FW: Just Talking: How Ordinary Conversation Helps Make Better Tea chers

From: Cunningham, Donald (cunningh@indiana.edu)
Date: Tue Feb 12 2002 - 06:26:24 PST


Too obvious? Humble wisdom?

This article is from The Chronicle of Higher Education
(http://chronicle.com)

  Just Talking: How Ordinary Conversation Helps Make Better
  Teachers

  By DANA SOBYRA
  
    Talking Shop: Authentic Conversation and Teacher Learning
  (Teachers College Press, 2001), edited by Christopher M.
  Clark. $22.95.
  
  Teachers have much to learn from simply talking with one
  another. This collection of essays argues that ordinary
  conversation among educators is a powerful resource not only
  for faculty members just beginning their classroom careers,
  but also for veteran instructors eager to share their
  expertise.
  
  The book tells how groups of teachers from the United States,
  Canada, and Israel, at all levels of education, exchanged
  ideas, whether in person or via computer, about their
  profession. The educators were assembled by the book's
  eventual editor, Christopher Clark, a professor of education
  at the University of Delaware, who found individuals
  interested in "connecting" with their peers through the use of
  what he called "teacher conversation groups." As Jean
  Clandinin, a professor of education at the University of
  Alberta, explains in the foreword, "the groups met in the
  context of courses, of shared interest in subject matter, and
  of shared work," for periods of one to several years. The
  book's essays, she says, reflect "the range of possibilities
  for teacher conversation groups -- from groups of beginning
  teachers to mentor teachers to women science teachers."
  
  The groups were "extremely diverse," she says, but they shared
  key characteristics. For example, after close examination of
  the teachers' dialogues, Mr. Clark was able to identify the
  qualities of conversations that the participants found
  satisfying. First of all, he writes, "good conversations
  demand good content -- something worth talking about:
  something that every participant can get intense about." Of
  course, there is a "paradoxical feature" built into the
  process of generating meaningful conversation: Talk can
  filter toward subjects and themes not intended to be a part of
  the original discussion. Mr. Clark suggests that conversation
  be allowed to drift as it will, to touch upon "personal
  stories, reports of adversity endured , and tales of heroic
  teaching." The point is that no matter what level teachers
  find themselves working at, the content of any effective
  conversation among them should provide for personal
  connections. What's more, of course, good conversation is
  voluntary. "For a conversation to have a chance of getting
  good, the participants must want to be there, must want to
  cooperate."
  
  An atmosphere of safety, trust, and care is crucial, he
  writes. Conversation "invites us to become vulnerable by
  telling our personal-experience stories, taking a position, or
  expressing opinions, uncertainties, and regrets." Egos are on
  the line, "out from behind the mask of everyday talk," and
  "participants need to know that exposing their vulnerabilities
  will not bring judgement, punishment, or rejection."
  
  "Our collective experiences put the lie to the cynical view
  that when teachers have the freedom to talk together, they
  waste that time on superficial, petty, trivial matters," says
  Mr. Clark. On the contrary, he believes, "the common ground
  that unites teachers across the spectrum from preschool
  through high school to graduate school are the mysteries of
  learning, teaching, and life in all its complex
  relationships."
  
  If you would like to share your thoughts about this book,
  please send an e-mail message to mitch.gerber who-is-at chronicle.com.
  We will post selected comments.
  
  
  
  To purchase this book online, choose a bookseller:
  
             
  
  Questions about ordering?
  

_________________________________________________________________

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http://chronicle.com/teaching/books/2002021201b.htm
 
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_________________________________________________________________
 Copyright 2002 by The Chronicle of Higher Education



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