My goal as a teacher is to make myself an after thought. More like the couch cushion that serves as the door to an elaborate sleeping bag, sheet, chair, table, and couch fort, and less like the couch. I am not the structure that keeps the sheets up, I am the door that invites visitors in.
I want the learning to happen without me. I want my students to initiate their learning, use their resources, and share with each other in order to build their understanding. They take the inspiration from the rug of sleeping bags, they find the extra sheets needed to complete their compound, and they use their chair and couch support system to hold it all together. I am upstairs, eating freshly baked cookies. I am forgotten, until tummys begin to rumble.
However, I, as the teacher and cookie maker, need to consider the social and academic lessons that bring my students to such an independent level. Lessons that need to be taught directly, lessons that need to be repeated in small groups, and lessons that need to be modeled on a daily bases. My goal is to empower my students so they see me as foot steps upstairs. I may iron the roof, but I will not hold it up.
"This must be Thursday," said Arthur to himself, sinking low over his beer. "I never could get the hang of Thursdays." -- The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
Forty-two
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3 comments:
beautiful. so well said. I wish I could re-do 4th grade again in your class.
This is the ultimate goal. All our workings are melded to achieve this smooth succession. Our kids take over the business. They are groomed and nurtured so the are the CEO, COOs, and if we really work it right...the CFOs who pay us big bucks:)
Well said, Tree. There's nothing quite like a job in which our goal is to make ourselves irrelevant and unnecessary.
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