Improving Teachers
The title is ambiguous isn't it? Either "teachers who are improving" or "making teachers improve". I really don't know yet where this post is going. It is a response to a number of tweets and blog posts I have read recently, and to a speech last night by a retiring colleague. All, in different ways, suggest that good teachers are good teachers and should be left alone to get on with their jobs. Here's an example of a blog post: " Evidence Based Teaching or Curing Stupidity ". The gist of this one seems to be that the author once took part some research which turned out to be rather pointless, and that the author thinks learning and teaching are too complex to be amenable to the distilling of transferable strategies through research. My colleague last night (a man for whom I have a huge amount of respect, and whom I count as a good friend) mocked the learning trios that have been operating in our school this year: colleagues engaging in