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Ted LeachDraft#lDecember 7,2009

She's getting ready to ask me a question. I know i! because I can see her in the

back of the room, writing notes in that wom leather notebook she carries with her. For

weeks, she's had that notebook, in rvhich she writes everything. I've never looked in it,

but I see her writing. I know she's writing notes about me. What she sees me do. What

she sees the class do. And she's got this knack of asking me the perfect question every

time.

We're sitting in the back of the room, at the makeshift desk I've set for her. She's

got the notebook open in front of her, and she's looking at it. She always does this. She

looks at the notebook, pauses. Sighs a bit, then moves her pen in a semi-circle.

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I know what she's doing. She's looking for the perfect question -- the one that

pulls everything together. This is what she's good at -- every day she watches, writes, and

=*_,n"n pulls together the perfect question. The one I have trouble answering inevitably.

"Hmm..." she pauses. I wait, knowing rvhat's coming.

"Can you tell me how you decide to use group work? When you decide to do a

group assignment rather than individual seat work?"

She's got me.

It's not that I can't answer her questions. I can -- but it takes me the same amount

of time sometimes to answer her questions as it does for her to come up with them.

Sometimes days. And she's always apologetic as she asks them, as she watches me

struggle to find the answer.

"Don't apologize," I say. "It's a good question. It deserves a good answer. Besides

-- if I can't answer this question, then I really shouldn't be doing this job." ii

This job, of course, is being a mentor teacher. After l2years of teaching ^, :students, I suppose I'm now supposed to have some answers. Why else would Bard have Ibrought me into this program? I'm a Mentor Teacher. ['m supposed to have The \,

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\tIAnswers to The Questions.

' { So I struggle. I think. And eventually I come up with the Answer.

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, .,r, ^ "How do I decide when to do group work? Well, there are a few things that come

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(, , into play here. The class, for example. Some classes just aren't as good at being in

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',.,..rt" Friday. With a vacation coming up, this is not the day to throw the eight period class into I' i-. a group. But the sixth period almost needs to be in a group, because they'll take the -'\ \

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\ ,.,L points you're tying to make and run with them to places you can't anticipate. And do "''

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,, -. yorr h4ve different ability levels in thJ class'/ A cooperative group might be a good fit in ,, r l

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' those cases. Have you read Johnson and Johnson on cooperative groups? I've got my

: coPY at home, I'll bring it in if you want. though I bet there's something better out there' t r . ' now.'

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' Jt rarnbling stream of coherence. By the end of it I might have answered the question.

Or perhaps I confused her more. That'll give her something else to write about in

her journal. Must make seminars fascinating. I remember going to seminar during my

,/ own student teaching. Flash back to 1997, Simrnons College in Boston. Meeting once a

; ( | week, we'd inevitably spend the first hour of a three-hour seminar venting, griping and/-{

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. \./ shudder to think what if anything she's said about me.

I't'e never been good at the straight answer. But I guess that's because there just , \i. {, \ ' -

aren't that many good answers. The questions though, fascinate me. ,-t ,

' ,n "" . ' , \ ' tIt took me three or four years of teaching before I really began to develop u ' ,.J '' '

respect for good questions. My department head at the time suggested I read Mortimer .' ,

Adler, who had come to the school several years earlier to teach a workshop on Socratic

Seminars. In his bookThe Paideia Program, Adler wrote that seminars could "be

described in a single word: they are conversations" (i7). Adler's approach hooked me. I

began to prepar:e for classes by writing out questions. The questions were designed to

evoke further questions. Sometimes I 'would even create flow charts of questions; one set

of questions to ask if the class went one way, one set to ask if they went another.

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i " 'fhen I began reducing my questions to only two or three. Eventually I got to thepoint where I could prepare fcrr my seminars with a few notes on the back of an indexcard. The better the questions, the fewer of them I needed. It was about this time that wealso were working on a lot of "Essential Questions." Predictably, I loved it. I lovecl theconversations that flowed from a good question.

As I learned the value of good questions, I learned the fascinating paradox ofteaching. It's not in having all the answers that good teaching lies. It's in asking theright questions. Granted there's a place for having some answers --and there,s a place

for asking questions that are designed to get the right ones.

^. ('''' But I had learned that whg1,yotr.gfua4ge schools, or change roles in your school,wy_eu become, for a brief moment, a new.teacher again. So, Ithe fl1.g1200g, when Ibecame for the first time a teacher of teachers, t forgot rftfi;;,i"f GA 11;r-a fewthankfully brief moments. And I struggled with the questions my apprentice posed,partially because I knew they were good questions, ones that I should be able to answer.

How do I set up my groups? I'm sure I have a better reason than the day of theweek.

:- 'And thus tie conversation,began.

Sometimes it took place in the back of my classroom, long after the students hadleft the room. We'd sit, and talk about the lessons, the students. We'd talk about the life

of a teacher, and the need to roll with theiuaehe#the highs and lows of beginning ateaching career bring.

And sometimes the conversation would continue after she left. Behind the wheelof my car, driving out of Kingston, through the traffrc circle, up Route 2g, into the

ntountains, I'd continue thinking about the problems we'd discussed. Sometimes I'd talkthem out aloud. I've long since stopped apologizing for my habit of talking aloud.

Sometimes those conversations led to a coherent answer. Sometimes they simplyled to more questions. Sometimes, I suspect we didn't even come close to anythins

approximating an answer.

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But maybe that's okay. ln2}07, a group of teacher educators identified four ,[ ,)

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critical stances necessary in beginning teachers; they're open to collaboration vr,ith other : ; lt \

teachers, able to face challenges and hnd necessary support, deal_withlhc-binary-_tpnsions ,\.,

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inherent in teaching, and develop their own identity as teachers (NCTE). - ''* i I

All of these essentially reduce to questions.

How do we best collaborate with other teachers?

How do I deal with the challenges of teaching?

How do I balance my personal and professional life?

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tuAnd most important: Who Am I as a teacher?

These are questions that as teachers we struggle with throughout our careers.

Thankfully, no one demands that we have a coherent, permanent answer. What is

demanded is that we engage in the conversation.

So I'm glad that in my first year as a mentor teacher I managed to stumble my

way to a few answers. I'd hate to think that my apprentices left with an image of

someone who can't ever give a straight answer.

But, in a strange way, I also hope that when they leave my classroom, they left

with more questions than answers. If they're okay with thaq then I think they'll turn out

to be great teachers. r j

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Works Cited

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Adler, Mortimer J. The Paideia Program. New York: Macmillian,1984. Print.

*What Should English Education Consist of During the First Years of Teachers'

Careers?" National Council of Teachers of English, Conference on English

Education. 18 Sep. 2008. Web. 7 Dec. 2009.

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