What It Is About Teaching That Makes Me Happy

4:55 a.m. 79 degrees. I had opened the door and stepped out into the darkness. I thought I was hitting a wall someone had built during the night. The quiet air was awash with water. Maybe we’re beginning to feel the first subtle effects of Ernesto. I drew strength and energy to struggled through the dark heaviness, from thinking about two questions a first year student, an aspiring teacher, threw at me in her journal last Friday

“Dr. Schmier, you don’t know it but I’ve been watching you in and out of class….So, I have two questions for you. What is it about teaching that makes you always so happy and what does teaching mean to you.”

Interesting questions aren’t they. Certainly reflective questions that can cause you to pause. I told her to give me the weekend to think about them. After yesterday, Tuesday, I have the answers for both. Let me take the first one first.

To answer that question, I want to briefly talk about a student I’ll call Samone. It’s not her real name. She is a real person, a daring and courageous person I might add. She didn’t know it until yesterday. Let me backup. In an early journal entry she said in no uncertain terms how nervous she was about being in this class. She had heard that she would have to get up in front of class and do lots of things. She was scared. She labeled herself as a very shy person who didn’t like to get up and do things in front of people. But, she ended her message, with a wish she wasn’t way, but was resigned to the fact that she was.”

I replied by saying that because that’s the way she has have been and presently is doesn’t mean that’s the way she has have to be, especially if she didn’t like being who she was. I reminded her about what I said about having had cancer; that it was okay for me to have had fear, but I had to fight not to let the fear have me and stop you. I asked her what would happen if she took the risk to slowly start breaking the habit of thinking that she was shy and struggled to choose to think differently of herself, especially in this class where we’ll be forging a supportive and encouraging community.

I left it at that and didn’t say or write another word about it. We spent the four classes on the first phase of breaking barriers, building bridges, and forging community with a bunch of what I call “getting to know ya” exercises. Yesterday, we entered the second phase by starting to lay down the four operational principles of the class that rested on community. This semester I’m experimenting with changing the order of the exercises. I started with an exercise I call “The Story” that I have normally saved until last. I’ll just say that I use it to place the material of the course and the lives of the students in historical context and to it some meaning and purpose. It has been nine years since I’ve written about “The Story.” It’s a silly story with not-so-silly meaning and with semester long impact. I always hope that something resembling noisy “organized chaos” will erupt. To recap, I hand out this four sentence story accompanied by eleven short questions to which the choice of answers are: true, false, unknown. The instructions are simple: “Read the story and answer all the questions. Everyone in your community must reach a consensus for all the answers. But you’re not finished. In some manner, shape, or form of your choosing, EVERYONE in the class must reach a 100% consensus for ALL eleven answers.” Then, I stand back without uttering a word or making a gesture for the students to discover that the simple story and simple answer are anything but clear-cut and simple.

Invariably, things start slow and quiet as the student read the story and initially answer the questions. Then, slowly, the silence is broken by murmur. The murmur grows into rumble, and rumble explodes into movement and sound. Students getting out of their chairs; they squeeze between the chairs, move chairs, climb over chairs; they’re walking around, bumping into, bending over, kneeling; they were arguing, talking, debating, even shouting; they were persuading, being persuaded, talking, listening, not listening, being sarcastic, being disengaged, leading, following: “Let’s keep it simple….” “But, we don’t know…” “This is not as simple as he said it was.” “Do we know anything?” “Look….” “No, you look…” “If you read….” “You can’t read….” “You’re reading into….” “Just read what it says….” “You have to infer….” “This is dumb…..” “I don’t like confrontation…..” “How do you figure that….” “It says that….” “It doesn’t say….” “Who cares….” Answers were erased, cross-out, rewritten, kept, defended, questioned, attacked; fighting raged over a word; struggles ensued with a phrase, confrontations were held over a meaning; heads nodding agreement, heads shaking in disagreement; voices rising into shouts, in annoyance; arms moving and flailing in all directions; feet stomping; faces smiling, frowning, laughing, becoming wrinkled and puzzled, getting tight and serious; quiet students becoming; vocal students becoming silent.

