What Makes a Good Teacher? (2001)
unicef.org
unicef.org
Once they are next to you, they guide you to take the very first step, nothing more. Then just the second step, nothing more. Then the third etc.
If you are not understanding what is being taught: the problem is the teacher.
Soon you both see YOU have more confidence. That confidence is called learning and the best teachers know when to pull back and let you go on your own.
Great teachers do not judge you. If you are embarrassed in front of a teacher because you do not know something; the problem is the teacher.
The best teachers let me be myself and just showed me how to take the next step.
Context matters.
I work in metal fabrication, and more than a small fraction of the people who end up in this trade are here because they have learning disabilities, typically undiagnosed, or if they are they don’t advertise it. Many of us are in this trade because we are too dull to have chosen something higher paying with better conditions.
Additionally, may of the tools and equipment we use are inherently dangerous, so teaching might involve repeatedly showing and correcting, watching, scrutinising, and coming back again and again to review and refresh.
Kindness certainly helps though :)
> If you are not understanding what is being taught: the problem is the teacher.
This is the case a lot of the time, but if it's applied as stated above, it misses the fact that some subjects are literally unlearnable for certain individuals and is not the teacher's fault.
Probably a statement more in spirit is:
"If you are not understanding what is being taught: The good teacher asks what methods can be changed to further learning."
This feels like a controversial starement to me. There are certainly some subjects that are currently beyond some individuals’ ability to learn, but that seems to reflect more on a lack of prior required learning than a fundamental inability to learn that subject.
It’s certainly much harder for some people, possibly to the point of economic infeasibility, but impossible seems a stretch.
It could be viewed as contrarian, but putting the blame/responsibility for a student not learning solely on a teacher's shoulders removes the human which the spirit of this post and thread embodies.
It doesn't remove the fact that some people have disabilities that mean they will simply never be able to complete certain tasks, including ones of the learning kind.
Everything is a continuum, it’s never so black and white.
Even if something are incredibly hard for some people to learn I think it’s worth avoiding the fixed mindset that the notion of “unlearnability” produces.
The belief that one can change things about themselves is the most fundamental attitude required for learning in my experience and opinion.
Without it, learning can only be an accident.
I don't think there's anything wrong with accepting that one can't learn something.
I probably wouldn't be able to learn world-class violin skills even if I trained obsessively. Plenty of violinists train obsessively, from a starting age far younger than me, with more natural ability than I'm likely to have, and a tiny fraction of them become world-class. So what? I don't see this as disempowering.
you could learn as much about playing violins as world-class violinists if you were as obsessive about it, even if you couldn't play as well. those not-quite-world-class violinists likely know as much, but just don't have the same combination of accidental (physical/psychogical/biochemical) gifts that give them a miniscule edge.
"ability" is often an illusion of opportunity costs. it's less "can't" and more "won't".
I'm not sure about that. Knowledge 'in a vacuum', separated from one's abilities to do anything useful, isn't what we normally mean by the word. To put it bluntly, no-one cares who has the most encyclopaedic knowledge of violins, they care who's best able to do the job.
Like I said in the other thread, sometimes there's no substitute for raw talent. Just about everyone is smart enough to learn algebra, and programming, but I suspect most people lack the raw intelligence to become an MIT professor, regardless of how hard they work.
You can put in as much work as you like, but if the other guy puts in just as much work and has an incredible natural ability in the field, you really don't stand a chance. Same goes for sports, where it's more about your physical limits than your intellectual ones.
Again though, I don't see that these realities should put us off self-improvement, whether learning, or sport, or any other avenue. It seems silly to even write it: learning still has plenty going for it.
> "ability" is often an illusion of opportunity costs. it's less "can't" and more "won't".
Agreed. For most of us at least, our intellectual ceilings aren't generally what steer our decisions.
that's a different claim from before: "I don't think there's anything wrong with accepting that one can't learn something." my counterclaim was limited to the ability to learn, not perform or achieve accolades. besides, you can do something useful with just knowledge, for instance, teach others who can/will exceed your performative abilities.
> "I suspect most people lack the raw intelligence to become an MIT professor"
becoming an MIT professor is fraught with confounding variables like luck and politics, so that's not a great example of raw talent/intelligence trumping all.
> "Same goes for sports, where it's more about your physical limits than your intellectual ones."
actually the best athletes are also highly intelligent. it's part of the accidental gifts that give them another tiny edge in a winners-take-all arena. lebron is known for his "photographic basketball memory" (in reality more intelligence than memory).
also, there are plenty of coaches that are highly knowledgeable and better as coaches than they are as players. lakers coach frank vogel for instance.
people have limits but the inability to learn generally isn't, and shouldn't be, the limiting factor.
The ability to perform is something that is learned. I'm not abusing the word 'learning' here.
It makes little difference though, as my point applies just the same. The most difficult things to learn (in the narrow sense) may still be beyond the abilities of many. I suspect this is true of many areas of advanced maths, for instance.
> you can do something useful with just knowledge, for instance, teach others who can/will exceed your performative abilities.
Sure.
> becoming an MIT professor is fraught with confounding variables like luck and politics, so that's not a great example of raw talent/intelligence trumping all.
No, the example is fine. Without a high natural intelligence, you won't even be in the running. It's necessary, but not sufficient.
