When I say this, I'm thinking about whole school approaches to reading instruction, setting down principles for assessment (for example in English, no podcast tasks if you're not going to teach podcasting skills), saying no to PBL etc. I'm not envisaging walking into classrooms and inspecting but at least some agreement on 'this is how we do things around here.' You might have seen some school playbooks floating around too. That kind of thing.
I don't believe we have interrogated the idea of attracting the "best and brightest" enough, as you have here. It seems based on an assumption that expertise can only be "passed down" by those with expert knowledge, disregarding the potential for students to surpass their teacher's skill, knowledge and expertise without it needing to be "handed to them" by those above. Ultimately, I believe this idea is limiting to education and stacks one's value in their ability to perform (which we could decide we're okay with, but it's not for me!). Thanks for the post!
Agree, Tom. I have taught students many times more intelligent than I am. There’s an analogy in elite sport - the coach is not the elite sportsperson, but gets elite performance out of their coachee.
Hi Louise,
When I say this, I'm thinking about whole school approaches to reading instruction, setting down principles for assessment (for example in English, no podcast tasks if you're not going to teach podcasting skills), saying no to PBL etc. I'm not envisaging walking into classrooms and inspecting but at least some agreement on 'this is how we do things around here.' You might have seen some school playbooks floating around too. That kind of thing.
Thanks for commenting, Louise.
I don't believe we have interrogated the idea of attracting the "best and brightest" enough, as you have here. It seems based on an assumption that expertise can only be "passed down" by those with expert knowledge, disregarding the potential for students to surpass their teacher's skill, knowledge and expertise without it needing to be "handed to them" by those above. Ultimately, I believe this idea is limiting to education and stacks one's value in their ability to perform (which we could decide we're okay with, but it's not for me!). Thanks for the post!
Agree, Tom. I have taught students many times more intelligent than I am. There’s an analogy in elite sport - the coach is not the elite sportsperson, but gets elite performance out of their coachee.