The article "What Makes a Great Teacher?" in the Atlantic Monthly was an interesting read. In particular, the actual "secrets" of TFA teachers made me giggle a little bit. I'm not sure whether to laugh or cry really, which is a feeling I have when I see almost any media outlet discussing "great teachers." When ABC did a short 2 minute bit spotlighting people that make a difference (2 teachers in this case) I was mildly mortified. Why? Because the reasons they were being spotlighted, much like those in this article, are simply characteristics teachers should embody. Perseverance, willingness to change, commitment, reflection, intelligence, etc are all traits that teachers should have.
None of the secrets revealed in the article were earth shattering to me. In fact, my own "research" (done via discussions with people coming from various teaching programs) shows that most programs stress those secrets to their students. I could get cheeky, but I'll refrain. Of course you want to be frequently checking for understanding. How else will you know if your teaching is being effective? Of course you want to revise your practice. If something is not working, or isn't working well, then you need to spend the time finding a way to make it work for your kids (not for you, but for your kids). Yes, you need to involve kids and parents in the learning. Yes you need to be committed to student success on a very deep level. Certainly you need high expectations. If you went up to 100 educators and asked them if they believe in these ideas, my guess is that at least 90 would agree with all of them. Now do they all actually do these things? I'm not sure what the percentage would be... 60-70%? Actually do them well? Lower than that.
What I found to be amusing was the mental math example in the article. Why? At our New Teacher training on Thursday we were discussing high access/involvement strategies for students. Hand raising is akin to giving kids a ticket to La La Land. As a teacher, you are allowing students to opt into your lesson, while others are allowed to opt out. Earlier in the year I did a mixture of this, along with selecting kids... usually after a prompt of "let's hear from someone we haven't heard from yet." That was part of my whole group instruction, and I did monitor who was involved. I'd then check with those who didn't raise hands as I floated during guided practice or independent work.
In this instance I'd have kids write it on scratch paper and correct with a partner (a mental math partner- done either as ability groups or heterogeneously). We do mental math as our morning warm up 2-3 times a week, and it is a set of 10 problems on the board that they do in a journal we created (construction paper over lined paper) and check with their shoulder partner. I then pull Popsicle sticks to solicit responses. If someone were to get it wrong after checking, then we do a thumbs up/down with another Popsicle stick with someone showing/telling the process and the answer. This allows them to see where they went wrong. In the example the teacher had them shout it out, which does a few things. 1) It could easily be a signal that shouting out (blurting out) is acceptable (low access to learning), 2) It provides little to no information that you can use since you have 20-30 voices going at once. So how are you really checking for understanding?
The last point I wanted to make was about the process. The process "I do, we do, you do" is far from new. What I would have enjoyed is seeing more of the we do, you do in this article. What does the teacher do during guided and independent practice? Are they pulling small groups (using the checks for understanding to reteach)? Is the teacher floating around to table groups? How did they establish the guided/independent routines, assuming they exist in these classrooms?
I feel a bit like I am slamming other teachers, which isn't my intent. But I do find myself a little offended when TFA-ers or KIPP teachers are spotlighted for their "magic" when non-Ivy League, hard working teachers are doing the same things (if not better) and receive no credit. Do I want TV cameras? Truthfully, no since that is another distraction and takes time away from getting kids to standard (and beyond). I simply want a more representative article of the teaching profession.
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