Of course, nothing is ever simple in education. The answer is that teachers - whether they are subject specialists or generalists - need a wide range of different skills and attitudes if they are to assist their students achieve high outcomes. These should include relationships with students, subject matter knowledge and also an understanding of pedagogical processes to develop the understanding that is required.
Should a teacher fail to have any of these, then it is likely that the learning in the classroom will not be as successful. However, it would be foolish to isolate one of these skills to the exclusion of all others: teaching, like most people-centred professions, requires a range of abilities and skills that the practitioner carefully weaves together, in such a way as to provide the most meaningful experience possible. One Chapter Ahead of the Students… It is surprising, then, that there is relatively little evidence supporting this claim.
Not so Fast… Of course, as with many other things in education, the answer is much more complicated than that. Preparation needs to go not only into what you need to cover in your explanation but also into how you are going to explain it. What concepts are pupils going to struggle to understand?
What analogies or examples could you use? What questions are you going to ask to really test their understanding? The problem with this approach is that it can lead to teachers staying just one page ahead in the textbook, whereas lessons for many subjects rarely work this way when synoptic links to other parts of the subject are common. In the example above, about teaching appropriate technology, I would need not only knowledge of this concept and examples like the Play Pump scheme, but also knowledge of aquifers and different forms of aid.
This kind of knowledge is more likely to accrue through a more regular immersion in your subject. One simple way to do this is to continue to read about your subject. It can be difficult for someone new to the profession to make time to sit and read a book or article when it feels like there is so much else that needs doing.
The solution is to recognise the importance of maintaining your subject knowledge and plan in time to maintain it — the same way you would set time aside to mark a pile of tests or plan your lessons. A potential problem of relying on books to maintain your knowledge is the lag time between a development in your field and these developments being recognised in the literature. A second issue is that the content can feel very far removed from the subject at school level.
The information needs to be recontextualised from an academic setting to a school one Firth, This is where subject associations can play a pivotal role.
For example, The Geographical Association have recently published articles on the changing ideas about tectonic movement and the implications for the classroom.
Subject associations also offer training sessions and conferences, where new ideas can be shared and discussed and knowledge built. As well as the conferences run by official subject associations, there are also an increasing number of subject-specific TeachMeet events being organised by teachers around the country. These, almost always free to attend, tend to be held at evenings and weekends.
They are usually advertised on social media and through word of mouth and help to show the importance of building a strong and supportive network of fellow subject specialists in those early years of teaching. Social media has certainly made developing subject knowledge easier than ever, with communities of teachers willing to share resources, discuss teaching difficult concepts and help out those new to the profession. There are subject specialist groups on Facebook but it is Twitter where you tend to find the most immediate support.
Most subjects have their own hashtags, such as TeamEnglish and GeographyTeacher, and many have their own dedicated group chat sessions where questions are posed by a moderator and conversations are followed with a shared and searchable hashtag.
Enjoyable experience 08 Aug, In many countries, teaching is a graduate only profession. Teachers are required to be educated to degree level before being permitted to lead education in a classroom. Want to keep learning? This content is taken from Manchester Metropolitan University online course.
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