It’s Time For Teachers’ Roles To Evolve And Change
Post #1.2 — Lecturer to Facilitator, Sage to Guide, Coroner to Doctor.
If you were a product of the public school system, then you are most likely familiar with the lecture formatted classroom. A teacher stands in front of the room, delivers a lesson, and then you have classwork or homework to complete. This “sage on the stage” approach lent itself well to the traditional setting in early 20th century classrooms. Diversity in those classrooms was not as robust as it is today. However, as the diversity inside the classroom has changed and grown, the role of the traditional teacher has not. A switching, actually more of an evolution, of a teacher’s role is needed.
The first set of roles is the easiest to see — lecturer(sage) to facilitator(guide). With the rising trend of ADHD, with over 50% of our students eligible for free or reduced lunch, with the different socio-economical backgrounds of families, and the different skill levels students have, the traditional approach does not cut it anymore. Students from this diverse pool cannot be standardized to the extent we currently expect. There is just too much diversity. Instead of standardizing each student, we need to maximize their potential.
On an even more somber note, it is time to discuss a teacher’s transformation from coroner to doctor. Yes, a coroner. The person who does an autopsy at the end of someone’s life to determine the cause of death. How can I compare that to a teacher, you might ask? You mean the teacher who places so much emphasis on a test given at the end of the school year, grades it, and then determines what the cause of the student’s misunderstanding is? Yes, that is the comparison.
Don’t get me wrong. Teachers do their best to help students understand in the moment. However, the truth of the matter is that the expectation of covering 100% of the curriculum allows teachers to callously ignore misunderstandings in the moment because we “need to move on”. Thus, burying a problem that only reveals itself again when we perform the autopsy, oops, I mean when we test.
Teachers need to become doctors. A misunderstanding in the moment should be treated and remedied in the moment. Do not wait until the quiz at the end of the week or test at the end of the unit, or a state test at the end of the year. If you take a doctor’s approach, you do not need autopsical evidence to prove what you know by reading the symptoms in the moment.
What it boils down to…
A facilitator’s approach places its primary focus on the individual versus a lecturer’s primary focus on the curriculum.
A doctor’s approach places more emphasis in remedying and healing in the moment than the coroner’s approach of assessing the past.
It’s time for teachers’ roles to evolve and change.
