British wrestling champion and RE teacher, Mark Cocker (appropriate), was asked to decide on between a job in training or sport. Photograph: Mark Cocker
Mark Cocker is deputy head at Sale Substantial College, Better Manchester. As properly educating RE, he is a British wrestling champion who continues to compete internationally.
Wrestling and RE are a match made in heaven. For some men and women, to go from wrestling to being an RE teacher appears weird. But in fact it was a logical phase because I knew from my sporting expertise that I liked to work with younger people and I knew from my knowledge studying philosophy at Manchester University that I loved religious studies. It was perfect for me and I have never looked back.
My enjoy of wrestling has always gone side by side with my passion for schooling. Sport has been a stabilising characteristic of my life. It is constantly been there, by means of college and college. In contrast to numerous young athletes, I have caught at it and there’s in no way been a level when I stopped currently being a wrestler to turn out to be anything different. There was a time at the end of university when they informed me to choose among a profession in training or sport. That wasn’t a decision I was inclined to get. People seemed to imply that you couldn’t have the two. I was specified that if I worked difficult, I could compete in sport at an elite level and remain in training.
Even though it’s been actually hard operate and taken plenty of sacrifice, at the finish of it all I can stand in front of my students and inform them it’s about how considerably you want something and how much you feel in it. That is what truly will get you to your objective. The lesson for college students is that it is not always about compromise. Sometimes if you have the function ethic, you can have the best of the two worlds.
When college students hear I am a wrestler, they realise there’s a particular person behind the instructor. It does absolutely spark curiosity in the classroom. They’re quite curious as to how I manage to balance currently being a teacher with currently being an athlete and there are a whole lot of questions all around whether that’s in fact attainable. They are usually keen to discover out how I deal with to fit it all in. I speak to the college students about how the issues that make you successful in sport also assist you in your existence and career. Factors like dedication, aim-setting, and focussing on obtaining targets.
People think that simply because you are a wrestler you get no troubles in the classroom but it truly is not simple engaging youngsters, specially in RE. Folks usually stereotype the topic as a instrument to preach, but in fact it truly is the opposite. It’s in essence a examine of what it indicates to be human. Whether you are religious or not, RE need to be accessible to all.
I in no way see college students as numbers or targets, I often see them as people. Teaching is about striking up relationships and engaging young folks. Consider religious training, for instance. The subject challenges college students to believe about huge philosophical questions, about why individuals pick religion and what it indicates to be human. But RE can grow to be extremely fragmented and not very engaging if students will not see why they are doing it. It is about obtaining some frequent ground and making certain each student in the area has some thing they can relate to in the subject, irrespective of no matter whether they are a Christian, a Jew, Muslim or atheist.
Good RE educating in schools is crucial today and in the future. I don’t see how anyone of any religious or non-religious persuasion could make a good argument for upsetting the location of RE in British training. It’s the a single lesson in college where we get a likelihood to check out problems of morality, ethics and social obligation.
College isn’t just about currently being a factory that turns out numbers, grades and outcomes. We are also sending college students out into the globe as well-rounded men and women with an understanding of the religions and cultures of the people all around them. RE plays a essential part in enabling younger grownups to be capable to do that.
My favourite area is in the classroom in front of the students. One of the biggest challenges is to get certain students to see the possible that, as a teacher, you see in them. But there is no larger reward than when that youngster begins to feel in themselves.
Wrestling with a teaching career: the classroom vs the ring
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