Teaching is not about the Teacher

The title of this blog comes from a tweet by Alice Keeler (@alicekeeler) last week in which she made this very statement. I of course agreed, who would not. Surely any sane person knows that teaching is a process. Or surely any sane person who spent 25 years in industry would right away see that teaching is a process (we can discuss if I am sane or not latter). Of course what she really meant was that teaching was about the learner. The educator in me had to agree and I have been thinking about this point for several days now. I do see teaching as a process but it is a process that should be all about the learner. This also ties back into something that I believed since my career shifted to education seven years ago that if the students did not learn then I did not teach. The real funny piece is that teaching did not occur if there was no learning but learning occurs everyday without the presence of teaching.

In the original tweet she did mention about the statement that it is "My classroom" so "My rules" can be a turn off for students. In certain situations this is 100% true. On the first day the teacher can set out some guidelines and discuss them with the class to come up with reasonable classroom behavior. This will get buy in from the students as they were part of the formation of the rules. This of course does not hold true on certain shops or labs where the teachers rules are really tied to health and safety rules. In these cases the rules are tied to curriculum and form part of the learning experience for the student.

In thinking about this and doing a little digging there are tons of things on what is teaching and how to be a good teacher or how to make your instruction come to life. What I really wanted to know was how I can tell if I am building my lessons, creating the teaching process framework, with the teacher or student in mind. This is what I have been thinking about since reading the post and I hope I have found my answer. If as an educator you are continuing to look at ways to improve the delivery of the material, to find that really cool experiment that will blow their minds. If you start building next years class with the thought of what can I do to make this more exciting and head straight to the internet to find something cool you might be on to something. Of course we need to figure out how to make it totally awesome and meet them on their level so we get the next best gadget to but in the class as well. If you are also one of those educators that can not wait to share these great ideas with your fellow faculty so that they can benefit from your efforts then I can say for sure that your teaching is 100% about the teacher.

I think my teaching is about the learner. I always started to build next years lectures from the point of strength for the students which means to look at the grades for the subject in previous years. I asked what have I done that helped learning to occur and what did I do that simply was fun but I really did not teach. I then look at the lesson plan and determine what I need to keep, what needs to be improved and what needs to be scrapped. Of course as I build the new lesson plans I do keep in mind the possibility of bringing out the IPads if required but only if required as sometimes they hinder learning. I also try and have two approaches prepared for subjects in which students have struggled in the past so if the students do not seem to be learning I can switch and move on. I am not tied to or sold on anyone method as the end all as I know I might be wrong in my approach. If you always ask will this help them learn and then try and measure that learning and adjust then I think your teaching is totally about the learner, as it should be. 

Thanks Alice for getting me thinking and learning more about the process of teaching.

Jeff

@j_rmurrell

When I stop Learning, I have stopped Living

I believe that it was Aristotle that first indicated that each creature on the planet was made for one special purpose. They could do more than one, but their individual structure was designed for that one special task. The easiest example of this is fish, they are designed to swim. Lots of creatures can swim but fish are the best at it. With this in mind that each creature is best at just one thing, I feel strongly that humans are best at learning. This is what we are designed to do. We hear, see and feel new things around us each and every day. We take in this information and then internalize it and think about it, sometimes at great length, and come to a set of conclusions forming a new understanding of the world around us. We as educators simply get to set up the tasks and activities for children to learn. We SIMPLY set it up and the magic of learning happens. There is of course nothing simple about it.

What we sometimes fail to see is that while we are going through the process of determining what specific activity we are going to use in the class room, what reading we are going to assign and what technological tool we are going to use to help bring it all to life, we are learning. If to be human is to learn from each and every interaction then you have no choice but to learn. Of course we have not even considered what actually goes on in the classroom while the activity is happening and you are interacting with the students or reflecting on the class and marking assignments. We as teachers and educators are lifelong learners. Of course "lifelong learning has become a strong catchphrase during current times, a slogan bandied about in conferences, symposiums and seminars" (Findsen and Formosa, 2011, p.1). I would suggest that lifelong learning is not a catchphrase at all but simply a statement of what we are.

The concept of lifelong learning has got me to start to question the idea of life itself and what it really is. We string it together as a series of accomplishments and milestones that are all learning activities. Life is not a spectator sport, it is meant for us to take hold and get involved and to learn. My grandfather said to me once when I was a boy of twelve that the day he stopped learning was the day he stopped living. I of course have tried to learn new things everyday of my life. As my parents have started to age and we consider homes for them to move into I have really started to question the concept of education for older people and wonder what we should do as educators about it. "Keeping old people in a state of inertia, passively awaiting death, is a denial of the right to citizenship" (Findsen and Formosa, 2011). I of course think that when I stop learning I will stop living so keeping me in a state of inertia with no opportunity to interact and learn is death.

I think that there is no simple answer here for our aging population. There are two things we as educators can do to help. The first is easy as we get to interact with the people who will be filling these old age homes 60 years from now everyday. We need to make sure they understand learning is fun and that they should never stop trying to reinvent themselves. By reaching out to them now we might help them build and prepare to always learn. The other requires some work. Would it not be cool to start an evening of education in an old age home in your community. I wonder what information and knowledge I would get from the interaction?

Learning is not something that only happens in the classroom, from reading a book or the exercise of study. Learning occurs in many forms around us everyday in our day to day life's.  I have promised my self to never stop studying and growing. To never stop looking to the world and looking within for answers to life's questions. I shall always look to reach out and try new things, go to new places and meet new people. To interact, explore and discover. My goal is to live and learn.

Findsen, B. & Formosa, M. (2011), Lifelong Learning in Later Life. Rotterdam, Netherlands; Sense