FIVE WAYS TO IMPROVE YOUR TEACHING OVER THE SUMMER (PLUS A BONUS OR TWO)

 

Jackie Robinson was the first Black to play major league baseball.  I am old enough that I can remember watching him on television.  That had to be an unbelievably difficult challenge for him but Robinson was a person with style and grace and a fabulous amount of talent. 

His own words are inscribed on his tombstone,

         “A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives.” 

I suspect that none of us will ever come close to facing the challenges that Jackie Robinson endured and conquered.  Nevertheless, his words must ring out to all of us who think of ourselves as teachers.  You and I have the wonderful opportunity to impact hundreds and thousands of lives through our classes.  If you believe Robinson’s words, that gives us the chance to mold a life for ourselves that has true meaning.  Who could ask for more than that?

 --“A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives.”

--Perhaps I am simply getting old but I cherish that opportunity more every year.

--I wish I had 50 years left to keep on teaching.

For most of us, this semester is done.  The 2020-2021 academic year is finished.  If you have read this blog for long, you know the question I ask myself at the start of every summer, “A year from now, will I be a better teacher?”  

My longtime readers know how much I believe in the power of evolution, the importance of trying new techniques and tactics to see what might make my teaching better.  It can be difficult to improve a course during the school year because everything moves so quickly.  If you and I are going to get better as teachers by next year, the foundation for that improvement must begin right now.  As I say often to my students, “Procrastination is your biggest enemy.”  Putting off the battle for improvement is probably the single most significant reason that holds us back and prevents our evolution. 

DO NOT PROCRASTINATE, SPEND TIME RIGHT NOW THINKING ABOUT HOW TO BECOME A BETTER TEACHER DURING THE NEXT YEAR.

I am going to provide five suggestions on how to get better as a teacher.  There is no need to try them all.  Instead, pick one or two just to see where they might lead you over the next few months.

Suggestion Number One:  Break through the psychological ceiling.  I rarely meet teachers who have not established a ceiling in their minds as to how good they are going to be as teachers.  They will practically chant these mantras, “I am as good as I am ever going to get” or “I am good enough for this place” or “I am as good as time will allow.”  I am never sure whether these teachers (a) actually believe this nonsense or (b) use this artificial ceiling as a convenient excuse for not working to improve or (c) believe that teaching is essentially unimportant and not worth additional effort.

Stop telling yourself such limiting stories!!  The main thing that holds any of us back is ourselves.  As Shakespeare wrote, “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves that we are underlings.”  I believe that absolutely.  It is a theme in my life.

During the summer, work on a new story for yourself, “Teaching is important.  I am having a real effect on the lives of my students.  I AM going to find ways to improve during this coming year.” 

Suggestion Number Two:  Make better use of your emotional energy.  Many of the teachers I speak with seem perpetually annoyed with something.  “Students are not like they used to be.”  “The administration does not appreciate how hard this job is.”  “I can only teach what the department tells me to teach.”  “The school has the wrong priorities.”  “The other departments are ruining this university.”

Stop and listen to yourself.  Complaining is fine and often justified.  Obsession is different.  Would the people who listen rate you as a positive or as a negative person?  How much emotional energy are you burning up by being annoyed?  Think about switching that energy to more positive channels like, “I had a bunch of great students in the spring.”  “Several students really wrote great papers this semester.”  “I truly enjoyed working with my classes, even during the pandemic.  Now and then, they were just brilliant.” 

How much benefit are you getting from your emotional energy and how much of that energy are you wasting by being annoyed at your own favorite grievances?

Suggestion Number Three:  Ask a proven talent for advice.  If you want to become a better teacher, you need ideas.  Unless you are Picasso or Bob Dylan, you probably cannot get enough interesting ideas purely from inside your own head.  I have often told my children, “If you want to have a few great ideas, then you must first seek out a whole lot of ideas.”  I think that approach is so very important for success.  Lots of ideas à a few great ideas.  Become an idea gathering machine. 

