“The Child Whisperer”

"The Child Whisperer" - What Is Good Teaching?

A parent of sibling students today called me "The Child Whisperer."

As a teacher of both students and teachers, and a developer of both curriculum and non-curriculum-based non-traditional schools, I am perpetually seeking to understand what comprises good teaching.

There probably is no summary answer. But I am sure of the starting point: The student.

I think I am learning every moment I teach how to better understand the student, how to grasp what the student is communicating, how to get in tune with the student's interests, motivations, and goals, to support their agency in creating the life they seek, and advocating for their needs, as they see them.

In short, it's learning about them. For its own sake. Not in order to coerce or trick or sugarcoat them. Just to learn. And then I just know what to do. (Not always immediately, but almost always eventually.)

Most education of teachers that I have experienced tries to give teachers tools and skills to answer and resolve the fundamental question and problem: How do we get people to do things they don't want to do?

It's the wrong question. It's the heart of our education, but it's wrong. We need to change the question to: How do I help people do what they want to do? This should be the heart of our education.

This philosophy of education will go against the grain of many, for a host of reasons. I suggest all the reasons are assumptions, and wrong assumptions. I'd have to address each of them one by one, but I think I could.