motivated me, and motivated the students to study hard. As a graduate student we had a lot of work to do, but she used such a phrase as “Don’t worry about this homework”, “It’s only going to take about 50 minutes or so.” So she didn’t put us (under) a lot of pressure, saying “Do this, it’s going to be a lot of hard work!” But I’m sure that every student spent much, much more time to complete our homework and were very happy about that because she successfully motivated us to spend a lot of time. When I teach, and when I teacher train, I try to use Professor Oshtine’s magic tricks. I am aware that my students, my teacher trainees, are very busy with their own lives and with their own work, so when they complain about not having enough time for their homework I acknowledge that and I so “Oh, don’t worry about that, do your best…” so I try to show sympathy… But it works! What usually happens is that they used to complain about not having time, but they spend a lot more time than they can imagine for their own work, and that they are happy and that they grow. So as a teacher and as a teacher trainer I always have this magic trick at hand, and try to encourage and motivate my students. What Professor Oshtine taught me the most was that it is important, not only to develop myself professionally, but also develop myself personally – to inspire my students and my teacher trainers.