Accountability and Classroom Control

This morning's read was a book I've owned for close to 10 years but never found time to read, and I was missing a gem: Kathleen Andrasick's Opening Texts: Using Writing to Teach Literature (1990, Heinemann).

As I reflect on my own teaching and the curricula I am given to "teach," I can only assert that I must do things differently this year. And, I must keep this section of text in mind each and every time I plan, asses, and reflect. I quote directly from pages 17 and 18: As Peter Elbow suggests, "much teaching behavior stems from an unwarranted fear of things falling apart" (1986, 71-72). A classroom centered around the teacher dispensing wisdom and information, then evaluating student assimilation of that information, feels like a quiet, safe place to work, a place where nothing can fall apart. And it is--for the teacher, who is in control, who knows exactly what will happen next and how, because he or she is making it happen. It is not such a safe place for students, however. They are being directed by forces over which they have no control (the teacher, the text, and the curriculum, for example). Furthermore, they have little or no control over classroom events, not even over the topic of discussion or its direction. For students, things often fall apart. They encounter surprise quizzes, questions they have never considered and for which they have no answers, and tasks for which they have had little or no training. At school, they confront the risk of embarrassment and failure hourly. We should not need to be told that the tension and discomfort (and perhaps fear) that students feel deflect their attention from learning. Common sense tells us that the context we create for students affects their thinking; classroom context can limit as well as empower learning."