Teaching young teachers a privilege and an experience

One of the great joys of my life, and my work, is to be able to pass on my knowledge of teaching and learning to education students at the University of Nizwa, and also in sharing good practice with in-service teachers, in workshops and teacher training throughout the wider Al Dakhiliyah Governorate. I never turn down an opportunity to work with teachers because I know that I have something to offer. It’s not always nice to hear that what you are doing may not be the most effective way of doing it, but if teachers can see through the ‘pink mist’ of indignation, we tend to make very fast progress. Teaching does require special people, with a resilience and fortitude that keeps picking them up when they are down, and for many, getting the harsh news delivered by that messenger can create a ‘watershed’ of pedagogical, or teaching and learning, discovery. Most of which is centred around the fact that yes, we know stuff, but just telling our pupils and students about it will rarely help them know the same ‘stuff.’ I want to reflect upon some of the ways forward for teachers, and it will do no harm whatsoever for parents to understand the same perspectives, dynamics and discoveries, made by some students in my Educational Psychology class. These are all graduate students and have a depth of compassion and understanding that reflects very well upon their progress, and trust me, these are only a sample of the discoveries these students are making for themselves, with the group interactive and academically progressive. Writing about the benefits of reflecting upon our teaching, Rawaa al Saqri quoted the doyen of educational psychology John Dewey, saying, “We do not learn from experience, but we learn from reflecting on our experience.” She explained that pupils are not the only learners in the classroom, with effective teachers embracing self-observation and self-evaluation, “If they are to become the best version of themselves.” She made the important observation too that reflection is likely to create opportunities for sharing best practice with colleagues and developing better professional relationships as a result. Another, Asma al Abri, said that we need to be aware too, of the emotional and compassionate aspects of our teaching while we evaluate and analyse our teaching to find out, practically, “what works and what doesn’t, as effective teachers are the first to admit that no matter how good a lesson is, they will always identify something that can be improved.” She says that reflective practice is the “super-highway to enhanced teaching and learning, where we don’t teach facts, as much as teaching minds to think and learn.” Taking an entirely different tack was Ahlam al Abri, who focused on the culturally sensitive aspects of teaching today, emphasising that teachers have a responsibility to ‘know’ their learners, as issues such as the directness or otherwise of eye-contact, or the wait/response time they allow, and the need to maintain distance more in some cultures than in others. Even the most empathetic and compassionate teachers may fail to appreciate any of these through enthusiasm rather than any insensitivity or disrespect. She says that both teachers and learners have shared responsibilities in cultural sensitivity for effective learning to occur. Finally, Mohammed bin Sulaiman al Shehhi has applauded the relatively recent changes to the Omani educational culture, writing that “many intelligent, clever young women of previous generations lost their dreams,” before the Renaissance, and that ironically for himself as the only male in his class, his classroom isolation has become an issue of equality of interaction and participation, with respect to the societal and cultural norms he lives by. On reflection, my job is more like an experience than work!