The importance of a ‘good’ teacher
Until I started teaching in earnest a few years ago, I had not given uhh thought to what makes a good teacher. I undertook a number of teacher training courses and learnt the technical aspects of teaching. That did change my perspective as I was more used to thinking with my professional hat on and that did not necessarily make me empathetic to my students’ needs. It seems simple to say now but I knew where I wanted my students to get to in terms of their learning and taught in the manner that I had observed people who taught me teach me the same material. In other words I was a good mimic but that did not take in to account what my students needed to help them learn. So the courses were useful but I found observing good teachers very useful too. The best observations are the ones done when the teacher is just doing their thing, unaware that they are being observed or that the observation means much. I found watching the various teachers that Baby had- swimming, piano, language, ball sports- very fruitful. Here are a few of the things that I think makes a good teacher.
1. Not every student is the same so the same teaching method may not work on all of them. Generally, the more experienced the student, the more adaptable the student and the more able they are to cope with less flexible teachers. This makes teaching young children probably one of the hardest teaching situations one can think of. Most of us would have forgotten how we learnt at a very young age so would not have experience to fall back on. One really needs to understand the students to be able to teach so going back to learning how to teach for specific age groups help. I have seen swimming teachers who are more used to teaching more able students stand in and try to teach younger students who are fairly new to swimming for the odd lesson get very frustrated with the lessons. They don’t feel they are getting there message across or that the students are not listening to them. The students get distressed because they are unsure what is expected of them, and the parents are frustrated witnessing all this. So knowing one’s audience is important, and then one needs to adapt one’s teaching to the audience, making it important that the teacher is able to think on their feet and act on observation. Aside from that, one needs to know one’s stuff in order to be able to adapt one’s teaching to the student. So when push comes to shove, and if choices have to be made, the more experienced and more able teachers are needed for the less experienced, less able students.
2. Developing a rapport with the student is good but it is important not to lose sight of the fact that a teacher-student relationship needs to be maintained. There are times when the teacher needs to be the adult rather than the friend and it is confusing for the student if the teacher flip-flops between friend and adult. Thus, maintaining that delicate balance of trust, ease of being and staying within professional boundaries is important.
3. Have a target. It is good to have something to work towards, a common goal. But setting the target so that it is challenging without being daunting is important, especially with the less experienced learners.
4. Trust your student. Sometimes we do treat students like children. However, they are supposed to grow as they gain in learning and it is important not to lose sight of that. Thus, it is important to adjust our teaching as the students gain understanding. It means setting the scene to prepare for mistakes and failures as the more we trust students to do things on their own, the more likely they will run in to problems. Solving the problems and coping with the failures are part of the learning process. We need to trust the students to be able to navigate their own path, within reason. The skill is in understanding the students’ abilities and being able to judge how much they can be pushed.
1. Not every student is the same so the same teaching method may not work on all of them. Generally, the more experienced the student, the more adaptable the student and the more able they are to cope with less flexible teachers. This makes teaching young children probably one of the hardest teaching situations one can think of. Most of us would have forgotten how we learnt at a very young age so would not have experience to fall back on. One really needs to understand the students to be able to teach so going back to learning how to teach for specific age groups help. I have seen swimming teachers who are more used to teaching more able students stand in and try to teach younger students who are fairly new to swimming for the odd lesson get very frustrated with the lessons. They don’t feel they are getting there message across or that the students are not listening to them. The students get distressed because they are unsure what is expected of them, and the parents are frustrated witnessing all this. So knowing one’s audience is important, and then one needs to adapt one’s teaching to the audience, making it important that the teacher is able to think on their feet and act on observation. Aside from that, one needs to know one’s stuff in order to be able to adapt one’s teaching to the student. So when push comes to shove, and if choices have to be made, the more experienced and more able teachers are needed for the less experienced, less able students.
2. Developing a rapport with the student is good but it is important not to lose sight of the fact that a teacher-student relationship needs to be maintained. There are times when the teacher needs to be the adult rather than the friend and it is confusing for the student if the teacher flip-flops between friend and adult. Thus, maintaining that delicate balance of trust, ease of being and staying within professional boundaries is important.
3. Have a target. It is good to have something to work towards, a common goal. But setting the target so that it is challenging without being daunting is important, especially with the less experienced learners.
4. Trust your student. Sometimes we do treat students like children. However, they are supposed to grow as they gain in learning and it is important not to lose sight of that. Thus, it is important to adjust our teaching as the students gain understanding. It means setting the scene to prepare for mistakes and failures as the more we trust students to do things on their own, the more likely they will run in to problems. Solving the problems and coping with the failures are part of the learning process. We need to trust the students to be able to navigate their own path, within reason. The skill is in understanding the students’ abilities and being able to judge how much they can be pushed.
Comments
Post a Comment