I have a very similar sense of how teaching is situated as labor/activity with the only slight difference being that I think of it as a "practice," which I define as the skills, knowledge, attitudes, and habits of mind of a practitioner. (I refer to writing as a practice as well, and really, it's a lens that can be applied to any labor/activity.)
As you illustrate here, I think one of the key parts of a practice/craft is the necessity of experience as a way to practice the practice. There's really no substitute for it.
John--thank you! This means a lot to me, as I admire your work. I agree that the lens of a 'practice' is similar to that of 'craft,' and a tremendously helpful way to view the profession. This dovetails a bit with @Ryan Bromley's 'garden' metaphor and @Guy Craig's reference to Aristotle's 'Great Cooperative Arts.' You've all given me further ways to complicate and enrich my viewpoint!
I appreciate your insightful reflections. I agree, not a science, not an art, not a business; although, there are elements of each of these in teaching.
I'm still a fan of 'gardener', as per Fröbel's kindergarten. I think it best describes the care and nurturing of life (although, I am quite far removed from Fröbel's model). However, I do feel that one must love gardening to fully relate to the richness of the metaphor.
Ryan--thank you! I thought of 'gardener' and 'gardening' a few times while writing this post--and think of the metaphor often in all of my work. 'Planting seeds' is my favorite thing to do in life, and the work of pruning and caretaking, while difficult, always gives satisfaction. Appreciate the read, as usual!
Heart and head in excellent place with this one. It feels summative of a set of ideas you've been pondering for half a lifetime - while also feeling generous in spirit, and part of an ongoing conversation. Will be restocking with gusto 🤌
Thought-provoking piece - as a craftsman (B2B copywriter) for my day job, I appreciate the notion that craftspeople deserve more respect in our culture (worship me!), and that middle managers can sometimes complicate projects with unhelpful information due to their lesser knowledge of the nuances of craft.
I originally wrote most of this comment in response to your piece on "pedagogy" but then I thought I should read some more of what you wrote, and so I'll post this here. I like the idea of Substack for the sake of these conversations.
I agree with pretty much everything you say here. I have long thought of teaching as best understood as a craft. I taught English for 25 years, including AP Lit and Lang, as well as various electives like Creative Writing and Journalism. Then I worked as an administrator for the next 13 years at the same public high school in California. I wrapped it up with two years at an Independent school in Seoul before retiring. That's background to my perspective.
I've worked with lots of great English teachers who would agree with you, and their practice is basically as you describe. Although the details are substantially different, I could say the same about many teachers in math, Social Studies, World Language and other disciplines. Of course, there were some teachers in all areas who weren't great. And there were always students, in all classes, who didn't do so great.
But what does that mean? What am I looking at when I say that some teachers weren't great, or some students didn't do so well?
In my experience (late twentieth century/early twenty first) there was a growing concern/interest in outcomes. Sometimes I felt that concern was driven by cynical or self-interested/ideological motives, and those concerns led to the kind of simplistic and often harmful development of "learning goals" and "assessment" you talk about.
On the other hand, I do think there were and are legitimate concerns about ensuring that all students had a fair opportunity to learn, especially in the context of historical/institutional racism and gross economic disparities. In addition, access for students with learning disabilities became a newish and very important concern.
I don't think it was very convincing for teachers to say, "trust me....(everything else you write here.)" I do think we often failed to describe outcomes for students that were visible/measurable to concerned constituencies, especially those representing the students I note above. I still think that's a major issue for public education. We also need to say what we are trying to do about it. That's where pedagogy comes in. There are vast seas of BS out there, but I think good teachers need to be able to show others what the goals are, (best through examples of the craft that students will produce,) how you can tell students and others that they are making progress toward them and what you are doing to help students who aren't making the progress they could.
A ceramicist can show examples of what her craft will produce. So can a chef, a cabinet maker, etc.
I have found that even some teachers who are perceived to be great have a hard drive with this. I do think this is critical and is an essential response to the absurd lists of "measurable student learning outcomes" and pretest-post test ridiculousness that distract vast amounts of time from much more valuable learning in all disciplines.
