The Art of Teaching
Mark Van Doren, American poet, writer and professor at Columbia University said:
“The art of teaching is the art of assisting discovery”.
Teaching truly is an art form.
Each teacher is a unique artist creating a masterpiece lesson plan into which they put their own carefully chosen objects, colors, shadings, meaning and a bit of themselves.
A masterful teacher creates this masterpiece lesson, and then, like any work of art, invites the viewer/recipient to explore, discover and learn at their own pace and in their own way.
A work of art is personal and sensory and contextual.
Yet it is also universal and appeals to the humanity in all of us.
Lessons need to be personal, sensory and contextual in order to become meaningful.
They also need to be universal and teach us the “greater understandings” of life.
When something is personally meaningful to us, we make a connection…literally brain and heart connections.
This is the magic of teaching, and what may be missing in some classrooms today because of various factors.
Why has this changed, and what can a teacher do to become a masterful artist at their craft?
Standardization and testing have taken away much of the creativity in teaching.
Federal, state and district standards, testing and teacher evaluations have created a sort of template, one-size-fits-all approach to teaching and learning.
Rules, checklists, common lesson plans, curriculum mandates and unreasonable accountability have forced teachers to adjust and comply to expectations outside of their context rather than create, explore and discover within their own personal experience and that of their students.
It is like we are trying to homogenize the classroom…one size fits all…we are all the same.
We preach differentiation, but do we really and truly practice that?
Teachers are merely being asked to paint-by-number rather than being allowed to start with their own personal canvas and use their own uniquely chosen palette with which to create their masterpiece lesson….a.k.a…work of art.
The happiest and most effective teachers I know and have ever worked with are the ones who are allowed by their administrators and teammates to be their most creative and unique self.
Administrators know what good teaching looks like, despite what a district-mandated rubric looks like.
Teammates know how important it is to support and lift up those around us rather than exist under a cloud of jealousy and envy.
It should all start with creating a school culture that recognizes, encourages and supports the art of teaching and the artist in every teacher.
I am always moved to tears by the scene in Mona Lisa Smile when Julia Robert”s character, the teacher, gets out of the classroom and takes her students on a field trip.
Instead of giving them all the “right” answers through content served up on a silver platter for them to memorize and consume, she asks them to just stand in front of a Jackson Pollack painting and merely consider it by looking at the colors, texture, size, personal connection and feelings it evokes.
This is the art of teaching, which, as we discover throughout the movie, is the main theme.
The teacher, Katherine Watson, wants to open the minds and hearts of her students in the all girls’ school of Wellsley College.
However, she is expected to teach to a syllabus and deliver the content to the girls in conventional, standardized ways that the college deems acceptable.
When the students are able to recite and regurgitate dates, names and memorized facts about the artwork Miss Watson is presenting in class, then, they are considered model students on the road to success and wholeness as a human being.
However, Miss Watson quickly reveals that these polished and “well-educated” young women don’t really know themselves or the world in which they live.
I especially love the scene where each student, as a final project and homage farewell to their beloved teacher, create their own unique masterpiece based on Van Gogh’s famous painting of sunflowers.
There is a paint-by-number available, but the girls have finally learned how to paint of their own, using their own canvas and uniquely created palette.
Brilliant!!! (**heart eyes**)
So, if you are a teacher who is feeling boxed in, wrapped up and delivered like a package deal or if you feel like you are only doing paint-by-number lessons, then, get out your paints, your canvas and start creating a better lesson plan for you and your students.
Don’t be afraid. There are no right or wrong ways.
That is the beauty of art…it is both personal and universal at the same time and always open to interpretation based on the eyes of the beholder and the perspective of the lenses through which we are looking.
Now, go create your next masterpiece!
Inspirational song:
Soundtrack to Mona Lisa Smile – brilliantly and artfully created by Rachel Portman
Photo credit:
“TA Artist Palette – Nico Griffith AND OTHER NICE PAINT SUPPLIES” by ▓▒░ TORLEY ░▒▓ is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.
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