On Being and Becoming a Good/Better Teacher part 2

Lets start with a story. A man goes into a bar and orders some drinks comprising: 4 beers, 2 wines, 3
cocktails and a glass of water. Having served the beverages, the waiter asks, would you like a tray, sir?
The customer is rather startled and retorts, Good God man, dont you think I have got enough to carry?
You may draw your own conclusions from the above anecdote, but it has served me well in over 35 years
in teacher education; especially in the context of teaching new (and some experienced) university lecturers
who saw the idea of engaging with pedagogy/andragogy, as well as the thought of improving their
professional skills through reflective practice, as an extra demand to contend with rather than as the tray
designed to ease their burden.
So, if you really want to continue your journey on the road to becoming a better teacher, lets go on with a
challenging, but involving, exercise. Please start by responding in WRITING to the questions below (DO
IT NOW. OK, whenever, but, if possible, immediately after reading this article). If this exercise is likely to
prove too lonely a task, find a colleague and discuss/share your answers, but THEN sit down and
WRITE/RECORD own your replies. Otherwise, it aint gonna work! NB All the relevant
books/papers/websites on this subject and my own experience, as well as that of many colleagues, confirm
that reflection without recording (writing) is not effective; in fact, its probably useless. Now, think about and
start writing.
What do you do in class?

Teach, yes, but unpack this term in as much detail as you can. Do you
teach only content, or do you emphasise the learning process as well?

How do you do it?

List the methods you use, your style/mode of delivery etc. Do you
lecture/pontificate or facilitate?

Why do you do it that way?

Give a rationale, underlying theory/ies for the way you teach/assess etc.
Can you justify why/how your modus operandi is the most effective?

How do you know it works?

Identify the ways in which you can find out if you are effective: surveys,
questionnaires, video recordings of teaching, peer observations et al.

Who can give you feedback? Students, peers, managers, mentors, inspectors and YOU! Comparison
with established good practice guidelines in the relevant literature et al.
What will you do improve your practice? This will remain your work in progress as your Continuing
Professional Development (CPD) since every classroom is a place where both the students and teachers
should be continually learning. NB if you are open to it, and are prepared to put in the work, paradoxically,
your students can be your teachers as well.
I guess, you decided to read on without stopping to do the above task? Never mind. Lets carry on
regardless. The other more formal way that I have approached the above task is to invite course
participants to think about; not to write in full but simply to think about the following assignment (1,000
words): What is your mission/vision about learning and teaching; i.e. what are your values, beliefs,
principles in relation to learning and teaching? Arrrggghhh, I hear you scream! No, no, you dont have
to do the essay as homework. Calm down dear, its only a suggestion. To mitigate threats of heart attack
(not to mention physical attack against my person), I used to say the following to my students; just write
down the 10 key words/terms or phrases/expressions that you might include if you were to write the
essay in full. Phew! Now that IS doable. So, stop, and do that right now. Put these in a sealed envelope
and forget about them for a few months; or, better still, write your name and address on this envelope and
ask a friend to post it to you in a few months. We shall return to this in Part 3 of this series of articles.
Even if you have (partly) made an effort to address the questions above (in writing), you have started
taking the first steps towards becoming a reflective practitioner. Another, fairly informal, way to rise to the
challenge implied in the title of these articles is to simply keep a diary/journal of your teaching for a

week/month/year. This could comprise, e.g., what happened from time to time, positive and negative, in
your classes during the course of a given period and, more importantly, how you felt about the incidents
under consideration. A Google search on critical incident form will provide you with examples of different
formats for these. This self-reflection is only part of the overall strategy. Look back at the question above
(who can give you feedback?) and you will see that you need to involve others in your journey from being a
novice to becoming an expert.
At some stage in your teaching career at least once make a video recording of yourself teaching a
class, and then alone, or with the help of colleagues, analyse your performance. Yes, this may prove to be
a painful process but remember your students are watching and assessing you all the time. Ideally, you
should ask sympathetic colleagues to carry out peer observations of some of your classes perhaps on a
mutual basis and share their perceptions of what is happening when you are teaching. Having done peer
observations/reviews with 100s of colleagues, it is interesting to note that the espoused theory (what they
think is the best way to teach/learn) of many teachers is often at odds with their theory-in-practice (the
way they actually behave in class). There is only one way to find out. Go on, have the courage to invite a
colleague in to observe you teaching.

The word courage takes me to the reference to relevant literature. If you are really, really serious about
becoming a better teacher, you will also have to engage with some relevant literature in the field. Parker J
Palmers book, The Courage to Teach: Exploring the Inner Landscape of a Teacher's Life is often
mentioned in this context but, I have my own favourite - Robin Richardsons Daring to be a teacher. More
on these in the final part of this article. Happy reading and writing.

Rakesh Bhanot