For a long time now, I have had no problem looking in the mirror and finding something I like. I don't know how this came about, I come from quite a humble household. I guess at some point I got it in my head that girls liked confidence(said the single 21 year old with ego made in Texas) so I changed my wallflower ways and opened up. Honestly it's served me quite well. I'm still relatively reserved around strangers, yet I'm more than capable of articulating my points and getting people to like me. It has not been until recently that I realized I may need to tone it down.
Let me explain. You see I have this goal of establishing a classroom community which I think is vital for all classrooms. How that community looks and functions is solely up to the teacher and should be natural for that teacher. For instance, the two teachers I learned the most from in high school were Mr. Axe and Mr. Carter. Mr. Axe wouldn't dream of lecturing or really telling us anything. He simply gave us books paired with articles and gave us incredible discussion topics or essay prompts or let us teach the class anything about the book we chose. It was self-directed learning that drew upon personal experience; it was authentic and it was community. The second was Mr. Carter. Mr. Carter taught social studies and economics, and most of his class was lecture. Now don't misunderstand me. Lecture often has a negative connotation when associated with pedagogy, but lecturing is not bad. Again, it is all about the person. I learned an incredible amount about their content area, teaching and how to be a man from both of these individuals: both were very different, but both were successful based on their passion and community.
The trouble I am having with community is that it's a process. Because of my personality, I gravitate much more towards the Mr. Axe way of doing things. I'm laid back. I like students to do their own work at their own pace. I also love listening to them through conferences and class discussions. The problem is I have a lot of ideas about the books we read. So when I pose a question and I hear crickets, I rephrase it ( aka I dumb it down or ask it in a way that leads them toward what I want to hear). This is wrong. i am conditioning my students to avoid answering because they know that I will come in for the rescue. In the process their learning is stifled and the community ceases to grow.
Like I have said before, the root of most harmful teaching practices is fear. My ego makes me fear how I look in the eyes of others. What perceptions will they have of me? What will the silence that follows my question say about me? Parker Palmer talks about this when he speaks of the paradox's of good teaching, specifically good teaching values discussion as much as silence. According to Palmer, when I choose to end the silence, I am interfering with my students thinking and thus learning. Rather than allowing them to eventually be led to their own conclusions, my fears cause me to spoon feed them my own regurgitated ideas.
In Arthur Miller's play All My Sons, the character Chris says "I don't know why it is, but every time I reach out for something I want, I have to pull back because other people will suffer." Chris is speaking to a very fundamental principle of teaching/service in general: I come second. Building a community is a process. I had the pleasure of having Mr. Carter his first year, and every year i was in high school, and I can tell you he got better every year. I am not discouraged, It's just scary when you find yourself talking AT your students, ask them to quiet down so they can hear YOU, and all the sudden I realize I'm like the Dad who vowls he'll never parent like HIS father I just know i can do better!
No comments:
Post a Comment