OCT 22 Entrance slip

 "The key items of these agendas are indicated with buzzwords such as “cost effectiveness,”“learning outcomes,” “performance evaluation,” “achievement levels,” “instructional productivity,” and “user satisfaction.” Contemporary policy perspectives tend to be results-driven and accountability based. The point is that these orientations, discourses, and perspectives do not adequately reflect the ways that teachers and students experience the pedagogical being and daily tasks of teaching."

 

This presents the problem that teachers have to follow these concrete learning outcomes and aim at user satisfaction while these do not represent the daily interactions between the teacher and the students. There is a difference between the two, so nothing on the curriculum guide tells the teacher what to do in an actual classroom. To be tactful, the novice teacher has to think for themselves. One has to be reflective before, after, and even on the spot, in order to improve. This relates to the next quote:

 

"Nevertheless, the acknowledgment that the active practice of teaching is too busy to be truly reflective does not mean that teaching is condemned to Dewey's blind impulsivity or routine habit. Teachers feel that they can act with students in the classroom with more or with less thoughtfulness. While they are involved teaching, good teachers “thinkingly act” and often do things with immediate insight."

 

While being reflective is important, teachers in a classroom face so many interactions and could not take a moment to step back and think about the process. So it is important for the teacher to develop an “instinct” about what to do. As the author mentioned, good teachers “thinkingly act” and deal with issues with immediate insights about what is appropriate to do. The feeling for the right action is a combined product of experiences and intuition. to my understanding. As the article stated:

 

 

"(1)   A teacher who is tactful has the sensitive ability to interpret inner thoughts, understanding, feelings, and desires of children from indirect clues such as gestures, demeanor, expression, and body language... (2) Pedagogical tact consists in the ability to interpret the psychological and social significance of the features of this inner life. Thus, the tactful teacher knows how to interpret, for example, the deeper significance of shyness, frustration, interest, difficulty, tenderness, humor, discipline in concrete situations with particular children or groups of children. (3) A teacher with tact appears to have a fine sense of standards, limits, and balance that makes it possible to know almost automatically how far to enter into a situation and what distance to keep in individual circumstances."



The instant reaction is somewhat “learned”. With more experiences and psychological knowledge, the teacher would be able to interpret the reactions/emotions of the students. The teacher would also stick to appropriate standards and personal distances while dealing with the issues. This standard could be taken from older teachers or from local rules (different areas have different standards for personal distance between the teacher and student). Mostly, one acts instantly without thinking too much in a classroom. So, the past knowledge experiences play an important role in determining the ability of the teacher to interpret and respond to the complicated reactions/ emotions of the students. Maybe we should learn more psychological knowledge to be tactful.

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