I do think, frankly, there is a lot of good stuff in this area, and as lame as it sounds NGSS and Common Core and often College Board were making good progress. The fact they were attacked by the people who want daily learning "skill" goals, and regular tests kinda says it all. I have so much faith in the great teachers I've worked with and known; I think we need to deal more effectively with this question of measurable outcomes; it's one that's as political as it is pedagogical.
Thanks for engaging. In good faith, it seems like we’re largely aligned in many ways and you don’t seem to disagree with me so much as you raise some really valid questions that are worth further pursuing, especially re: demonstrable outcomes and how teachers, who almost universally have students’ best interests at heart (and can often intuitively meet student needs even if they can’t explicitly articulate how they are doing so), should go further than merely saying “Trust me,” (though in better than 95% of cases I think we can, really, largely trust them…). I can’t do justice right now to answering everything you’ve written, but am working on some further posts that address some of these questions, and I will certainly be thinking about your comments here as I write them.
A belated thank you for this post. I not only loved it, but it made me think and rethink. And it inspired me to write a whole post about it. I have a lot on my reading list, but I will find some room to check out your book. Seems like a good summer read for a teacher....Thanks. And check out what I wrote: https://laurenbrownoned.substack.com/p/teaching-as-_____-art-science-business
This was very affirming. Thank you for taking the time to write this. I will be sharing with educators I know. We need this (at this time of the academic year).
I’m a bit late to the party, but I want to share how much I love this piece. You’ve hit on something that I’ve felt, but couldn’t put into words. In my career, I’ve traveled through all of these labels, and now that I’m 23 years in, I’m looking for a better label. Words matter. I love the metaphor of a craftsman! I’ll be thinking about this piece for a while.
Adrian! I’d meant to get back to this sooner! I can only plead that it’s the end of the year! Any ‘teacher’ party I throw, I’m glad to see you show up at—thank you!
Great post. Love the take about teaching being a craft. Foremost, I can't agree more that K-12 public education cannot and should not be a business. Too much of our world, at least in the US, has become too much about business. The most fundamental goal of a business is to make money. If public education's goal is to make money, what does that make students? Widgets? Cases for billable hours? Scary to think about the sweat equity that goes into teaching and learning being reduced to assets and liabilities.
I was grateful for the added perspective on teaching as an art. I always leaned more toward that in the binary debate referenced. I hadn't thought about the performative aspects, which take away from learning and detract from the genuine efforts of good teachers. My best teachers always seemed to have that balance of preparation and ability to react in the classroom, like a great athlete on the field, where I saw a particular move and could tell when experience and instinct took over. It was like watching an artist at work. I wasn't aware of that until high school and college. My folks were teachers, and I still naively hold onto the romantic idea of a teacher's impact in a child's life, a la Professor McGonagle or John Keating, so thinking of them as artists is tricky for me to shake. I am glad to be thinking about this in a different light now.
A teacher as a craftsperson sounds right. I couldn't argue the accuracy. And I do like the idea of some inherent boundaries being created for teachers, for the benefit of all. Building a house takes a long time if the layperson watches over every nail and board that goes up. Nobody calls a chef to fix their clogged toilet. Far too much parenting, feeding, and raising children has been dumped on and/or assumed by schools. If we honored teaching more as a craft and simply gave educators time and space to do what they're trained to do, I suspect we'd see far better returns on the investments made by teachers and students. Some might even call that smart business.
Interesting! Doing science is of course itself not an (exact) science, and it occurs to me that one of the differences between teaching and crafts I am more familiar with (science and software engineering) is that the latter fields have much more prolonged and flexible mentorship/apprenticeship periods. A PhD student spends half a decade or more under the advice of a PI but also at the day to day level in the lab with more senior PhD students and post-docs, receiving scaffolding that is not considered to be "done" after a certain number of hours. A new post-doc will similarly be assisted by more senior post-docs, and a new professor by more established professors. Software engineering similarly has an understanding that the amount of scaffolding needed is specific to the project and people involved. None of which is perfect or always as supportive as this makes it sound, and figuring out how much you can take advantage of this without annoying the busy more experienced people is a challenge, but there is no point at which conducting ones experiments alone or tracking down bugs without assistance is considered necessary. Our experiments don't (generally) distract each other, so we're free to continue to help each other not just by discussing what happened after the fact but also in the moment, throughout our careers.
Wonderful, reflective piece.