Then, I saw it happen. Samone slowly, almost painfully, got up out of her chair. There was anxiety in her eyes. As she slowly went to the front of the room, I silently said to myself, “Go girl!” She stood there for a moment. I wish I could have spoken a soft supportive “Just do it.” She took a deep breath, and shouted the class to order. “Hey, listen up. Let’s go over these questions together. For the first question, our community got…..”

After an hour of struggling to maintain some resemblance of organized chaos, Samone led the class to reaching a 100% consensus of the answers.

At this moment, the purpose of the exercise is not important. Perhaps that is for later. What Samone achieved is my answer to what it is about teaching that makes me happy.

Samone wrote in her journal, “You could probably tell how nervous I was cuz (sic) my hands were shaky, but I figured since u (sic) told me to just not be shy that I should just get up in front of the class and go for it. And I did. I am so proud of myself….”

I wrote back a simple, “Great job. I knew you could do it. Now, you see you can….Keep on walking.”

So, as an answer the first of this future teacher’s question, I wrote her:

You ask what it is about teaching that makes me happy. Well, I have my own yardstick.

It’s for me and only for me to define. I don’t allow others to define happiness for me. If I did, I wouldn’t truly experience it; if I let them lay out the path, I wouldn’t be following my road; if I allowed others to dictate what my dreams should be, I’d never reach them.

The only way to reach for my dreams, to follow my vision, and to achieve happiness, as I define it, for myself is to choose what has real meaning and purpose, and significance, for me as a teacher.

You want to know what, then, tickles the sweet spot in the deep part of my soul? Let’s see. Being significant, being effective, changing things, learning new things, having a ‘let’s see what happens approach, being imaginative and creative, having the courage to risk changing, influencing things, being flexible, being adaptable, making things happen, making a positive and lasting difference, being authentic, and, most important, being able to be in the service of others.

Being in the service of others. Having an impact on others, not just on myself, is rewarding. Being significant is satisfying. Making a difference is fulfilling. Just think of it. It is a sobering–and humbling–responsibility it is to realize that we teachers each can be the instrument of making a difference in someone’s life; that our courage, empathy, love, support, encouragement, compassion, belief, and creativity can set into motion attitudes and actions that can only make for a better person and therefore a better world. That realization turns any woeful sighs I might have into joyous songs.

Now some of you may think that what Samone did was small potatoes. You’d be wrong. And, I made sure she didn’t diminish the importance of what she did. As I told her, “Don’t let you or anyone else let you think you took ‘just’ a small step. There is nothing small about it. Any step that is part of a great journey is great, and you have just begun a great journey of self-discovery.”

For me, then, what appears to be the smallest, plainest, simplest moment can be fertile ground for the most extraordinary happiness.

One small step for Samone; one giant leap for the world. A lot of happiness for me.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–

A Honey-Do-List

The pre-dawn Valdosta streets were dark. The air was wet and hot. The tarred street seemed a bit tacky. My feet were sloshing in my walkers. Plop. Plop. Plop. Water was pouring off my body like I was one the fourth waterfall in my Koi fish pond. The summery Dogs of August are howling so loud they make the baying of the Hounds of the Baskervilles seem like whimpers. In the stillness I was thinking about honey-do-lists.

 No, I’m not talking about Susan’s honey-do-list. I’ve got my own “honey do” list that I put on my computer here at the house and on the wall of my office that I intensely read each time as I meditate before I go on campus and before I enter class. I looked at it more intently this morning before I went for my walk. I had read two students journal entries last week and I can’t get them out of my mind. One was from a student whose father had died of cancer last year. “No one can tell me why he had to die. You had it. Maybe you can.” The other was from a student whose mother is currently battling breast cancer. I’ll just say they are struggling. Cancer is preying on their minds and soul. “I wish it would just go away,” one of the students woefully lamented. Their words reveal they are consumed with distracting and depleting sadness, confusion, guilt, fear, helplessness, and anger. Sometimes those weighty feelings show themselves; sometimes they lay hidden. Try as the students may to push them out of sight, they’re always there doing their corrosive and debilitating work, and often create wrong impressions to others.

