THIS is the epitome of education for me!

The world is complex and teaching at school needs to include skills for engaging in a complex and dynamic world deeply influenced by globalization and digital technology 

(Benade, 2016). 

This is scary, especially when you have been a teacher for long and maybe have been rooted in a method of your own. For these are times that are so unpredictable that they challenge every belief that one may have had in the head about teaching. They reflect fluidity, unpredictability and complexity.

The only way to be is the way of being a lifelong learner. 

What does it mean to me? To constantly refine oneself to meet the young people where they are (NOVA, 0.45, n.d.) is the closest to what I can describe as the reason for teaching. The objective of this would be to create a space where the students feel safe to learn joyfully and to believe that they can (NOVA, 0.53, n.d.) is the basis for having such a space. To constantly refine myself to create such an eco system needs a continuous work on me as a person. It would be a system of learn-act-reflect-modify-relearn way of being.

What it involves are:

(a) continuously learn about everything that is needed for being a teacher. Subject knowledge, pedagogy of the subject, psychology of the student and of course, myself; 

(b) bring new ideas in action, that is, to try all that I have learnt in the classroom space; 

(c) constantly reflect on the actions by focusing on the sensation of unease that comes up; 

(d) be open to accept mistakes, which one becomes aware of in the space of action; 

(e) modify action as per the insights gained during reflection and hence 

(f) continue the chain of learning.

To teach is to grow. 

To challenge the belief system that one holds and changes it through the power of cognitive work of reflection. But this reflection is not just static, that is reflection on action. It is also dynamic, reflection in action, that modified one’s behavior in the space of action (Benade, 2016). At the end of this, I understand that there is no mutually exclusive strategy for teaching my subject, math. One can focus on student engagement, cognitive activation or have a teacher directed class, all of them are equally needed and what a teacher needs to do is to develop the judgment call that teaches one to ‘switch’ (Costin, 2017).

An approach of act-reflect-modify has helped me to develop such flexibility for the same. The path to developing as a critically reflective teacher cannot be prescribed with an intervention formula. The route cannot be preplanned; it must be lived (Larrivee, 2000).

References

1. Benade, L. (2016) Teachers’ reflective practice in the context of twenty-first-century learning. In Open Review of Educational Research 3:1, pages 133-147. Retrieved March 27, 2018 from https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/23265507.2014.998159

2. Costin, C. (2017, August 3). What is the role of teachers in preparing future generations? Retrieved March 11, 2018, from https://www.brookings.edu/opinions/what-is-the-role-of-teachers-in-preparing-future-generations/

3. Larrivee, B. (2000). Transforming teaching practice: Becoming the critically reflective teacher. Reflective Practice,1(2), 293-306. Retrieved March 12, 2018, from http://ed253jcu.pbworks.com/f/Larrivee_B_2000CriticallyReflectiveTeacher.pdf

4. NOVA. (n.d.). School of the future- What should the school of the future look like? Retrieved March 10, 2018, from https://mass.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/nvsof-sci-futureschool/wgbh-nova-school-of-the-future-what-should-the-school-of-the-future-look-like/#.Wr13LIjwY64