Watching a video of yourself teaching is simultaneously painful and illuminating. While you continually cringe at your every movement and the sound of your own voice, you are also given the opportunity to honestly and objectively observe your practice. Having gone through this many times in my teaching career, I can say with confidence that the pain is worth it. Every time I watch myself teach, I learn about a way that I can improve my practice.
In a recent viewing of my own instruction, I picked up on a habit I have that, while well-intentioned, hinders my students’ opportunities to formulate their own ideas. When students are sharing a thought during class, I noticed that towards the end of their thought, I will begin to speak over them and finish their sentences for them. I seem to do this more with students who tend to struggle with the information in general, and also those who get the concepts, but have a difficult time expressing their ideas verbally. I know my intentions are good–as the students are speaking and I want them to say the right answer, so if I see them going astray, I think I’m helping them by leading them in the direction I want them to go. But really, all I am doing is cutting off their thoughts, and not giving them the opportunity to share what they really think, or practice expressing their ideas out loud. I am also missing out on the chance to understand how they are learning in my class.
Many of my students struggle with writing, so I make them write. I tell them that the only way to get better at writing about science is to practice writing about science, and I realized that I need to extend this same logic to their speaking skills. Allowing students to struggle when expressing an idea during class is a part of the process of learning how to speak clearly and thoughtfully about complex ideas. By not giving students this opportunity, I am denying them important chances to practice how to organize their thoughts for presentation to others.
As the end of the semester approaches, I have made a commitment to myself to focus on how I cultivate my students’ speaking skills in my classroom. To do this, I have set some rules for myself. First, I will not cut off students as they genuinely struggle to answer a question or share a thought. I will let them finish without taking over for them. Then, I will summarize the students’ thoughts for the class in a more precise manner, and allow that summary to further the class discussion. Additionally, I will remember and re-commit to a practice that helps support all students as they publicly share their ideas, which is to give them time to write down their ideas to questions before sharing them with the class. This will allow students, those who struggle and those who don’t, to organize their thoughts before sharing them.
I want my students to feel as though what they have to say is important, but also give them the opportunity to improve how they express themselves, as well as support them in ensuring that their ideas are topical and accurate. While there are many parts of my instructional practice that go into this, I think it all begins with letting my students speak in the first place.