 I understood. Now, almost two years after being told I had cancer, having lived what I felt at the time was an epic struggle of life and death, having bowed my head and heart, and still experiencing the consequent side-effects from that radical operation nineteen months ago, I shared with them of the four lessons I learned in having cancer. First, I told them that don’t have the answers. I don’t have the answers to their “Why?” any more than I have answers to mine. I don’t think anyone really does. Second, I warned them that I almost instantly found that it was paralyzing to believe that to find a comfortable place all I had to do was push my feelings our of my mind rather than face the challenges of everyday life. Retreating to a “quiet place,” finding a “safe haven,” struggling to avoid consciously frequenting the cancer, would not make the cancer go away or eradicate the influence it would continue to have on me and those around me. As Jeremiah said, you have to experience the dark in order to celebrate the light. I would add that maybe you have to feel that your tomorrows have run out in order to appreciate today. You have to have all that you are mortally threatened in order to appreciate what you are capable of being. Maybe you have to have all that you possess threatened in order to place in priority what you have. That’s the third lesson. This day, today, is the only day I have, that my life can be snuffed out at any moment without notice, and it would be tragic not to have a passion for living today, to be truly and intensely awake and alive this day, to be drained by depleting moans and groans. And fourth, Harold Kushner is right. As I don’t take anything or anyone for granted this day, including myself, I find the sacred in each person and thing, as well as in myself. And, as I can see holiness in things and people, as I discover the good in every situation, as I clearly see beauty all around me, as I empower myself with love, I find my life filled not only with an overwhelming feeling of gratitude for having this day, but with an almost uncontrollable sense of mission, fueled by a compassion for today, to awaken through the example of my attitudes and actions that awareness in others as well. It is a joy that nurtures my soul, fires my passion, energizes my body, and sharpens my vision.

 So, here is my own honey-do-list. I started to put it together soon after my epiphany fifteen years ago. Added to it over the years. Slowly capitalized each word. Then, one by one, wrote each in upper case. Put each into bold type when I discovered I had cancer. I am powered by this list. I am directed by this list. I am guided by this list. I am sustained by this list. For me, this an activating list, an uplifting list, a comforting list, a joyful list, a sustaining list. I am transformed by this list every time I can live each word to the fullest. It is a list that let’s me give life to my vision of helping each student help her/himself become the person she or he is capable of becoming. And, trust me, they each are a chore:

NOTICE
WELCOME
EMBRACE
LOVE
FEEL
CARE
SEE
LISTEN
UNDERSTAND
HOPE
APPRECIATE
BELIEVE
RISK
STRETCH
ENCOURAGE
SUPPORT
LEARN
DEVELOP
GROW
CHANGE
Make it a good day.

