This week my teaching picks up again, making me reflect about a course I had begun taking on Coursera “Diversity and Inclusion in Education” just to see where I stand with the topic, and what I still ought to learn.
Now there was an interesting prompt for reflection, about how we think about our learners, when we are planning their learning (yes I know that alone is a whole different blog post). Basically, what image–stereotype–do we have in our heads, and I thought that was such a strange question. Because this is not how I think when I plan my teaching. I think about the information, the story this content is telling, and how to create spaces within this story for engagement, ownership, play, reflection.
Well, at least these were my first thoughts, and as I was writing my answer my second thoughts came in*, and here it becomes very messy. I don’t have a formulated image of “a student” in my head but I have this visceral sense of my students over the years. I remember the stumbling stones, struggling points, frictions, break-throughs, joys, debates, insights, questions, but not in a clear image of a chimera style entity.
In my head and body these memories join into a fluid song of texture, colours, feelings, I sense the “no go zones” and possibilities. And from there seek to identify the smallest common denominator where the whole class can meet jointly, that one point in time and space that offers a shared experience. And this is the point from which we all move forward.
The struggle is to offer differently paced paths forward. Potential side quests as well as clearly described roads—preferable straight ahead. These different directions jostle for dominance. I try to stay afloat the messy business that is learning.
Some students are timid
Some fight with ideas
Some fight with me because that’s easier
Some jump into the deep-end and realised they should have brought PFDs**
Some jump in the deep-end and immediately swim joyfully
None are wrong in their approach–really
We are in this pool together
I just have to stay atop to throw the life preserver in time
What we do in class isn’t an end point it’s a starting point
*And this my friends is why writing and reflecting throughout, why becoming SoTL, is so important for teaching
** Read this again NOT pdf … PFD = Personal Floating Device, swim vest