Student Conceptions and Critical Teaching

As a graduate student, I straddle, among other things, both sides of the student/teacher conceptual divide Jennie Nelson describes; I teach, I grade, I study. I have worn, these two months into my career, the hats of instructor, evaluator, and learner interchangeably. As such, Nelson is describing ME. I am interested in what she has to say about me.

As an instructor:

In the Major Modern Writers class that I TA, my cooperating professor occasionally (and let me emphasize the occasional element at play here) lets me teach. This previous Monday was one of those occasions. Hence the vest I wore to class. My modus operandi for teaching my wee young blossoming minds was, after having introduced the poem to be discussed, breaking them into four small groups and giving each group a theme to investigate in the poem. I thought "It's like a game! Hee hee! They're going to hoist me on their shoulders for this."

Obviously, no hoisting occurred. Where I saw an opportunity for active and engaged participation with a text, the students, damn them, saw through to the meat of the matter: They were being expected to act out their knowledge of the poem, and did not appreciate that the stress this entailed had no immediate pay-off. When I walked around the room to listen in on the small groups discussion, the students were not shy about acting (and, again, emphasize the act there) out active involvement. Brookfield's proffered assumption on visiting small groups, eat your heart out.

In any case, the students clearly generated from the instructions I gave them for class involvement their own definition of successful participation. They were aware of the nuts and bolts elements of the classroom setting, and, realizing that their participation could not be reflected in their grade for the course, limited their effort accordingly.

As an evaluator:

In the same class, I am responsible for all the grading, which so far has only entailed one essay test. Here, I would like to quote Nelson in deference to her delineation of my own experience:

"Too often teachers expect students who are newcomers to a field to be able to determine the implicit ways of thinking and presenting evidence required to write successfully in their particular disciplines."

Very, very few students in Major Modern Writers are English majors, or are even well versed in the requirements of critical college writing. However, the class is run in such a way that English competence is assumed, not constructed. As such, the VAST majority of the grading I've had to do has revealed that students need to understand HOW to write an English essay before they can know WHAT to write in an English essay.

Additionally, and actually more directly applicable to Nelson's point, I encountered significant difficulties in reconciling MY interpretations of student success with what I was forced to imagine would be the professor's. The evolution of expectations has certainly never been clearer to me than in the moments when I have to juggle my definition of success with what I know of the professor's. This is especially difficult when our opinions on these matters differ.

As a student:

In these past few months, I have discovered that, in graduate school, it is en vogue to never really have any idea how you're doing until the absolute end of the course, when you turn in one assignment that constitutes three quarters of your final grade. As such, I have slowly started to panic as I realize that, not only do I have to produce a substantial amount of original work to fulfill these assignments, but I also have had no sort of outside experience that will guide my understanding of teacher expectations. This feeling of unease at having this experiential safety net certainly underscores what Nelson is describing in the case study, as it urges me to explore other avenues of work completion.

Now, I realize that this examination of the relevance of Nelson's, and to a lesser extent Brookfield's, articles on my recent life has been little more than a largely self-serving digression. However, I would like to underscore what I hope comes through as my central belief regarding these two readings: that the material presented here is far from abstract, and that it is simultaneously accurate and significant.

Brookfield's article on critical reflection positions itself to have considerable importance as my career in academic instruction continues, if for no other reason than that I can easily imagine myself taking personal responsibility for aspects of teaching beyond my control. While I understand that this introductory point is far from the crux of the matter at hand here, the ability of critical reflection to identify not only the areas of responsibility that I have as a teacher but also the responsibilities contingent upon my students is largely comforting. I view this as an affirmation of my commitment to adaptive teaching, certainly, and also as a method whereby I can distinguish areas of improvement from elements beyond my control.