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Copyright © Louis Schmier and Atwood Publishing.
Date: Thu, 21 Feb 2002 12:18:02 -0500 (EST)
Random Thought: On Teaching, I
The pre-dawn morning today was damp, foggy, and muggy as the
remnants of yesterday's rain hung around in the air. It was peacefully and
meditatively still. Still thinking a lot because lots of stuff that has
been converging the last few weeks. First, were my reflections on
learning and motivation. Second, my always successful resistance this
week to the University's requirement to post mid-term "progress grades."
Mixed in with them were, the rock-'em-sock-'em student initiated "Tidbit"
discussions on racism and feminism and flag-burning. And, to top it all
off, the students worked on and presented their Salvador Dali and Dr.
Seuss projects.
For both projects, the classroom was hoping! Chairs strewn about;
students hunched over easel paper or poster board, spread out on the
floor; student lying about in the hallway, a serious pose on some faces;
laughter on others; color markers, sparkles, string, cotton balls, and god
knows what else scattered on the floor; communities outside in the hall.
Textbook pages are being flipped, sentences being read, paragraphs being
discussed, fingers being pointed to words. The scene was a collage of
excitement, enthusiasm, creativity and imagination, movement, and noise.
All this poured over into the Library, on the quad, into the Union, into
dorm rooms and apartments. To the munching of doughnuts and cookies and
popcorn, they presented the projects. Gosh I wish you could have seen all
that. If these were the Olympics, each and every community in all four
classes--all forty-nine of them--would get gold! They got me so excited,
I even wrote them an open evaluation in the form of a Dr. Seuss rhyme.
As one student said in his evaluation of the "Dr Seuss Project,"
"It was just like the Dali Project. From what our community did and what
I saw other communities do, most of us have been in and out of the
textbook and over and under the material like earthworms turning bland
stuff into a rich nourishing compost heap. Boy, it looks like most of us
have surprised ourselves. I really can't wait to see us sing for the
Bruce Springstein Project and make a sculpture for the Rodin Project."
And, in this delightful confluence, I am asking myself "why is
what is going on going on?" I have gut feelings; I'm struggling to
translate them into words. The students, in their evaluations of each
other and the project offered me clue words and phrases among which were:
"trusted us," "had freedom," "respected us," "had to decide on our own,"
"exciting," "interesting," "safe to try something different."
You know, so many of us are so quick to ask two questions about a
teaching method or technique: "Does it work?" and "How do you grade it?"
In asking those questions, we spread the pernicious rumor that if
something, the lecture or discussion or project or experiment goes the way
we want, and the students' grades are good, however we twist and curl and
and turn and curve and weigh them, the students have learned. I once
thought there was such a tight, direct connection of the elements in that
progression. Then, about a decade ago I started wondering if that was
true. Now, I don't anymore, for I don't see the connection.
For the past decade I have been asking with increasing frequency
some questions of myself and colleagues. Recently, they have been
slamming me between the eyes:
Do we really believe students can be trusted to learn?
Do we really engage in a control system whose motto
is, "If we didn't, the student wouldn't."
Do we really allow students to decide, become involved, and get
excited?
Do we really give students responsibility to decide, to be
involved, to question, to think?
Is grading really what education is about and is education really
about grading?
Do we really believe that lecture is teaching?
Do we really believe that note-taking, test cramming, paper
writing, and test taking are what learning is all about?
Do we really believe that the student really learns what is
lectured.
Is what we cover really learned.
Are we only intellectual and information masons building a wall,
of knowledge, content brick by content brick by content
brick by content brick?
How do creative and imaginative people come from passive learners?
How do problem perceivers emerge from solvers of our problems?
How do manipulated classroom objects come out of the academic
cocoon as respected and respectful individuals?
How do students trained to converge emerge with the courage to
diverge?
How does imposed PC encourage diversity of thought, action,
and expression?
How do controlled passers of tests and getters of grades
metamorphose into independent discovers?
