I absolutely believe that teachers can and should learn from students. I’ve heard that sentiment expressed often throughout my teaching career and honestly, I never paused to think about it. It seemed uncontroversial, if not obvious, to me. But after some lively pushback and discussion among friends, I think it’s well worth an attempt to articulate what it is about the claim that I agree with. Let me begin by stating what I don’t agree with.
I believe this claim is made too often and is often made disingenuously. Educators say it to their students on the first day of class, as if it’s a reverse-learning-outcome. Presenters say it reflexively at conferences in an attempt to increase audience pathos. I don’t like either of those things. I also don’t agree this claim should be made as a promise (e.g. “I will learn a lot from you all, my students, this year!”) or best practice (e.g. “Step #4 is to Learn from Your Students.”). Importantly, it certainly should not be an expectation from the student (e.g. “You’re going to teach me so much!”) as this would exploit their chosen role as a student. None of these methods are paths to the learning experience I’m referring to here.
There’s one more thing I don’t mean, at least not for this particular discussion. Most teachers would probably (hopefully) agree with this claim in the following sense: My students have taught me to become a better teacher. I’m going to go out on a limb and call that the most uncontroversial version of this claim. And like Kino wrote, we’re not talking about learning to teach. What Kino does ask us to consider are two scenarios: (1) that the teacher voices the intention to learn more about the area of study they’ve been hired to teach, and (2) that the teacher learns more about other aspects of life from students with different life-experiences. I agree entirely that (1) is very problematic, and I agree with the reasoning presented by Kino. It’s (2) where I find myself in disagreement.
Interestingly, (2) is the way Kino “really dislikes.” Given that Kino and I are both reasonable people who agree on most issues, I have a feeling we may just be thinking about the classroom differently and that our visions are probably compatible with one another. So, to add some spice, I’ll double-down on my claim: My students have taught me things that have made me a better person and a better academic. That is the claim I stand by and the one I am writing to defend here.
A few preliminaries:
- I have taught mostly philosophy classes, with two exceptions (Introduction to Political Science and Statistical Techniques… although it turns out I teach everything like a philosophy class). I mention this here because the content and range of class discussions may not suit other disciplines as easily as they do philosophy.
- My teaching has been greatly inspired by colleagues who were trained in pragmatism. This was a long and arduous process for me, which fundamentally transformed my teaching philosophy.
- In every class I teach, I focus heavily on the application of theory to real-life experience. Now, that doesn’t mean real-life, real-life. More like realistic fiction. I want my students to be able to think about a theory in practical terms, in a way that will actually matter to them outside the classroom – or, at least in a way that they can bring into their other classrooms. Anything to synthesize their learning experiences.
- So – and this is the critical part – anytime I prompt my students to use a personal example, personal feeling, personal belief or personal view, I tell them (multiple times) it does not have to be their personal example etc.; they are free to make something up. They can create hypotheticals, they can play the “devil’s advocate” or represent a view they’ve heard elsewhere. They don’t even need to tell me that’s what they’re doing. I don’t ask. The entire point is that I want to see they can apply the theory to real-life situations. Now, it might sound like I’m creating little liars who fabricate elaborate stories to get homework points. That’s not my intent and I don’t believe that’s the consequence. (Elaborate stories wouldn’t get extra points anyway… again, realistic fiction!) My intent here is to teach the students this application-skill while giving an “out” to those uncomfortable sharing their own personal experiences.
The times I have learned from my students in this impactful, meaningful way, I have learned things I could not have learned from anyone or anywhere else. It has been me learning from the personal experiences they’ve shared, in a way that combines with the course content we’ve already covered. When it happens, we’ve found ourselves at an intersection of their experiences, my teaching, and notably absent: my (life) experience. I’ll give two examples:
Veteran Students
Teaching ethical theories to veteran students is one of the most humbling experiences of my life. I began teaching at 27 years old, and soon found that I had veterans in my class that had served a couple tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. What was I going to teach them about ethics? One of our readings was from Michael Sandel’s Justice: What is the Right Thing to Do? which discusses the 2005 case when a U.S. special forces team in Afghanistan came across a group of innocent farmers. They had to decide between killing them and letting them go, thereby running the risk that the farmers would give up their location to the Taliban. Sure, we could interpret it as a moral dilemma between utilitarianism and deontology; but when I’m talking to students who have lived through similar events and even have shared acquaintances with those involved, that was completely insufficient. There had to be space in that classroom for me, the teacher, to learn from those students. Over several years, I learned many valuable lessons from my veteran students, that were more than just about how to reach out to them or about how the military has affected their lives. I learned from them in ways that ultimately affected my beliefs and my assumptions, creating in me a filter through which I have since viewed all ethical theories.
Native Hawaiian Students
Soon after I began teaching at Hawai‘i Community College in 2010, I heard rumors of controversy over a proposed Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT). I didn’t understand why it would be problematic; it sounded to me like it would be good for the local community, and a way to honor the astronomical tradition of Polynesians. My knowledge of the land and culture was limited, but I knew enough to think it would be an effective topic for our Social Application of Logic (SAL) project. In the SAL project, I asked my critical reasoning students to take a controversial topic with local significance and build arguments for and against it. My goal was to show them that we can’t truly feel confident in our own position until we see the other side at their best. In line with my teaching style, I told the students they were welcome to add their personal perspective, but it was not required. Ideally, I told them, they would build arguments so strong for both sides that I wouldn’t know what they personally supported (unless they chose to tell me).
The TMT was the most meaningful and impactful topic for students, and for me. In class presentations, students passionately shared their experiences, cultural beliefs and practical concerns about the telescope and its proposed infrastructure. Native Hawaiian students shared what the land meant to them and why its continued mismanagement and desecration was deeply painful. Other Native Hawaiian students spoke about feeling conflicted by wanting to honor their ancestors and also provide for future generations by improving the local economy. Non-native students listened, asked questions and shared their thoughts. Now, open discussions like this can and should happen often, not only in the classroom. But what makes our discussions unique, and why I say that it’s about more than just me learning from their life-experiences, is that they happened against a very particular backdrop. At this point in the semester, the students could name and analyze a couple dozen logical fallacies, and they could create their own inductive and deductive arguments. We were, in one sense, speaking a common language which afforded us a distinctive level of analysis. In another sense, they were taking me through a portal into their world. The lessons I learned from them changed me as a person and as an academic. They inspired me to learn more about the place I lived and the culture which had embraced me. They sent me on a journey I didn’t even know was possible.
I think there is much room for agreement here. It should not be disingenuously stated that teachers will or should learn from students. Most importantly, students should never feel that it’s their job in any way to teach the teacher. But I firmly believe it can and does happen genuinely, and in that sense, it also should happen. I don’t mean that it should happen all the time, or that it’s part of some formula for good teaching. But I do think that teachers should be open to the idea of learning from their students, and that this type of learning can be authentic and substantive.
- Ready to Learn - September 12, 2019