In every school, college, and university, there are professors who are known across campus for being great teachers.  Pick a few and send them an email, “I have heard from many that you are an excellent teacher.  I am trying to get better.  I want to improve as a teacher.  Can you provide me with one or two pieces of advice as to what has helped you become such a good teacher?” 

I am always mortified that teachers do not do a better job of sharing the secrets of the trade.  You never have to follow their advice, but why not seek it out?  I will bet that any truly excellent teacher can give you a couple of pieces of fabulous advice right off the top of their heads.  No one becomes a great teacher by accident.  Be brave enough to ask for advice. 

Suggestion Number Four:  Read a book on teaching.  Here is another suggestion about generating ideas.  You have a summer.  There are a great many excellent books on teaching:  Make It Stick, What the Best College Teachers Do, any book by James Lang, Teaching for Critical Thinking, and so many more.

Go to Google and type in “What are the best books about teaching in college?”  Take a few titles to Amazon and read the reviews to see what appeals to you. 

Do not read these books like they are novels.   Read 2-5 pages per day at a maximum.  Write down one or two things you learned each day from those pages.  You want to draw the reading experience out as long as possible.  You want the reading to become a type of daily devotion.  You read a bit and then you let those words bounce around your brain until the next day’s reading.  By the end of the summer, you will be amazed by how many teaching ideas you have generated from your reading and from your own reflections.

(If you have a teaching book that you really like, send me a note at Jhoyle@richmond.edu and tell me about it.)

Suggestion Number Five:  Focus on what you learned during the pandemic.   Hopefully, we will all go back to “regular” teaching soon.  However, we cannot abandon the lessons of the past 15 months.  We should evaluate what we had too learn quickly and consider how to make the best use of that going forward.  We should think about blending our old teaching with our new teaching. 

For example, I have never been a technology person but I am amazed by how much I learned in working with our learning management system (Blackboard).  Videos on YouTube and LinkedIn were a great help.  With a little patience, you can learn to do virtually anything. 

In addition, I have grown extremely fond of Zoom videos.  They are easy to make and post to YouTube.  Students can then review the material whenever they need a second look. 

So, as a bonus feature for this blog entry, I have made a YouTube video with a few additional suggestions for better teaching.  I used Zoom.  It was easy.  It will not look like it was made by Steven Spielberg, but I believe it gets the message across. 

And, it is unlisted on YouTube so the only way to get this extra bit of teaching help is to go through this blog.   Here is the URL.  Hope you enjoy.  It is only 11 minutes.  I am biased, of course, but I think it is worth 11 minutes of a teacher's time.

 

https://youtu.be/TOzwdtobPKc

 

Suggestion Number Six:  Write out your thoughts.   Okay, I lied about passing along five ideas.  Here is number six because I had one more thought that seemed worth bringing up.

I have long said that the one thing that helped my teaching the most (by far) was creating this blog.  For many years now, I have had to force myself once or twice each month to write about my teaching.  More than anything else over the past 50 years, that writing process has helped me improve as a teacher. 

--Because I write about my teaching, I have had to become very observant as to what is working and what is not working.  That consideration has been extremely helpful.  Good days are not accidental.  The same is true for bad days.  Watch and you will figure out what happened.

--Because I write about my teaching, I have tended to become more experimental so that I will have material to write about.  If I lectured every day, I would never have a blog.

--Because I write about my teaching, I have had to probe deeper into what is happening and why.  I cannot just dismiss a classroom or student occurrence as an aberration.  I find that I think more deeply about such events so that I can understand them myself and deal with them. 

Creating a blog is great and I would highly recommend it as long as you will force yourself to write 8-12 times per year.  However, a journal will work as well.  I think you need to write as if scores of people are going to read and think about what you have to say. 

Do not be shy.  People are interested in your teaching so start writing down your thoughts.  You will be surprised by how quickly that process will help you become a better teacher.

I added the following few lines several days after the original posting.  This morning I was reading a novel.  One of the main characters is a song writer and she says, "I write songs to discover what I want to say."  I immediately responded to her as if I were talking with a friend, "I write compulsively about teaching to explore the very depths of what I think and believe about teaching."