Issue link: http://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/63421
From Editors the What It Takes to Teach Many people believe that "anybody can be a teacher." After all, it's just telling a group of students something they need to know, right? How difficult can it be? Quite difficult, as anyone who is or has been a teacher will testify. Whether you're teaching kindergarten or college, economics or English, teaching is a vocation that requires a diverse, almost ineffable combination of talents. Professor Regina Bento of the University of Baltimore's Merrick School of Business, who is profiled in this issue, says that teaching is akin to "casting a spell" and that learning is akin to "falling in love." So, a good teacher not only must know the material, but also must be part magician and part matchmaker, sparking in students a love of the discipline and a desire to learn more. That's a pretty tall order. I must admit, I've never taught a business course. But for five years I taught my own specialty—English composition—to col- lege freshmen. I soon discovered that teaching is no simple feat. In my first year of teaching, I practiced my lesson plans as an actor rehearses a script. I worked on my inflection, gestures, and use of props. I'd "stage" my class carefully. Should the students have their desks in a circle or break into small groups? With what idea should I start to pique their interest and provoke a lively, meaningful discussion? Then, I'd walk to my classroom door, take a deep breath, and walk in. Showtime. As the years went on, however, it became increasingly clear "If Virginia Woolf can use a semicolon any way she wants, why can't we?" My care- fully planned lesson on the use of semicolons, colons, and their brethren evaporated. Instead, we broke into an impromptu discussion of Virginia Woolf's unconventional use of punctuation. And I was astonished. My students were actually interested! Together, we came to the happy realization that you've got to know the rules before you can break them effectively. To be honest, I'd never thought of it that way before. I also realized something important about teaching: Although it's essential to be prepared, sometimes it works best just to make it up as you go along. Unlike the award-winning teachers featured in this issue, I can't say that I broke that as a teacher, I had to be better at improvisation than rehears- al. I had to think fast, for instance, when a student asked defiantly, into the realm of the innovative with my little punctuation epiphany. But my students learned something. As Professor Yezdi Bhada stresses in this issue, learning is the ulti- mate goal of teaching. That idea may seem clear now, but it hasn't always been so obvious to many educators. I know it took time for me to realize that the essential responsibility of teachers is to ensure not that they teach, but that their students learn. In addition, my students taught me something. Indeed, inno- vative teaching—and its corollary, innovative learning—is achieved when teachers actually learn from their students. That's when teachers know…it's working. ■ z 4 BizEd NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2002 BILL BASCOM