Learning informing teaching

In our professional development meeting we were considering the question ‘what does a good teacher in your faculty look like’ and of course many responses came up such as a good classroom management, engaging etc. We know these are good skills but how did we come to that conclusion?

In my year 10 class I’ve been talking about the teacher I want to be and the teacher I need to be and I made connections in terms of my teaching being a product of the attitude and behaviour of the students, however failed to make that link back to the students’ progress.

In a presentation yesterday, we were given a quote:

‘When you plant a lettuce, if it does not grow well, you don’t blame the lettuce.

You look into the reasons it is not doing well. It may need fertiliser, or more water, or less sun.

You never blame the lettuce.’

I started thinking about the fact that if you were to describe a good gardener it goes without saying that you talk about the garden; so surely when thinking about a good teacher you should talk about the student. Your teaching should be responsive to the learning.

In order to consciously become a better teacher I need to really think about how I envisage a successful student.

Successful: This is the word I’ve chosen to use as it is the product of all those virtues and attributes we are trying to encourage. My mission is to help students obtain success and I’m not just talking about this in relation to careers and money, but also in friendships, family, lifestyle and wellbeing. I want this success to be a lifetime thing. I ultimately want my students to leave school with the confidence to obtain their ambitions.

So I think one attribute that leads to success is confidence. What I’ve noticed is that some students seem to have a fear about being wrong. I believe that some learners view things as a polar extreme. If they doubt they’re not doing the right thing, it must be wrong; there is no other option. This clashes greatly with my subject as many tasks require them to think outside the box. Technology is an evolution and it requires imaginative and creative people to push those boundaries and question the limitations. I think at this stage in my thought process I’m referring back to John Moravec’s idea that education is about how to learn and not what to learn. If you stick to the content, how can you surpass that thinking? I want to be Freire’s (1968) door opener, not the receptacle filler.

My focus at this moment in time is to work with (I choose the words ‘work with’ as to avoid the idea of shaping) the learners to encourage them to be independent thinkers and have the confidence to explore and experiment, and question what they are doing.

‘The teacher is of course an artist, but being an artist does not mean that he or she can make the profile, can shape the students. What the educator does in teaching is to make it possible for the students to become themselves’ (Freire, 1990, p181).

#Learningfocusedculture #TeachingasInquiry #Professionallearning