      –Louis–

Scholars and Teachers

Well, the new semester is upon us and as I was listening to new faculty being introduced I thought of how tired I am of the old, shop-worn “research versus teaching” debate that rages in academia. I am tired of sitting in on beginning-of-the-semester college meetings having new faculty introduced by having received this degree as this place, having a concentration in this discipline, having published this book, having received this grant. Rarely, if any, mention of teaching credentials. Usually, just age-old, unfounded assumptions, prevailing myths, that if you know it, you can teach it and to be a good teacher you must be an accomplished traditional scholar. Yet, having lived for many years in the research and publishing world as an accomplished and acclaimed scholar and now dwell in the world of the latter as something of an accomplished teacher, I can tell you that both researcher and teacher are comparable scholars, that Ernst Boyer’s concept of “the scholarship of teaching” was hijacked by researchers to mean research and publication about pedagogy. That’s not what he really meant. In the context of his report SCHOLARSHIP RECONSIDERED, he didn’t mean that scholarship was synonymous with research and publication. He meant it is time to stop demanding professionalism when it comes to one’s discipline and accept what only can be called amateurism when it comes to the classroom. He meant it time to stop demanding that an academic be up-to-date in his or her discipline and accept him or her being out-of-date of the literature pertaining to teaching. Maybe that’s why academics generally receive critique of their research and publication with far more acceptance and graciousness than they do of their classroom teaching. Maybe that’s why academics generally grimace when are asked to be held accountable for their classroom teaching effectiveness no less than they are for their research accomplishments. He meant that classroom teaching should hold a place no less than classical research and publication. He meant that preparation for the classroom should be as deliberately and consciously intense as preparation for research and publication. He meant that graduate schools should consciously prepare their students as future classroom teachers no less than they do as future traditional scholars. He meant that institutions should look at teaching credentials no less than at traditional scholarship credentials. Scholarship, for him, had a broader meaning than is currently held in academia. For him, it is synonymous with professional–I repeat, professional–preparation, as well as practice. It is synonymous with know-how, with professional training, development, and expertise. He meant that academics should enter the classroom with the same professional preparation and training as they enter the archive or lab. He meant they should enter the classroom with the meaningful and purposeful “why” of what they do as they do when they enter the archive or lab. The research scholar and classroom teacher should engage in equally scholarly work. They should engage in deeply informed, intensely prepared, and purposeful reflection, vision, meaning, purpose, and practice.

Whether scholars or teachers know it or not, scholarship and teaching are in many ways spiritual endeavors. I say this because I find the two worlds are not as much worlds apart as many scholars–especially scholars–and teachers think. Going beyond Boyer’s “discovery,” “integration,” and “application,” and “dissemination,” both scholarship in the traditional sense and teacher are as much, if not more, about personal change, growth, awareness, and sensitivity as they are about professional development. If you think about it, the most rewarding aspect of scholarship and teaching is not found in the resume or the award, in the reputation or the recognition, in position or authority, in tenure or title. It’s that personal “eureka moment;” it’s discovering what your own core values are, finding out what you believe in and what inspires you and what drives you, and learning what you’re capable of becoming as a person. So, scholars and teachers must respect each other, for they both are fellow-travelers and kindred spirits.

True, they venture into different lands, walk different paths, climb different mountains, need to have received different training, are in need of different equipment, and utilize different techniques and methods. Contrary to prevailing and self-serving myths, to be a master teacher, you don’t have to be an acclaimed scholar and to be an acclaimed scholar doesn’t mean you’re automatically a master teacher. But, difference is not the same as better or lesser, or as superior or inferior, or as professional or non-professional. Difference means just that: different. Contrary to existing academic culture, there is no reason for anyone to believe he or she is a higher or lower order of professional, much less of a human being or should have a more or less honored place in academia. Each serves a vital role and deserves respect of the other. Each relies upon the other for the discovery, dissemination, integration, and application of all that an education is about. Both scholar and teacher experience the same mysterious and organic process, and are the flowering of their own ongoing exploration and growth.

What do I mean by that? This is what I mean:

Curiosity about the subject matter in your discipline is the starting point for scholarship and discovery. Curiosity in your teaching about each student is the starting point for teaching and discovery.

Scholarship is a creative act that feeds on imagination and fresh wonder which hold surprises if the subject matter is intently studied. Teaching is a creative act that feeds on imagination and fresh wonder which hold surprises if each student is intently studied.

Scholars are always braving the unknown seas and launching courageous expeditions as explorers into “terra incognita.” Teachers are always braving the unknown seas and launching courageous expeditions as explorers in “terra incognita”

Scholarship embraces new experiences and insights into the subject matter which take you into surprising new directions. Teaching embraces new experiences and insights into each student which take you into surprising new directions.

