Tuesday, November 25, 2014

On Being a Student (Temporarily)

I'm not sure how much effort this blog deserves, at this point; I was letting it die without ever really deciding to do so, but it's possible that saving brief notes or at least clips on educational practice and progress will be useful in future, and I do scan blog posts anyway. So.... Teacher spends two days as a student and is shocked at what she learns - The Washington Post
I have made a terrible mistake.

I waited 14 years to do something that I should have done my first year of teaching: shadow a student for a day. It was so eye-opening that I wish I could go back to every class of students I ever had right now and change a minimum of ten things – the layout, the lesson plan, the checks for understanding. Most of it!

This is the first year I am working in a school but not teaching my own classes; I am the High School Learning Coach, a new position for the school this year. My job is to work with teachers and administrators to improve student learning outcomes.

As part of getting my feet wet, my principal suggested I “be” a student for two days: I was to shadow and complete all the work of a 10th grade student on one day and to do the same for a 12th grade student on another day....

It's an interesting story, and perhaps all teachers should do that... one or two days per year? There's a postscript to it on Wiggins' blog, at A PS to the guest post on shadowing HS students (and the author revealed) | Granted, and...
I was the first teacher in my school – in 1978 – to tape myself. I thought: well, coaches watch game film; why don’t I? Yikes! I was horrified. I had thought of myself as a good teacher and I was praised for being one. But the tape told a different story. My manner was a bit off-putting; I was a tad sarcastic; I was using phrases like “Well, it’s obvious that…” and “So, anyone can see that…” and I was not as skilled as I thought I had been in checking peripheral vision. I had missed 5-6 kids making a timid attempt to enter the discussion. Without my noticing and imploring them in, they fell back to more passive distanced listening...

It occurs to me that every class minute is a minute of "public" behavior by the teacher; perhaps webcams, available for view by parents, should always be on. (Or perhaps every teacher would immediately quit.)

No comments:

Post a Comment