#caedchat

It’s easy to come up with little quips when considering the differences between good teachers and great teachers. “Good teachers teach, great teachers learn,” quoted one teacher last night on the #CAedchat on Twitter. And maybe that’s a cute (and let’s face it, rather trite) way to say it, but it doesn’t really dig deep enough into the question. What really does make the difference between a good teacher and a great one? From the eyes of most students, whether they’re sitting in the back of the class falling asleep during a lecture or anxiously asking questions in a discussion, teachers can make or break a classroom setting. The teacher’s attitude, both toward the students in class and the material they’re teaching, dynamically affects the way a class absorbs information and gets involved.

This past Sunday night, I decided to lurk on the #CAEdchat Twitter chat to see what teachers had to say when they gathered together on the online forum. The topic, the differences between good teachers and bad ones, peaked my interest, because I wanted to hear what the teachers thought of themselves-- how they viewed their teaching and how they valued different methods. The participation online surprised me. There were hundreds of teachers all discussing and responding to questions, really interacting and forming a community; however, I found the reflections less impressive when I considered at whom the criticisms were generally directed. If a response was negative, most teachers aimed their criticisms at “other teachers,” an ambiguous group of adults made scapegoats by all of the teachers participating, and whose dedication to a Twitter chat supposedly proved their educational savvy.

Despite my opinion on the teachers’ comments, though, I want to offer a student perspective on the topic. The chat consisted of a series of questions, 9 total. The questions were released periodically over the hour from 7-8 PM last Sunday. What follows are my responses to several of the questions presented on Sunday, each contained within 140 characters.

Q2: What are some qualities of teachers in your past that made them a great teacher in your eyes?

A2: Great teachers get their hands dirty and escape the teacher jail, letting students mean more than a name on a roll sheet.

Q4: Good teachers _______, Great teachers _________.

A4 (1): Good teachers care what students know. Great teachers care what students think.

A4 (2): Good teachers keep me interested once I’m in class. Great teachers make me want to be there in the 1st place.

Q5: Sometimes it is intangible, but what are qualities of a great teacher?

A5: Passion, patience, quirkiness, time, and big dreams. Don’t let a classroom close you in; you hurt students by hurting yourself.

In my eyes, a great teacher is someone who can peak my interest, and keep me engaged, however they achieve it. Whether it’s through an exciting lecture or a fascinating activity, I want my classes to be full of new information, and I want to be able to explore that information on my own. Sometimes students need handholding, but often it’s a little offensive, and makes us feel patronized. And sometimes students need a steady hand, but often we also need a lesson sprinkled with humor and personality. It’s hard to be a great teacher, but every student has one or two they look up to. It’s not an impossible feat.

Whoa...whoa... Whoa... I decided to check out a different chat on Twitter tonight (I feel like I am cheating on my commitment to #NTChat, HehHE!) called #CAEdChat (California Education Chat, "Connecting California educators each Sunday night at 8pm") and well...