My parents, both educators, decided that I shouldn’t become a teacher. “You don’t like kids,” they told me. I have managed to avoid reminding them of this prediction, as well as the one they made about my decision to abandon playing the violin (“You’ll regret it,” they proclaimed. I still don’t.).
Much to my amazement, I have been a teacher for nearly 30 years. I have worked as a teacher educator at KU since 1978. During this time, I have taught children from preschool through high school and a broad span of adults in undergraduate and graduate courses. I teach and coordinate graduate courses leading to a certificate in gifted education, and I also teach courses in instructional theory and creative thinking. Next year I will have the opportunity to teach a new course, The Reflective Practitioner, in our undergraduate program. The opportunity to pause and reflect on who I have become as a teacher came at just the right time, as I develop the course designed to prepare our students for student teaching.
Fits and starts
My early exposure to teaching from the teacher’s side of the desk was less than encouraging. After working in student affairs for a few years, I entered a doctoral program in educational psychology. If I was going to prepare future teachers, clearly I needed an experiential base from which to draw. My advisor arranged for me to teach American history and world literature in two nearby high schools. I had very little by way of resources or collegial support. I was so anxious that I prepared elaborate lectures and read my notes to my classes. I nearly put myself to sleep along with the students. Fortunately, the simulations I enacted were more successful. The students became deeply involved in the activities and performed well on unit achievement tests. I became a fan of inductive learning—putting students into puzzling situations in which they are presented with evidence they must dissect in order to discover underlying operating principles.
The next year, as a graduate teaching assistant in an introductory educational psychology course, I was in charge of a weekly 90-minute discussion section with college juniors. I was a dreadful instructor. The first time I was observed I had an image of myself falling off a cliff while I stood by helplessly. Steve, the professor who taught the lectures and oversaw the GTAs, was a terrific supervisor and a model of reflection on the mechanics of teaching. His feedback consisted of a running narrative, minute by minute, including very concrete suggestions (like “When a student asks you a question, don’t back away. Move in closer so that you demonstrate you value the question and the student for asking it” and “Smile at the students occasionally. Act like you like them”). He urged me to partner with another assistant and do exactly as she did. I followed Steve’s instructions, and I started to experience some success. I still have some of those notes, complete with margin instructions about when to pause, ask a class questions or insert a humorous anecdote.
The biggest assist was the weekly meeting of all four or five teaching assistants. Steve talked with us about the goals for that week’s topic. We constructed discussion points and class activities to fit the goals and concepts. He provided additional readings to inform our presentation of key concepts. We were expected to attend his lectures, and he included us in class demonstrations. Some of them seemed pretty goofy to me, but they made principles of learning come alive for the students—and I relaxed more about performing in front of a large group (about 150 students). In our meetings, we also talked about the previous week’s class. Steve invited us to unpack his teaching style and the lecture content. He reciprocated with comments about his observations of our discussion sections. He was highly effective at noticing what we were doing better and commenting on those improvements. I began to think of teaching as interesting, and the enterprise of enticing students to learn as intriguing rather than threatening. I also started to value the contributions of a teaching community of peers to my emerging practice.
Before I graduated, Steve and I had a heart-to-heart in which he talked about his experiences in learning how to teach. I was shocked to find that he, too, had been shy. His most powerful model, coincidentally, was the person I was replacing at the University of Kansas (they were both at Purdue at the time). He described in detail the aspects of Don’s teaching style that made him a compelling lecturer, and he encouraged me to keep looking for models and to adapt aspects of their styles that I thought were effective.
Armed with this minimal success and other happy experiences leading workshops for teachers, I arrived at KU. I was so lacking in self confidence that in a graduate course on learning in school situations, I ordered three textbooks for the students so that they could choose the one that fit their needs best. What a management nightmare. My first three years at KU were challenging. I was young and my students were older than I. Establishing credibility was difficult. I had no guidance that could help me continue to improve my teaching. I used the student feedback on the campus-wide Curriculum and Instruction survey to target for improvement various aspects of my teaching, but teaching was more anxiety-producing than pleasurable.