Do we really think that standardization encourages the
development of individual traits?
Think about it. Much of what so, so many of us do is composed of
taken-for-granted routines. Whether we have one technique or a variety of
techniques, we still have a routine upon which we focus. We focus on what
we do, we ask about whether something works or not, not so much to
challenge the validity of our routine as to reinforce it and make it work
better. And when a challenge arises, so many of us, like accomplished
gunfighters, in a blur movement of the hand, pull out and rapidly fire
our "That's not me." "It's not my personality." "It's not my style." "I
could never do that." and "I believe." When we ask whether a technique
works or not, we're asking the wrong questions. So many of us seldom ask
the whys of student attitudes: why are or aren't the students turned on;
why is or isn't what you're doing seemingly important to then; why do
they see or don't see the tasks demanded of them as they do; why do or
don't they come to class; why do or don't they get turned on.
So many of us are into syllabi that have emerged in these days as
"binding contracts," not mutually negotiated and arrived at by student and
professor. These syllabi are seen more as a protection of the professor
than the education of the students. More often than not, these syllabi
are laced in word and tone with flurries of warnings of penalty which ooze
suspicion and distrust rather than support and encouragement and respect.
More often than not, everything is done by us for them. Everything is
organized for the students, everything is planned out for the students,
everything is scheduled for them, everything is defined for them. We
impose a particular pattern and dirge-like cadence of study over which we
hold the threatening cat-o-nine-tails of "to make sure they read it" pop
quizzes and unannounced tests. Gobs of material are thrown out with the
expectation they will be consumed and then regurgitated. Education so
often equivalent to sitting still, being quiet, eyes straight, hearing and
writing down, "mastering" of a set mass of information, given ways of
thinking and doing. We engage in perpetual academic hazing. It so often
is a student vs. faculty gladitorial contest rather than a student with
faculty association in supporting and encouraging community. Students have
to tune into the professors' wave length. Taking an exam is not learning;
it's psyching out and/or second guessing. Students don't learn how to
learn, they learn about the teacher. What else do you think all those
bombardments of nervous questions--"What do you want?" "Can we" "What do
you think about...." "Is it all right to..." "Are we going to get graded
on...." "Are we allowed to...."Is this okay," "Should we"--mean? The
students give the prof what does he or she wants because all too often the
prof wants back what he has given the student--sometimes almost
verbatim--what he or she has lectured or handed out.
We assess them. We give them quizzes, pop or otherwise,
test, exams, finals, and then the grade. The academic record, the
course grade, the Grade Point Average, the entrance and professional exam
scores, all become the primary criteria for evaluation on the unproven
hope and silly assertion they will predict not only academic success, but
professional achievement as well.
For the first 25 years of my academic career I was one of those
professors. When anyone asked what I did, my answer was a quick throw my
title at them: "I'm a Professor of history." End of question and answer
period. Translated that meant I did as I had been taught. I was
subject-oriented; I focused on what I did; I transmitted information; I
talked, they listened; I crammed them and jammed them, tested them, and
graded them.
In beginning in early 1992, soon after I had my personal epiphany,
I started on an evolutionary course and began answering the question of
what I did became a more extended conversation of a staccato question and
answer period.
"What do you do at the University?"
"I teach students."
"Yes, I know. But, what do you teach them?"
"I teach them that they can be their own learners."
"What department are you in?"
"History?"
"Why didn't you say you teach history in the first place?"
"I don't. I teach students."
A translation of that conversation is that I was becoming
learning-oriented and student-focused. It meant that I wanted to be there
to help each person become the person he or she is capable of becoming.
Lately, I feel that, too, is not really what I want to do. Whether I
said, "I teach history" or "I teach students" I am beginning to see it
still says I guide, I instruct, I impart, I show, I direct, I lead. I make
known. I teach. Whether I have moved from being the proverbial sage on
stage or guide on the side, I still do. I am slowly thinking I still have
a ways to move, that where I presently am is still not where I should be.
Later.
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