Learningās first principle ā the most important thing i learned this year
daveMarginalia
The problem with threatening people is that in order for it to continue to work, you have to continue to threaten them
If weāre trying to encourage people to care about their work, about their world, is it practical to have it only work when someone is threatening them?
Once we jointly answer questions like āwhy would people care about thisā and āhow does this support people starting to care about this for the first timeā and āwill this stop people who care now from caringā, we have a place to work from.
Iām in this business because i think i might be able to help, here and there, with trying to build a culture of thinkers.
Great post Dave. It often feels like the dialogue around āengagementā, whatever engagement actually is, centres around the teacher. After the year that I have had I am moving towards a more open understanding of āengagementā that incorporates the whole space. Starting with ādo you care?ā is not only simply, but to the point. This offers a great entry point to start an ongoing discussion. I wonder though if those students who may have been metaphorically beaten to oblivion, who say āthey careā as that is the answer required, but deep down seem to have forgotten what it is to care, what can be done for them. The supposed ālost causesā. I guess the only threat that should be made in classes is that you must make a choice?
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Aaron the idea of students lying about caring is always a possibility
Our job, i suppose is to see through that
I donāt think they ālieā about caring. They just donāt know what it is to ācareā about anything. They do care passionately about all sorts of things, just nothing to do with āschoolā as they know it.
I find public speaking so interesting. I wonder if sometimes success comes down to confidence over what is actually being communicated? Personally, I get lost in being ācorrectā or ārightā this leaves me feeling anxious at times. I loved your point about believers and the status quo. Personally, I wonder if I have read too much Deconstruction? Or maybe I just care too much? Really not sure.
Learningās first principle ā the most important thing I learned this year @davecormier, @AaronDavis, @simonsinek #startwithawhy, @bradgustafson
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āLearningās first principle ā the most important thing i learned this yearā via @Downes
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I was recently told to be mindful of the phases that people are in when adjusting to change. The focus was on Tuckmanās stages of group development. The problem though, as Seth Godin explains, is that this overlooks whether people actually want to change. Dave Cormier captures this by arguing that the first principle of learning is care.
Coming up to three years out of the classroom and not being based in a school, I am often left thinking about what this means for my identify as a teacher. Although I still work within education, my current title of āsubject matter expertā seems a long way from the classroom. This is something that I have been pondering for a while. Here then are some thoughts focused on three questions: legitimacy, context and relevance.
A Question of Legitimacy
A colleague recently put out the request for schools to invite them into their school as the experience of being in the classroom apparently provides ālegitimacyā. For me, this is always the dilemma with working in a central organisation across a number of schools. Although you may have up-to-date content knowledge, this is not always based on lived experience. As I have contended elsewhere, I am doing ārealā work, however the question that remains is whether this work is ālegitimateā to be called āa teacherā?
The Cambridge Dictionary defines ālegitimacyā as āreasonable and acceptable.ā Therefore, is the work my colleagues and I do reasonable and acceptable to be called a āteacherā? I have heard some use the word ātransactionalā to derogatorily describe the tasks that we complete. This is based on the observation that many of the processes are seemingly repetitious and methodical. I have lived this label before when I was report report coordinator, timetabler and all-round data guy within a school. The problem I have with this is that simply labelling such actions as transactional is that although the outcome maybe set, there are often variables at play when it comes to the process. This variables demand a sense of perspective and empathy to the lived experience.
A Question of Context
An example of such a transaction is my recent work supporting schools with the loading of literacy data into the central repository. One of my many hats. We had created a guide that walked people through the process. However, as more and more schools made contact it became apparent that there were many assumptions at play. Whether it be user access within the system, expectations based on past habits or working through various data errors, each of these issues needed to be contended with patiently, especially as the problem was not always evident to the user at the other end. Although it is easy to step back now and breakdown some of the difficulties faced, how to improve such transactions in the future is not always clear.
In some ways the recording of data needs to be covered in training. The problem with this though is that currently such workshops are mash together of different focuses and needs. Added to the mix is the reality that every school context is different. In the case of literacy data, for some schools it is the responsibility of someone in administration who enters the results, for others it is the learning and teaching leader, or even the literacy coordinator. This all depends on the school and the outcome desired. However, the training workshops are usually aimed at those working in administration, because they are usually in-charge of ātransactionalā matters.
In an ideal world, school users would be able to call on their prior knowledge to debug any issues. However, the templated nature of the technology neither allows nor encourages any notion of heutagogy and self-learning. Rather than working things out, people often fall back on guides, only then to scream out in frustration (usually on the phone) when nothing makes sense.
A Question of Relevance
Coming at the question of identify from a different perspective, Brendan Jones reflects on the world of conferences and professional development specialists wondering about the relevance of those outside of the classroom?
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I think this is an interesting question. In part, it makes me think about teaching VCE English. I have not taught it for a few years, having worked in a P-9 college for much of my career. However, I feel that I could easily step back into that environment. I assume that there would be changes in the curriculum that I would need to grapple with, but I do not feel that my experience is irrelevant.
In regards to conferences, questioning the relevance of presenters speaks as much to our expectations from such situations. Even if a facilitator is currently practicing within a classroom, they will not be the one to deliver the outcomes within the school so relevancy does not always seem the prime concern. In addition to this, there are some areas where no amount of knowledge and experience is going to achieve anything as the topic or technique in question has never been tackled before.
There are also times when I think classroom experience and content knowledge is itself something of a distraction. I think that this can be the case with coaching, where the focus is on the questions, coachees and a culture of curiousity. I think that Tomaz Lasic captures this in response to Jonesā tweet.
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I am not sure if I am still a āteacherā? However, one thing that has not changed is that I care. As Dave Cormier suggests:
This means having empathy for whoever it is that I am working with, being mindful of their context and identifying how I may support. This was how I approached teaching and it does not differ now.
As always, any thoughts and questions are welcome.
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On Being a Teacher ā A Reflection on Identity by Aaron Davis is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Andrea, Adam Grantās discussion of care and āfeeling joy of progressā reminds me of Dave Cormierās post about ācareā as learningās first principle.
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Ryan, I like your comment about motivation over talent:
@schnarfed https://snarfed.org/2024-07-31_53442
It reminded me of a post from Dave Cormier from a few years ago about ācareā being learningās first principle. He makes the case that,
Learningās first principle ā the most important thing i learned this year