What do you teach?
Food for thought
When you are asked what you do for a living, you probably tell people you are a teacher. The next question is, what do you teach? I teach (fill in the blank). We all answer this question with a content area, or maybe a grade. I propose that this is not wholly accurate. You teach students. You teach Joseph, Amelia, Sebastian, Simone, Talia, and Alex. You teach them about history, or how to be scientists. But you teach students.
What you teach is important, but it is the what. The who are what matters. Whether it is the skills of an artist, the foundations of history, reading comprehension, scientific process, or how to be socially and emotionally well, it is certainly important. I hope that you would not spend your life teaching something that is not important. But even more important are the students, the humans in your class, that you are teaching it to. As you think about designing instruction, where are you spending more of your energy? Do you think about the best way to teach the content, and then that is that? Or do you think about the students in your class, what they bring to the table, what they may already know and be able to do, and start there?
Think about this as you plan your upcoming unit or lessons, especially if there is content that might be difficult or complex. Instead of designing the content or skill instruction on its own and then thinking about your class, try to move the class of students forward in the process. If I teach it this way, how will Alex react? What does Simone need related to this topic? Does Period 3 need to look at this differently than Period 4?
How might considering what you know about your students help you to better teach them?
There is no one answer, certainly, and strategies abound across Substack and beyond. (See a just a couple of my go tos below…there are many!). Here my intent is simply to remind you. When the going gets tough, when the pressure of getting everything done is mounting, consider and do not forget. It is the students you are teaching.
And thinking about the students first makes teaching more meaningful