I have a very similar sense of how teaching is situated as labor/activity with the only slight difference being that I think of it as a "practice," which I define as the skills, knowledge, attitudes, and habits of mind of a practitioner. (I refer to writing as a practice as well, and really, it's a lens that can be applied to any labor/activity.)
As you illustrate here, I think one of the key parts of a practice/craft is the necessity of experience as a way to practice the practice. There's really no substitute for it.
John--thank you! This means a lot to me, as I admire your work. I agree that the lens of a 'practice' is similar to that of 'craft,' and a tremendously helpful way to view the profession. This dovetails a bit with @Ryan Bromley's 'garden' metaphor and @Guy Craig's reference to Aristotle's 'Great Cooperative Arts.' You've all given me further ways to complicate and enrich my viewpoint!
I appreciate your insightful reflections. I agree, not a science, not an art, not a business; although, there are elements of each of these in teaching.
I'm still a fan of 'gardener', as per Fröbel's kindergarten. I think it best describes the care and nurturing of life (although, I am quite far removed from Fröbel's model). However, I do feel that one must love gardening to fully relate to the richness of the metaphor.
Ryan--thank you! I thought of 'gardener' and 'gardening' a few times while writing this post--and think of the metaphor often in all of my work. 'Planting seeds' is my favorite thing to do in life, and the work of pruning and caretaking, while difficult, always gives satisfaction. Appreciate the read, as usual!
Heart and head in excellent place with this one. It feels summative of a set of ideas you've been pondering for half a lifetime - while also feeling generous in spirit, and part of an ongoing conversation. Will be restocking with gusto 🤌
*restacking
Thought-provoking piece - as a craftsman (B2B copywriter) for my day job, I appreciate the notion that craftspeople deserve more respect in our culture (worship me!), and that middle managers can sometimes complicate projects with unhelpful information due to their lesser knowledge of the nuances of craft.
I originally wrote most of this comment in response to your piece on "pedagogy" but then I thought I should read some more of what you wrote, and so I'll post this here. I like the idea of Substack for the sake of these conversations.
I agree with pretty much everything you say here. I have long thought of teaching as best understood as a craft. I taught English for 25 years, including AP Lit and Lang, as well as various electives like Creative Writing and Journalism. Then I worked as an administrator for the next 13 years at the same public high school in California. I wrapped it up with two years at an Independent school in Seoul before retiring. That's background to my perspective.
I've worked with lots of great English teachers who would agree with you, and their practice is basically as you describe. Although the details are substantially different, I could say the same about many teachers in math, Social Studies, World Language and other disciplines. Of course, there were some teachers in all areas who weren't great. And there were always students, in all classes, who didn't do so great.
But what does that mean? What am I looking at when I say that some teachers weren't great, or some students didn't do so well?
In my experience (late twentieth century/early twenty first) there was a growing concern/interest in outcomes. Sometimes I felt that concern was driven by cynical or self-interested/ideological motives, and those concerns led to the kind of simplistic and often harmful development of "learning goals" and "assessment" you talk about.
On the other hand, I do think there were and are legitimate concerns about ensuring that all students had a fair opportunity to learn, especially in the context of historical/institutional racism and gross economic disparities. In addition, access for students with learning disabilities became a newish and very important concern.
I don't think it was very convincing for teachers to say, "trust me....(everything else you write here.)" I do think we often failed to describe outcomes for students that were visible/measurable to concerned constituencies, especially those representing the students I note above. I still think that's a major issue for public education. We also need to say what we are trying to do about it. That's where pedagogy comes in. There are vast seas of BS out there, but I think good teachers need to be able to show others what the goals are, (best through examples of the craft that students will produce,) how you can tell students and others that they are making progress toward them and what you are doing to help students who aren't making the progress they could.
A ceramicist can show examples of what her craft will produce. So can a chef, a cabinet maker, etc.
I have found that even some teachers who are perceived to be great have a hard drive with this. I do think this is critical and is an essential response to the absurd lists of "measurable student learning outcomes" and pretest-post test ridiculousness that distract vast amounts of time from much more valuable learning in all disciplines.
I do think, frankly, there is a lot of good stuff in this area, and as lame as it sounds NGSS and Common Core and often College Board were making good progress. The fact they were attacked by the people who want daily learning "skill" goals, and regular tests kinda says it all. I have so much faith in the great teachers I've worked with and known; I think we need to deal more effectively with this question of measurable outcomes; it's one that's as political as it is pedagogical.