> actually the best athletes are also highly intelligent
I didn't say otherwise. It doesn't impact my point, though. The average person doesn't have the natural gifts necessary to make it as a top-flight professional athlete. That takes both natural ability and hard work.
> people have limits but the inability to learn generally isn't, and shouldn't be, the limiting factor.
For most things, sure, we're agreed.
Vaguely related interesting reading on philosophers exploring what it means to learn: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knowledge_argument#Thought_exp...
Obviously nobody can teach quantum computing to an infant. So how about this instead?:
> If you have the ability to learn something, and you are not learning, then the problem is the teacher.
My point is that students should not feel embarrassed because they aren't 'getting it' and they should take some comfort in knowing that unfortunately there are teachers who are bad at teaching out there.
That's obviously false. If you don't pay attention or don't do your homework or skip classes eventually you will fall back enough not to understand what is being taught.
Teacher can't repeat basics forever because there are other students in the class too, maybe they do pay attention and do their homework and would like to learn - wasting their time because one person doesn't care is absurd.
BTW I think online remote learning (which was implemented in my country because of COVID-19) could help with this issue. There's no reason for kids to be divided into classes according only to their physical location. It's possible to organize classes from all over the country divided by results of some placement tests, where every student has problems with the exact same concepts.
This shouldn't completely replace normal school, but it could be useful tool for keeping struggling kids up to speed (let's say there's 1 hour a week of remote math class where every kid is put into appropriate countrywide group of kids with similar problems).
But I was given an 'apprentice' to teach. He was very willing to learn, very interested in the subject (programming) but only insofar as I poured the knowledge into his ears. He would not do any work I set him so pretty soon I threw in the towel. I really enjoyed teach, he really enjoyed learning, but his dismotivation finished it, what a waste.
This sounds like it doesn't match this research which someone posted yesterday
http://www.paulgraham.com/raq.html
I'm about to become a teacher. How can I be a good one?
The best teachers I remember from school had three things in common:
(1) They had high standards. Like three year olds testing their parents, students will test teachers to see if they can get away with low-quality work or bad behavior. They won't respect the teachers who don't call them on it.
(2) They liked us. Like dogs, kids can tell very accurately whether or not someone wishes them well. I think a lot of our teachers either never liked kids much, or got burned out and started not to like them. It's hard to be a good teacher once that happens. I can't think of one teacher in all the schools I went to who managed to be good despite disliking students.
(3) They were interested in the subject. Most of the public school teachers I had weren't really interested in what they taught. Enthusiasm is contagious, and so is boredom.
A related anecdote: I was a TA for a course in which the students were required to write weekly essays. The first ones had grammar so bad that they were excruciating to read. Despite not being allowed to deduct points for such things, I copyedited all of them to fix the worst mistakes and returned them covered in red ink. By the next week, they had all figured out how to write in complete sentences, making my job much easier for the rest of the semester.
- How I wish I'd taught maths (Craig Barton)
- How to solve it (Polya)
The former is written by an already-successful math teacher, who applied others' research to further improve his teaching.
The latter is about the stages of solving a math problem.
I've had an interest in math teaching for quite some time, and recently joined a company (Yup) that provides 24/7 on-demand online math tutoring. Our tutors are trained to first figure out where the student is in their process of solving the problem or understanding the topic. Only then can they take action to help the student continue their learning.
About online tutoring: I work in the UK as an Adult maths tutor. I get GBP 24 per teaching hour which includes an allowance for prep time. It's alright as tutoring jobs go.
I had a quick look at Yup as it seems interesting. But Glassdoor reviews state tutors get ~ $10-$15 an hour. (some say $11 an hour)
Ah c'mon. I find that depressing. They're looking for high quality flexible tutors and pay that? I could work in Tesco stacking shelves for that. Even Amazon in the UK pay more (and I've worked there as a picker)
I find it cynical that so much quality is demanded from certain online companies and the pay is derisory.
I suppose the flexibility they offer is worth it for some people... and the chance to work from home...
Anyway had to get that off my chest... I think teachers are under-valued and under-paid anyway!
Doing that isn't easy, and it generally requires a very rich understanding of the domain. If you find a teacher that can do that sort of thing, you're very lucky.
IMO; They will engage you, make you curious, inspire you to become a better version of yourself and help you work towards your goals and objectives.
A good leader will also be there for you to guide you when you need extra attention and most importantly let you have room to fail.
To the good teachers and managers I've had, and I am currently having. Thank you.
Student is lost with only you on a walkie-talkie. You need to know where they are to know what instruction to give.
Gaps and misunderstandings must be identified to be corrected. It's debugging.
This is all very intensive, customized, one-on-one teaching. But there's no reason it can't be automated... in principle.
Some literally are contradictory.
So what we have is, a lack of understanding what makes a good teacher in the broader community?
Or are we looking at the differing misinformed opinions as a way of understanding local cultures?
Someone who stakes a claim on the value of what they teach and personally self correct when flaws are found. He or she can debate the merits or justify the work being taught. The same person burns a path or spends the time to make somebody be taught something important and valuable.
Interestingly, and perhaps related... love is mentioned 14 times and friend 17 times, yet mastery and skill are each only mentioned twice.