A Pedagogy of Humility
a summer reflection on a teaching mindset going forward
This summer I’ve been thinking a lot about change—particularly how we encounter change as teachers.
And thinking about change has made me think a lot about humility.
But first: a brief story.
(Note: many of our discussions and posts on The Broken Copier intentionally are framed to be helpful or inclusive of new and early career teachers, but this one is sort of the opposite: much more focused on those with some or lots of experience in the classroom.)
“I’m still here. You won’t be.”
In one of the first faculty meetings of my career back in 2012, all the teachers gathered in the school library while a presenter from the Arkansas Department of Education was giving a presentation (to the best of my recollection over a decade later) over how to deliver and assess standards.
Of course, as a new teacher, I took a seat towards the front and had all my note-taking materials ready. Best behavior with the state department representative visiting, right?
I was wrong.
One of our veteran teachers raised his hand halfway through her presentation: “Ma’am, I have a question!”
She made the mistake of calling on him.
“I have to be honest, why in the world should I listen to a thing you have to say?”
(You can picture me, Year 1 teacher, mouth agape hearing him say this.)
He continued with something very much like the following: “I don’t mean to disrespect you, but in a couple years a new you is going to drive down here and give us a new lecture about a new thing, just like so many other versions of you already have in all the time I’ve been teaching. I’m still here. You won’t be. So again: why in the world should I listen to a thing you have to say?”
Year 12 version of me looking back on this: while not the most polite framing, he did have a point. (Especially since that very same Arkansas Department of Education would go to great lengths to distance themselves from those standards a half-decade later.)
So Is All Change In Education Temporary?
What does Year 12 version of me have to say to this question, reflecting on education over my career thus far.
No. Some change definitely sticks around.
While I do believe my veteran colleague had a point back in that 2012 meeting (a meeting that left me awestruck on several levels) it is easy to look around the education landscape over a decade later and very quickly accept the notion that change has indeed happened.
In many cases, change that is not going anywhere, either.
Indeed, in an article I came across this week by Rick Wormeli, he pointed to none other than the legendary Bob Dylan to reinforce this idea: “the times, they are a-changin.’”
I’m not much of a Dylan fan, but I did take a time to listen to the song in full and read through its lyrics—and found myself returning repeatedly to this one: “As the present now / Will later be past / The order is rapidly fadin' / And the first one now / Will later be last.”
Thinking of this and so much else in the air lately amidst education, I find myself somewhere in between that veteran colleague’s “I’m still here” perspective from my first year and the many others who declare change as inevitable: many changes won’t stick but some will, inevitably, so what is a teacher to do in this moment?
In my view, the answer lies in a commitment to a mindset of humility.
Humility, however, is one of those words that is an easy “talk the talk” yet a very difficult “walk the walk.”
So my wondering, which the rest of this post explores: how do we embrace humility as teachers while still staying true to our values and convictions?
I ended up with three personal priorities:
1. Leaning First Into Reflection
First off, to remain humble I think it is important to constantly reflect on how we see ourselves as teachers, the values we hold, and the practices we align with these values.
Wormeli wrote something else in his article that deeply resonated with me along these lines: “The way we teach is often a statement of who we are.”
For me, this was a needed reminder that, when confronted with a change that asks me to adjust my teaching practice, it is important to really name and consider where any personal resistance may be coming from, including emotionally.
As Wormeli rightly notes, teaching is deeply personal, and I think it is critical that we recognize that in our own work.
An example of what this resistance has looked like for me: when I heard of teachers shifting to incorporate graphic novels several years back, my first reaction was unfortunately one of skepticism. How can those texts offer the same complexity as what we were already doing, I wondered? Unpacking this resistance now, though, I recognize that it was rooted much more in a) a fixed mindset of valuing a certain type of text I was more familiar with over others as well as b) an insecurity about how to adjust and expand my own practices to successfully facilitate the same type of complex learning with a new text.
Thankfully, I got past that stubbornness and now see graphic novels as a peak sequence of learning in our curriculum—but for me example reiterates Wormeli’s point: the need to understand ourselves fully as educators, especially when we feel ourselves resisting change.
This requires ongoing, genuine reflection as practitioners, which I believe is the first ingredient in pedagogical humility as teachers.
2. Avoiding “100% Right/Wrong” Framing
Another mindset that I believe is particularly important to hold to remain humble as a teacher is to consistently weigh and even challenge your own assumptions in order to avoid a lens that tempts you into thinking of any educational strategy or system as 100% right.
