What happened?

During this week, I was able to go and observe another teacher in the school for the final time in my
PSII. This time, I went to go see a Social Studies teacher who was very highly regarded in the school.
While I was there, I had noticed that there were two particularly notable things that he did to engage
his students in the classroom. The first thing was a “what did you read in the news” informal
discussion. During this, he had an open opportunity for students to share any notable current events
that they had recently read about—these did not have to be about Social Studies in particular either.
He would then talk to the students and class about the various things that had been brought up. The
second thing that stuck out to me about his teaching was his tendency to go on tangents, but in such
a way that it seemed planned and pertinent to his teaching.

Why did it happen?

I think that James is very good at not only keeping his students engaged, but also encouraging them
to develop the good habits of a learner. Having the students share things that they read in the news
accomplishes two things—first, it encourages them to actually interact with news in some capacity.
While the news can sometimes be depressing, it is important to keep on top of things that may
impact an individual. By starting his class off this way, it gives students a reason to look into current
events and gives a platform to share that information with students who may not be as likely to
search the news out themselves. The tendency to go on tangents was interesting to me because,
despite being spontaneously spurred by student comment or question, they had felt quite planned in
how he was able to deal with them. While he could have dismissed the tangent to go on with his
lesson as planned, I believe that following the tangent and turning it into a related teaching moment
was very encouraging to students. It showed them that, when they expressed a genuine interest in
something, James was willing to help them learn about this thing that was actually meaningful to
them.

What might it mean?

One thing that I thought it could mean was, in essence, never discourage a student from wanting to
learn, even if the thing they want to learn was not the thing that you had wanted or expected them
to learn. I believe that the seamlessness of his dealing with these tangents is a comfortability that
comes with more time and experience in the role, but I thought the fact that he never said anything
to discourage the derailment of his lesson was very interesting. The other thing that I think this
observation meant was that while it is unarguable that we must teach curriculum, it is also important
that we take some small moments to just teach our students how to be people. While I am,
admittedly, unsure on if there are exact curricular outcomes that would fit a daily news activity in the
10-12 Social Studies curriculum, I think that it is something that has a value which outweighs the
time it may take from other things. Having the students interact with the news can be valuable in
Social to have them recognize things like bias, but it is also just an activity which will help them
become a more well-rounded person if carried into the future.
Implications for practice?
The biggest way that this will inform my practice is the understanding that a lesson can deviate from
what you had planned, sometimes dramatically, and still be considered a successful lesson. Perhaps it
may even be more successful than the original lesson, as this new lesson may have taught the
students something that is relevant and useful to their lives, and therefore, may have a higher
practical value for them. I think that, whenever reasonable, finding these “teaching moments” where
you don’t necessarily expect them can be a powerful and interesting experience for the students. It
has the potential to encourage future inquiry and interest in that student if handled well in the
moment, and I think that it is a very interesting thing that I had not previously given too much
thought towards.