Teaching for the Students: Habits of Heart, Mind, and Practice in the Engaged Classroom (2011)
by Bob Fecho
A lack of intellectual curiosity is one of the most common complaints uttered by faculty about students at my school. I am certainly one who is baffled by my students lack of questioning. I want them to question the world around them, what they read or watch or listen to, what I teach them and why I am trying to teach them that particular thing. It seems, however, that their attitude is "tell me what I need to know so I can pass the test, get a good grade in your class, and go to college." It's frustrating. It's soul crushing. It's every day. However, while reading chapter ten of Fecho's book the following quote struck me: "It takes effort and practice to shift from a telling classroom to a questioning one" (page 92). It's not like I didn't know this, but what he made me realize is that in order to shift my students into a mode of questioning, I need to learn to shift my questions into ones that help them create a relationship with what they are reading. This, of course, is easier said than done, but I felt like this chapter laid the foundation on which I can begin building this shift and hopefully inspire a room of intellectually curious students.
In an earlier chapter, Fecho discussed the idea of continually changing contexts of a classroom. Students file into one's class for a particular period and what has just happened to them outside of class has an impact on how material will be received and processed. Each class period, therefore, may cover the same material but the changing context affects interpretation, processing and understanding of it. In this chapter, the focus is on the continually changing context of the individual. "...an individual's identity continually undergoes centripetal and centrifugal tension, that it is subject to both unifying and individualizing forces simultaneously" (page 95). Of course, this holds true not only for students but also for teachers. Fecho stressed the importance of teachers providing space for the exploration of the continually shifting contexts that their students are negotiating and notes that "...if we who educate can grasp that all of us are entered into a complex mesh of dialogical transactions with our selves and our many contexts, then we can also grasp that we teach for so much more than competency on a test" (page 101). I just really loved that; the reminder that we are not just teaching our students our subject, but we are teaching them how to connect with and come into themselves. It's one of the things I love most about teaching.
In the final chapter of the book, Fecho uses a yoga analogy to illustrate that teaching is a constant struggle towards perfection, but advises that we must find joy in that struggle. After nearly a decade of teaching, I decided to finally attend graduate school. Part of the reason was because I realize that an advanced degree would afford me more flexibility in my career options down the road, part of the reason was because I always envisioned myself earning a graduate degree, but the main reason was because I recognized that I am still growing as a teacher. I still have a lot to learn. I still have many areas in which I need to improve in order to be the best teacher that I can be for my students, in order to have the best chance at making a positive difference in this world. And although there have been days, especially lately, when this struggle towards perfection feels overwhelming, I still somehow find the joy.
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