SHORT BURSTS PREAMBLE

The author shares their experiences as a teacher, discussing a moment when a young girl questioned their work while they were reading on the bus. The author reflects on the role of teaching and learning in academia and how it has shifted over time. They discuss the challenges faced by teachers and the importance of provocation in teaching. The essays in the book reflect the author's attempts to address these issues. They also mention their background in biomedical research and how they unexpectedly became a teacher. The author acknowledges the military tone of the title and its connection to their upbringing and religious beliefs. They see teaching as a lifelong battle against ignorance. The author also mentions the concept of disclosure and begins with an autobiographical disclosure. Short Bursts from the Teaching Trenches is a series of essays about my experiences of teaching and learning over the last 40 years. In the early 80s, I usually took public transportation to work when I was working at a research institute that was part of Delhi University. One day a young girl who also took the same bus sat next to me and shyly asked me what exactly was my work. The reason was that she had seen me read books all the time on the bus, whereas other people of my age were reading either newspapers or chatting with each other or reading magazines. I was a little bit cautious in answering her because I didn't really want to tell her about my animal research, particularly as it involved rhesus monkeys. So I very carefully told her what I was as a research scientist and what that involved – the working, the planning, the organisation, the writing and the reading and so on. And after a while I realised she had actually stopped listening. She had a look of absolute horror on her face and she suddenly burst out. You mean to say you are going to be in school all your life? I thought that was a wonderful capsule description of an academic life. Learning and teaching are the wolf and the warp of an academic existence. In the mid-60s, Margaret Mead wrote, We recognise that a human being's most human characteristic is not the ability to learn, which humans share with many other species, but the ability to teach and store what others have developed and taught them. Learning, which is based on human needs, is relatively simple. The modern sensibilities run counter to that notion. The focus has shifted to the learners. Teachers are often seen as a necessary evil to be suffered rather than lauded. Even the very word is shunned. Teachers have become facilitators and coaches and guides and helpers or resource people or aides, since tailoring learning to the needs and interests of students would actually make them better learners. Though sages on stages may not be as effective as we once thought, teaching is a little bit more than sitting on the sidelines politely churring performances by one's charges. A few doses or small doses of provocation may actually help. The linked essays in this book reflect my attempts to deal with some of those issues that I have faced over the years. Stemming from my experiences, much of the focus will be on post-secondary education. I use the word essay in the original meaning of the word as a trial run. J'essaye has that tentative feel that I wish to convey to all these pieces. Though I will make references to published works, none of the statements here are the results of a systematic review, and the irreverent tone that may occasionally creep in is not accidental. Like many of my ilk, basic biomedical scientists have thought of themselves as laboratory-based. I did not set out to be a teacher. It just happened. At the outset, we felt that our research would define us, with teaching as a mere sideline. We rarely discussed educational theories or read any publications on the subject. We just snuckled down to it. But as time passed, many of us got excited or enticed into taking it a bit more seriously. I started reading about educational theory and took a course or two, only after I had been involved in teaching for quite some time. I have never really lost that in-the-trenches-face-the-bullets mindset that I started out with. Action at a distance did not really come normal. The military tone of the title may be disconcerting to many. The Canadian ethos leans towards spreading peace and goodwill, and we all boast from the trenches, maybe unseemly, but I cannot escape my past. My father was a career military officer, so I was surrounded by uniforms when I grew up. More importantly, though, one of the cardinal myths of my religion deals with a fratricidal war. The Book of Gita is an interlude in a long myth in one such war, the Hindu equivalent to the Iliad, but far more laden with moral overtones. That book has been interpreted in many different ways. I simply took from it the message that battles are inevitable, and that one goes up for lifelong struggles. The battle is all. Rewards are really not the issue. From that perspective, teachers are engaged in a lifelong battle against ignorance. Now disclosure has become a popular word, where authors expected to disclose their financial interests, if any, so that readers can decide for themselves whether the information provided is balanced or biased. In that sense, I will begin with an autobiographical disclosure, which may or may not have any bearing on what follows.