Today was the first day I handed over the reigns of my classroom to a student teacher. I was excited and anxious, but also very confident in her ability in the classroom. This is my sixth year of teaching, and while I am still learning and growing, it was the first time I felt confident enough to help develop and train another teacher. Fortunately for both of us, I have been receiving some mentorship of my own this year from a retired school district teacher, whom I had met during my master's program. We maintained the mentoring relationship because every time he visits, I take away new insights and become more intellectually engaged in my work. He is also just a great guy.
This mentorship has been fortunate for my student teacher and I because he modeled for me how I could mentor and work with my student teacher. My student teacher was even present last week when he visited two of my lessons and reflected with me over lunch.
What stands out about the insights that he shares about my teaching is the deep recognition of just how complex a classroom and a lesson is. He takes the ideas that I had for assignments or project steps two or three steps further than I initially imagine. He is able to see through what I now recognize as "classroom tasks and busywork" to identify the essence of my lesson and what should be focused on and addressed with class time. Initially, I thought this was some kind of magic power he possessed, but he assured me that it would get easier.
I have come to realize that he is able to see these things because his mind is completely present during the lesson and his attention is focused on the meaning that is being constructed between myself and the students in that room at that time. In every classroom, everyday, meaning is inevitably being constructed. However, the meaning that the students are constructing and the goals or objectives of the lesson are often at odds with each other because the students are not robots, and we cannot just insert the curriculum into their brains. Learning is a social process and the meaning and knowledge that exists in every classroom is dynamic. It takes a lot of patience and presence of mind to truly be with your students during each lesson and to be a participant in constructing meaning with them. We are guiding them through a process of inquiring, inferring, and reflecting, and we play an important role as these guides, but we cannot predetermine what is going to happen. While there is a lot we can anticipate and plan for, we still have to be patient participants in the construction of knowledge during each lesson.
I am so glad to have been engaged with this classroom perspective because I feel much more confident with how to mentor my student teacher. As I watched her teach, I took notes and observations about what was happening. Much of this was objective. I took note of student behaviors, comments made in class, the teacher's directions, even her tone of voice. I was able to "see through" the lesson to take note of what was really happening with the concepts that she had presented.
These notes led to a wonderful reflection after the lesson. We spent time discussing what happened and sought to understand what was happening during the different moments of the lesson, especially during the more challenging and confusing ones. We thought about what could be changed or done differently. Why did certain things happen? What meaning was actually being constructed? It was a refreshing and uplifting reflection for both of us. What was refreshing about it was that at no time were we discussing how to control, manage, or discipline students. It was completely around how to engage them in a process of inquiry with us.
This is the type of professional development that is uplifting as a teacher. It makes my classroom a more interesting space to be in each day, and I see my students as brilliant kids who want to learn if I can provide the space and the modeling for them to do so.
I hope to continue down this path with my student teacher. I feel as if I'll be learning as much as she is.
