“Whatever is rightly done, however humble, is noble”

“Whatever is rightly done, however humble, is noble”

In modern life, everyone depends on everyone else’s work, as well as on his own. The danger is that each person easily gets to think that his/her own particular contribution is of no importance, and that it cannot matter very much whether he/she does his particular job well or badly. However, this view, in the days when one, or even two or three persons, carried out through the whole of a piece of work-say, making a cart drawn by a horse- it was easy to tell who was responsible if the cart was badly made, or who should get the credit if it was well and quickly made. But when one individual’s sole contribution to the making of an engine is tightening one bolt as the piece passes by him on a conveyer, it is not easy for him to feel a sense of responsibility for the success of the engine as a whole.

In a similar fashion, taken the human society as a whole, every person’s contribution to his own society is important as well as equally helpful in terms of development. Suppose a worker in an engine manufacturing company, makes a mistake, or does his part badly, the whole industry will suffer even if his part is very small. When the same concept is applied to an institution, it is the same. Every employer’s task is important for the smooth functioning of the institution. If we move from a single institution to a country, it will be the same again. Every citizen should do his duty towards his country for its economic, educational, technological, and cultural development.

I wish to conclude the idea stated above by referring to Sir Henry Royce, a well-experienced manufacturer who said, “Whatever is rightly done, however humble, is noble, and that is the foundation on which the sound economy of a prosperous and happy country should be built”.

Failure is not something that you inherit

I strongly believe that there are many exciting possibilities around you than difficulties, Perhaps you have been focusing on the wrong side of life not to use these possibilites. It is time to shift your focus from the difficulties and place it on something else and begin to enjoy your learning journey. Allow the power that is in your destiny to teach you something new. Don't allow external circumstances to disorganize your perfect and pure inner being.

I would say that failure is not your inheritance. Don't embrace it. Hate failure with all your heart, soul, and strength. Failure will never rob you of your socioeconomic development. You are bigger than your weight and higher than your physical height. Your courage and determination may be under constant attack by failure and yet you are capable of placing failure where it belongs: under your feet.

Wherever you are, whether employed, unemployed, hight profile or not, rich or not, young and old, rural and urban, national, regional, continental and international, one thing you should strongly remember is that you were not born to fail. Make sure that you do not allow failure. Resist it and it will fly away from you.

(The ideas stated above concerning failure which all of us never want to experience in our life time are culled from a letter written to Inspired, an official publication for Unisa students, vol 6 (3), 2010) by Convy Baloyi)

I hope the ideas mentioned above will help us to become valued and respected members of our community.

A good language learner or a good communicator?

When we think about ourselves as learners of a foreign or a second language, or think about our learners whom we teach. We generally tend to hope that we should be good language learners and we want our students also to be good language learners. However, there is a question before us regarding the view stated above because some authors such as Margaret Mead (1964) insists that one should become a good communicator rather than becoming a good language learner. Therefore, EFL teachers are left to decide what they want to be or what they want their students to be by referring to what Margaret Mead (1964, P. 189) said, "I'm not a good mimic and I have worked now in many different cultures, I am a very poor speaker of any language, but I always know whose pig is dead, and, when I work in a native society, I know what people are talking about and I treat it seriously and I respect them, and this in itself establishes a great deal more rapport, very often, than the correct accent. I have worked with other field workers who were far, far better linguists that I, and the natives kept on saying they couldn't speak the language, although they said I could. Now, if you had a recording it would be proof positive I couldn’t, but nobody knew it! You see, we don't need to teach people to speak like natives, you need to make the other people believe they can, so they can talk to them, and then they learn".