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The word for today is…
docile (adj) – 1. Ready and willing to be taught; teachable.
- Yielding to supervision, direction, or management; tractable.
Source : The Free Dictionary
Etymology : Docile students can make teaching a lot easier. Nowadays, calling students “docile” indicates they aren’t trouble-makers; however, there’s more than just good behavior connecting docility to teachability. The original meaning of docile is more to the point: “readily absorbing something taught.” “The docile mind may soon thy precepts know,” rendered Ben Jonson, for example, in a 17th-century translation of the Roman poet Horace. Docile comes from Latin doc?re, which means “to teach.” Other descendants of doc?re include doctrine (which can mean “something that is taught”), document (an early meaning of which was “instruction”), and doctor and docent (both of which can refer to college teachers).
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