A reaction to "The Deconstruction of the K-12 Teacher"

“The Deconstruction of the K-12 Teacher” has been finding its way into my digital devices from a variety of sources in recent days. If you haven’t seen it yet, it is an insightful essay by Michael Godsey that appeared on The Atlantic’s site  (http://t.co/F0RJhFCHfV).

I think I am accurately summarizing of Godsey’s article: He describes the changing landscape of teaching, learning, and schooling and illustrates the changes with examples of strategies and digital tools that are influencing educators’ work. My career appears to have paralleled Godsey’s, and I can confirm the devices foisted on him as an English teacher have been foisted on me as a science and math teacher who joined the dark side of educational technology.

Godsey appears to have captured the landscape well; the work of dispensing information is being transferred from educator to technology. Today’s educators have access to amazing and previously unimaginable sources of information, and we can leverage those to our needs. (The recent allegations notwithstanding, I used Walter Lewin’s lectures when I last taught physics because he was a far better lecturer than I am.) Godsey uses the familiar “sage-on-the-stage” to “guide-on-the-side” metaphor to illustrate the changing nature of teaching.

I would share Godsey’s apparently cynical outlook on the future of our profession (indeed my colleagues would confirm my cynicism has equaled and exceeded his at times), were it not for the fact that many of the initiatives he references have failed. Online learning is probably the premier example. Despite much rhetoric, it still appears to be a largely marginalized endeavor, and students’ reactions to online learning experiences are the embodiment of ambivalence.

When I encounter a student who demonstrates this ambivalence, I try to engage him or her in conversation about the experience. These informal conversations typically focus on the fact that there was no personal connection with the teachers, and that contributed to a lack of motivation and engagement they felt. Without that engagement, the most wonderful online lecture cannot be an educative experience.

The un-engaging nature of much online learning can be attributed to the largely absent sense of community and culture. Being together and sharing stories, feedback, and informal advice are all part of becoming educated in the culture of the subject that is learned in school. It is through this (formal and informal) social interaction that we learn the essential lessons of our educated society.

I have searched in vain to find the article I read at some point in the last couple of years that added “mentor-in-the-middle” to the emerging roles of educators. The model seems to be a far more accurate summary of the future role of educators than the familiar “sage” or “guide.” Consider the relationship between graduate faculty and graduate student: As mentors, faculty help students identify relevant and important problems, they help them define and articulate and gather data to address the problems, and they facilitate groups of students to critique and improve each other’s work. These are the important roles of teachers in the 21st century landscape of infinite credible information.

As I read Godsey, I see another theme, and it is more distressing. Educators—Godsey and me along with our experienced and knowledgeable colleagues—are being replaced as the experts on teaching and learning. I can understand the politician, philanthropist, and businessperson who can gain political and public relations credibility and using his or her “expertiness” (with apologies to Stephen Colbert and his writers) to advocate for “school improvement”. I cannot understand the educational “leaders” who ignore what they learned in their educational research and learning science courses about data and learners as they allow destructive practices and dubious advocates to gain access to their communities.

I am hopeful that Godsey’s article motivates educators to accept greater role in defining the future of their professional. Actually, that is not my hope.

Educators must demand that we craft education that reconciles our past history as dispensers of information with the new need for students who gain wisdom as consumers of information and more importantly as creators of knowledge and wisdom.