Hitting my stride
The turning point for me was to take on teaching a large lecture class, Introduction to Learning, a course taken by juniors who were newly admitted to the School of Education. At last—an opportunity to create a reflective teaching community similar to the one that was so valuable for me in graduate school. For inspiration I drew on my memories of Steve’s confident, almost brash persona. I expanded my repertoire of models for my teaching self by imagining myself as Phil Donohue, a talk show host popular at that time. I left the safety of the podium in the old auditorium in 303 Bailey Hall and sashayed into the audience with my microphone, soliciting opinions, stimulating conversations. We adapted popular game shows to illustrate key concepts about learning. The students came to class, and even more wonderful, they stayed awake! My graduate assistants were my intrepid fellow voyagers joining me on a quest to keep learners engaged. Our checks on student learning consisted of short quizzes, multiple-choice tests and a brief teaching episode. I used the item analyses to re-grade tests in situations where it was clear that either a majority of students hadn’t learned the material or the test item was seriously flawed. The number of students challenging their scores became miniscule. However, we also reviewed and reworked the ways in which the concepts were taught. Even more powerful, we shared the information with the class. They were prospective teachers, after all.
I had an epiphany—I could model the practices I would like my students to use as teachers. My dread of student judgments of my teaching faded as I reframed my view of the teaching experience as an opportunity to (as Dennis Dailey, professor emeritus in social welfare, urged me) “be a teaching.” This has become a powerful theme in ongoing reviews of my teaching practice. A key effect is that I have broadened my reflections about teaching from a focus on technical reflection (“How was my wait time?” or “I should have switched to that group activity”) to include critical reflection. Thus, I also ask myself questions such as, “What am I modeling for my students?” “Are they truly understanding the material?” “How are my values, prejudices and biases influencing the ways in which we study x concept?” and “How can I communicate my views and make other perspectives welcome?” I continue to learn the value of sharing this inner dialogue with my students as a way to encourage them to initiate this practice.
I translate my desire to personalize learning by involving my students with shaping the community in which we learn. Students brainstorm questions they want to address in the course. I commit to making sure their interests are addressed. We talk about the values and principles we want as the frame and foundation for the course. Mutual respect, collegiality, choice and voice are popular examples. We then connect these abstract ideas to specific course features: I share illustrative experiences, provide options for projects and assignments that use a variety of presentation styles, and offer students the chance to have input into grading rubrics. Because I teach regularly at the Edwards Campus where connecting with an advisor can be difficult, I schedule individual appointments with students to visit about their career and program advising needs. To give voice to students’ interests and expertise, course members share something related to class content. Over the years, this has taken the form of books, articles, quotes, web sites and professional resources. I ask students regularly for feedback on their learning, what is going well in the course, questions that have emerged, confusions, aspects of the course that aren’t working, and their ideas for improvement. I share the information with the class and make sure to use their recommendations in some form.
One of the benefits of teaching in a professional school is the utility of the learning. Unfortunately, this can also be a limitation. Prospective (or practicing) teachers ask, “How will I use this information?” as the key criterion for judging the quality of instruction. Making that question part of the classroom conversation seems to reduce the focus on meeting immediate needs. I rely heavily on problem-based activities in my courses. This creates some risk in that not all students will create meaning at the same depth. But I’m willing to try it as long as I remember to provide a well-timed assist to make important connections.
I now believe that I can reveal myself—my values, experiences and views —while validating my students’ differences. I am far less self-conscious about mistakes; I can use them to illustrate the processes of teaching and learning. I am particularly sensitive to marginalizing, and I am passionate about social justice. I use personal stories to illustrate issues in education. I allow myself to be funny. I used to think that my offbeat sense of humor had no place in my classroom. In fact, my classes have run the full gamut of emotions—I have had classes in which we cried together, too. For me, teaching is an exploration, rather than a methodical investigation. I continue to relearn that some students are ready to accept the invitation I offer and to avoid taking it personally if they are not. Like the parable of the sun and the wind who made a bet as to which one would be successful getting a man to take off his shirt, my goal is to shine gently but insistently.
Reva Friedman-Nimz is an associate professor of teaching and leadership. She began teaching at KU in 1978.
