Advocacy for Gifted and Talented in New York
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What Makes a “Good” Teacher “Great”?
By: Kathy Hargrove
The fall semester brought me yet another class of graduate
students just embarking on their gifted
education courses. Unlike many students I've had in the
past, the majority of the class had no
background at all in gifted education--no undergraduate
courses, no graduate courses, not even any
staff development. While this was challenging, it was also
instructive because their questions let me
know where most teachers really are when it comes to
teaching gifted students. One concern voiced
over and over during the semester was "What makes a
'good' teacher a really 'great' teacher for
gifted and talented students?"
Of course, the literature is full of lists of traits of
effective teachers of the gifted. In fact, our textbook
had several long and very comprehensive lists--so long and
so detailed that one of the students
ventured to say that a teacher who measured up would be at
the least a magician and, at most, a
genuine miracle-worker! These lists and the student's
frustrations forced me to think about this issue.
So, "What makes a teacher of the gifted great?"
I found some answers in a study by Ken Bain and his
associates at the Searle Center for Teaching
Excellence at Northwestern University, reported in The
Chronicle of Higher Education (Bain, 2004).
The scholars at the Searle Center studied more than 60
effective college professors--the kind of
teachers students rave about. In fact, an example in the
article was one of my own history professors,
Dr. Ralph Lynn. Governor Ann Richards called his classes
"magical tours," and People editor Hal
Wingo said that Lynn offered an argument for human cloning
because "Nothing would give me more
hope for the future than to think that Dr. Lynn, in all his
wisdom and wit, will be around educating new
generations from here to eternity!" Bain and the other
researchers concluded that Lynn and the other
great teachers shared some common strategies.
First, they created a "natural critical learning
environment." They established an atmosphere that
fostered critical thinking about questions students found
interesting and provocative. "Critical thinking"
included making decisions, defending choices, reasoning from
evidence, examining quality, and
making improvements--all reinforced by ongoing feedback from
the teacher. Think of this process as
something like working out with a personal trainer. The
trainer uses a "show and tell" approach with
the client in teaching her how to perform an exercise. The
trainer constantly reinforces correct form as
well as criticizing "wrong moves," showing where
and how to improve. The message from the trainer
is that one can improve with time and effort.
The same thing is true in the classroom. Learning does take
time and effort, and there is no one
teaching strategy that inspires this. Almost any strategy
that "works" for an individual teacher is worth
at least a try. But, the teacher must always communicate to
the gifted students that mastery and
growth will require effort. Unfortunately, many of our
students have never been challenged. Great
teachers will challenge them while simultaneously offering
support and making it "okay" to try and fail
and try again.One key to engaging and challenging students
is asking provocative questions and providing
guidance as students struggle with answers. Think of
yourself as a 21st-century Socrates. Socrates
was never content with just one question; rather, he
continued to ask guiding questions that would
help his students discover the answers for themselves.
Another important element involved with a
good question (as opposed to initially giving a pat
"answer") is to surround the question with broader
issues, both in the discipline and in the world. I liked
very much what Donald Saari, a mathematics
professor at the University of California--Irvine was quoted
as saying: "I want the students to feel like
they have invented calculus and that only some accident of
birth kept them from beating Newton to
the punch." That, I think, is what we want for our
gifted students: that feeling that what they are
discovering is important and meaningful. Bain and his
colleagues cite many examples of authentic
intellectual activity by students in classrooms, examples
across the disciplines. They provide spaces,
Bain says, where "students encounter safe, yet
challenging conditions in which they can try, fail,
receive feedback, and try again without facing a summative
evaluation." It occurs to me that this is the
description of the kind classroom gifted students need.
What else did they find? They learned that it is important
to grab students' attention and keep it
focused. They also found that effective professors begin
where the students are, not where the
discipline prescribes they should be. Think again about the
personal trainer. He or she discovers at
the beginning of each session where the client is and plans
the session accordingly. In addition, the
trainer has a goal, achievement toward which the client
should be moving. Great teachers do this, as
well: They plan instruction based on clear goals. And, like
personal trainers, they also know that those
goals change. In relation to gifted students, I think
knowing students also means keeping in the front
of the teacher's mind the "who" and
"what" of giftedness.
Another key to effectiveness is high expectations, not only
of the students, but also for the teacher
him- or herself. Teachers of gifted students certainly must
ask as much of themselves as they do of
their students, for if we expect commitment from them, we
must own it ourselves.
Another idea from Bain's research includes the willingness
to help students outside of class. Several
of my students this fall needed lots of "how-to"
guidance as they experienced not only a new
discipline (gifted and talented education), but also
graduate study itself. Gifted students tend to push
classroom teachers to better explanations, more guidance,
and more detail. They have a strong need
to know. Many, as well, have a strong need to get it right.
Further, the best teachers engage students in disciplinary
thinking. In the gifted field, we have often
modeled instruction according to the standards of Bruner and
others who suggested that we need to
involve students in the structure of the disciplines, to
guide them to think like mathematicians or
historians or writers. Disciplinary thinking may also mean
relating the discipline to current news--
what's happening in the here and now.
Finally, the research suggested that the great teachers
provide diverse learning experiences. Gifted
students demand novelty; they have a great appetite for
different ways of thinking and learning.
Again, think of the trainer who alternates exercises and
moves on to something new when his client
gets bored or frustrated, finding something that will inject
fun and excitement into the workout.
How did I answer my novice gifted educators when they asked
about the difference in the "good"
teacher and the "great" teacher? I shared some of
these ideas and others as they traveled the
challenging road to greatness.
Reference
Bain, K. (2004, April 9). What makes great teachers great?
The Chronicle of Higher Education, B7.
COPYRIGHT 2005 Prufrock Press COPYRIGHT 2005 Gale Group
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