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Steve Robson

Marine Industry

Learning and Development Consultant

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Is this true?

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I just came across this on another post...

"those who can do, those who can't teach"

What if you were good at "it" and then want to teach "it"?

If you were rubbish at "it" I hardly think you would then be teaching "it"?

Confused... :-/

6 Responses

  1. I agree

    I’ve always thought this a ridiculous statement; it implies that our teachers have no skill and that simply is not true.  I know people who have had very successful careers but have been unfilfilled after several years in the same industry and feel that they could put their skills to better use and with more satisfaction.  Being a teacher brings more challenged day-to-day than working in the industry of the subject they teach. 

    I think parents invented it to tell their children when a child didn’t like a particular teacher!  To make them feel better or something, but yes, a ridiculous, sweeping and confusing statement which should be banished from our dialect.

  2. Quotation

    Hi Steve

    "those who can …..do, those who can’t …..teach" is a quote by Henry Louis Mencken who was an American Journalist & Satirist in the early 20th Century.  
    He also said (amongst other things) “Marriage is a wonderful institution, but who would want to live in an institution.”
    Make of his philosophy on life what you will!
     
    Angela

    O D Innovations

  3. Quote

    Hi OD

    Oh I thought tthe real quote was…

    "He who can, does; he who cannot, teaches." George Bernard Shaw in Maxims for Revolutionists

    I prefer "Those who can teach should teach and those who can’t shouldn’t" Steve Robson Training Zone

  4. Those who can

     Well I agree with you rus. I to have seen quite standard ‘training’ positions were the training element has not even been on the essientials  of a part of the person spec. It makes you wonder how important training is seen by recruiters.  I also would change the saying to those who can  teach the others who cant.

  5. Some truth in it?

    Hi,

    I have always thought that there may be some truth in this statement. Often people who can ‘do it’ don’t actually understand what it is they do to do it well, becasue it has come easily to them. Other people, who perhaps can’t do it, have tried all sorts of ways of learning how to do it, but cannot – so perhaps the latter group make the more effective teachers?

    Paul

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Steve Robson

Learning and Development Consultant

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