The other day I saw this post from John Spencer that asked educators to take our own utopian view of education and reimagine how it could become dystopian:
What an exercise this was for me.
I thought immediately about my deep conviction around collaborative learning and why the classroom should frequently lean into the type of environment in which students are learning with and from each other—and Spencer’s prompt was a slap-in-the-face reminder that while even when collaborative learning is going great, there are inevitably some students who do not benefit as learners from that type of environment.
Stepping back, this type of thinking applies to so much of education: choices we make in our classrooms and schools are almost never 100% right, and almost always have clear downsides or consequences, at least for some of our students.
This is why this work is incredibly difficult; this is also why it is incredibly important to remain humble and continually reexamine our beliefs and assumptions as educators—no matter how experienced or confident we may be.
3. Finding People Who Affirm You
I believe these first two aspects of humility as a teacher—committing to reflection and avoiding absolutist framings—are important, but I think my real takeaway today is that neither are easy to sustain without a third, foundational one: making sure you have people around you who affirm you and your value as a teacher.
Something I discussed with Sara Candela on The Optimalist this spring was how difficult it is to ask for and engage with critical feedback from students when you are new and/or struggling in the classroom, and I think that point also applies here—including for more-veteran educators.
If you do not have some sort of circle of support that sees and names your value and, in the process, reinforces it, then meaningful reflection is that much more challenging and absolutist framings become surface-level bandages to mask our insecurities and struggles.
The solution: if you’re a teacher—and I’ll admit right away that this can be very challenging!—find your people. In your building. Outside of your building. (Or both!)
Once you’ve found those people? Make sure they know how much you value their support then challenge yourself to be that person for others.
(And if you are reading this as educator in a role leading or supporting classroom teachers: what are you doing to create and sustain those circles of support for your teachers? Can you name their strengths and values? Have you?)
To pull back the curtain a bit, writing these posts is itself a reflective process for me, and the more I thought about and workshopped this piece on humility over the past week, the more I kept circling back to the people in my life, then and now, who by supporting and reaffirming me as a teacher allowed me to reach a better space of authentic, nuanced reflection in my thinking as a teacher.
What I realize: teachers have to be seen and supported to successfully be humble and practice humility in our work.
Consequently, humility starts with us doing a much better job (a) individually surrounding ourselves with the support we need to be seen and affirmed and (b) systemically making sure teachers are seen and affirmed by support around them.
The Order Is Rapidly Fadin'
In an educational landscape of rapid, frequent change, I keep coming back to how essential a mindset or pedagogy of humility increasingly is.
No matter how many years I have taught. No matter how many times I’ve seen something work. No matter how “right” I think I may have been or still am.
No matter the fact that I’m “still here” and many, many “they’s” are now elsewhere.
Thinking about the things I’m most proud of and grateful for as a teacher, almost all of them are a result of me not resisting the challenge and opportunity of change.
Which, admittedly, probably gets harder to do the longer I’m in the classroom.
Thus, today’s post (which is really a very-long reminder-to-self more than anything): a pedagogy of humility as a teacher matters. It matters a great deal.
Now more than ever.
(I think.)
A Few Additional Notes:
It was a busy start to the summer for me with quite a bit of humility in the form of teaching summer school for incoming freshmen, but I’m excited about several different The Broken Copier interviews scheduled on the near horizon! Along with keeping an eye out for when those conversations are posted, here are a few other things of note:
I had the opportunity to share a piece for Edutopia about my current mindset and strategy around independent work time in the classroom.
Chanea Bond (@heymrsbond on Twitter) and I are having an absolute blast leading a one-chapter-a-day book study on Their Eyes Were Watching God on Twitter—you can access each day’s conversation here.
If you missed it, the most recent “Kicking The Copier” was all about the integral role conversations and relationships play in successful differentiation—and you can check out that brief podcast reflection here.
Looking for an interesting conversation to listen to as a teacher? Just came across this one with Joe Ferraro’s One Percent Better podcast—and found it an excellent summer listen about the way preparation and adaptability walk hand-in-hand
I hope all of your summers are going well, especially since I know that for a good handful of you they are coming to a close rather-soon… (For me? Summer really just started and we don’t go back until the last week of August! Time to start winnowing that pile of “to read” books on my desk, finally.)
Take care, stay safe, and as always we appreciate your readership, support, and feedback!
—Marcus