Scholars who take the most intense interest in their subject area are those who achieve the most. Teachers who take the most intense interest in each student are those who achieve the most.

Scholars never have finality to their search, for tomorrow is always new and the information is always new. Teachers never have finality to their vision, for tomorrow is always new and each student is always new. Scholars go where they need to go, led on by and following the information, going this way and that way and another way, not knowing where they’ll be next, and then figure out what whatever it is they need to do. Teachers go where they need to go, led on by and following each student, going this way and that way and another way, not knowing where they’ll be next, and then figure out whatever it is need to do.

For scholars the options are virtually endless. Their assumptions must be as broad as they can be. They are constantly entertaining endlessly different possibilities, even the most unheard of. If they keep their eyes and ears and minds open, they’re going to get just about all they can handle. For teachers the options are virtually endless. Their assumptions must be as broad as they can be. They are constantly entertaining endlessly different possibilities, even the most unheard of. If they keep their eyes and ears and minds open, they’re going to get just about all they can handle.

Scholars more often than not shun the provided predictable and improvise their own way. Teachers more often than not shun the provided predictable and improvise their own way.

Scholars know that if they really want to learn about their subject, they must work there. Teachers know that if they really want to learn about each student, they must work there.

Scholars avoid the superficial and simple, and know that is the first step in solving the problems they wish to solve. Teachers avoid the superficial and simple, and know that is the first step in solving the problems they wish to solve.

Scholars know that scholarship is best approached without specific lexicons or set formulas. Teachers know that teaching is best approached without specific lexicons or set formulas.

Scholars know that every document, every questionnaire, every experiment contains what I’ll call “everyday miracle.” Teachers know that each student contains what I’ll call “everyday, common miracle.”

For scholars, scholarship is a manner of perceiving that brooks neither blind faith or blind doubt or deaf dogma or intractable routine. For them, more often than not, the most singular experience, the most exhilarating “wow” event, the most fulfilling discovery is not the one they had hoped for. For teachers, teaching is a manner of perceiving that brooks neither blind faith or blind doubt or deaf dogma or intractable routine. For them, more often than not, the most singular experience, the most exhilarating “wow” event, the most fulfilling discovery is not the one they had hoped for.

Scholarship is about always about being in a different often unpredictable place and what the scholar think of being in and seeing that place. Teaching is always about being in a different often unpredictable place and what the scholar think of being in and seeing that place.

Scholars must have courage for the inexplicable and the strange and the uncomfortable and the inconvenient that they encounter. They usually have little like for the necessary mundane. Scholars find little charm in being sure of what they will find. Scholarship involves a certain amount of hardship. Sometimes is it particularly trying. Then, there’s that discovery that makes it all worthwhile. Teachers must have courage for the inexplicable and the strange and the uncomfortable and the inconvenient that they encounter. They usually have little like for the necessary mundane. Teachers find little charm in being sure of what they will find. Teaching involves a certain amount of hardship. Sometimes is it particularly trying. Then, there’s that accomplishment that makes it all worthwhile.

For scholars, whether they know it or not, scholarship is a journey of self-discovery. To discover the potential within them is the first step in any scholarly exploration. For teachers, whether they know it or now, teaching is a journey of self-discovery. To discover the potential within them is the first step in any teaching exploration.

Scholars research to lose themselves and then find themselves, to open their hearts and eyes and minds as well as those of others, to stay young and vibrant and fall in love with their discipline once more. Teachers teach to lose themselves and then find themselves, to open their hearts and eyes and minds as well as those of others, to stay young and vibrant and fall in love with students once more

So, once again, lip service aside, if scholarship is truly reconsidered, they both are entitled to their due. They both have to know their particular stuff. They both have to know how to use and apply what they know. They both, then, are entitled to authentic and sincere–and, above all, equal–priority, acknowledgement, recognition, status, and stature–especially when it comes to promotion and tenure guidelines.

Make it a good day.

–Louis–