Hi Galen,
Thanks for engaging. In good faith, it seems like we’re largely aligned in many ways and you don’t seem to disagree with me so much as you raise some really valid questions that are worth further pursuing, especially re: demonstrable outcomes and how teachers, who almost universally have students’ best interests at heart (and can often intuitively meet student needs even if they can’t explicitly articulate how they are doing so), should go further than merely saying “Trust me,” (though in better than 95% of cases I think we can, really, largely trust them…). I can’t do justice right now to answering everything you’ve written, but am working on some further posts that address some of these questions, and I will certainly be thinking about your comments here as I write them.
Thanks again for engaging,
Peter
I look forward to your next posts.
A belated thank you for this post. I not only loved it, but it made me think and rethink. And it inspired me to write a whole post about it. I have a lot on my reading list, but I will find some room to check out your book. Seems like a good summer read for a teacher....Thanks. And check out what I wrote: https://laurenbrownoned.substack.com/p/teaching-as-_____-art-science-business
This was very affirming. Thank you for taking the time to write this. I will be sharing with educators I know. We need this (at this time of the academic year).
Thank you, Jamie—your comment is appreciated and affirming!
I’m a bit late to the party, but I want to share how much I love this piece. You’ve hit on something that I’ve felt, but couldn’t put into words. In my career, I’ve traveled through all of these labels, and now that I’m 23 years in, I’m looking for a better label. Words matter. I love the metaphor of a craftsman! I’ll be thinking about this piece for a while.
Adrian! I’d meant to get back to this sooner! I can only plead that it’s the end of the year! Any ‘teacher’ party I throw, I’m glad to see you show up at—thank you!
Great post. Love the take about teaching being a craft. Foremost, I can't agree more that K-12 public education cannot and should not be a business. Too much of our world, at least in the US, has become too much about business. The most fundamental goal of a business is to make money. If public education's goal is to make money, what does that make students? Widgets? Cases for billable hours? Scary to think about the sweat equity that goes into teaching and learning being reduced to assets and liabilities.
I was grateful for the added perspective on teaching as an art. I always leaned more toward that in the binary debate referenced. I hadn't thought about the performative aspects, which take away from learning and detract from the genuine efforts of good teachers. My best teachers always seemed to have that balance of preparation and ability to react in the classroom, like a great athlete on the field, where I saw a particular move and could tell when experience and instinct took over. It was like watching an artist at work. I wasn't aware of that until high school and college. My folks were teachers, and I still naively hold onto the romantic idea of a teacher's impact in a child's life, a la Professor McGonagle or John Keating, so thinking of them as artists is tricky for me to shake. I am glad to be thinking about this in a different light now.
A teacher as a craftsperson sounds right. I couldn't argue the accuracy. And I do like the idea of some inherent boundaries being created for teachers, for the benefit of all. Building a house takes a long time if the layperson watches over every nail and board that goes up. Nobody calls a chef to fix their clogged toilet. Far too much parenting, feeding, and raising children has been dumped on and/or assumed by schools. If we honored teaching more as a craft and simply gave educators time and space to do what they're trained to do, I suspect we'd see far better returns on the investments made by teachers and students. Some might even call that smart business.
Interesting! Doing science is of course itself not an (exact) science, and it occurs to me that one of the differences between teaching and crafts I am more familiar with (science and software engineering) is that the latter fields have much more prolonged and flexible mentorship/apprenticeship periods. A PhD student spends half a decade or more under the advice of a PI but also at the day to day level in the lab with more senior PhD students and post-docs, receiving scaffolding that is not considered to be "done" after a certain number of hours. A new post-doc will similarly be assisted by more senior post-docs, and a new professor by more established professors. Software engineering similarly has an understanding that the amount of scaffolding needed is specific to the project and people involved. None of which is perfect or always as supportive as this makes it sound, and figuring out how much you can take advantage of this without annoying the busy more experienced people is a challenge, but there is no point at which conducting ones experiments alone or tracking down bugs without assistance is considered necessary. Our experiments don't (generally) distract each other, so we're free to continue to help each other not just by discussing what happened after the fact but also in the moment, throughout our careers.