“What is Teaching” Aoki Reflections

While reading Chapter 8 Layered Voices of Teaching: The Uncannily Correct and the Elusively True, the TIE cohort and I are asked to reconsider and expand upon the questions of ‘where am I as a person/teacher/learn and where could I be’ by looking at Aoki’s readings as a tool for discovery.  This chapter breaks down the question of ‘what is teaching’ into three parts: teaching looked at by results, teaching looked at through theory, and teaching looked at by being.  While doing the reading, it brought up a lot of questions and commentary for me by reflecting on what I thought teaching was when I was new in this vocation compared to what I feel teaching is after almost two decades of experience.  I am a completely different teacher now than I was in the beginning, which is suitable for my current students.  I have been able to hone my teaching with real-life experiences in the classroom and implementation of different pedagogical methodologies.  I was focused on the “black box” of teaching, as Aoki describes teaching solely based on results.  As I explored this vocation more, I came to a similar realization that teaching is more than how a student does on a test or how they learn; it’s about their journey.  A big part of that journey is having an understanding, caring and compassionate guide.  I’m unsure when I shifted my stance of ‘what is teaching’ to this aspect of my role as more of a facilitator for my students and a support system for them in the classroom. Still, I have found that the experience my students have in my classrooms is now more authentic than the first five groups of students I taught.  

Photo by Rod Long on Unsplash

When asked what my teaching philosophy is, I always state that I am a relationship teacher.  I feel that is what Aoki describes as the essence of teaching: building relationships with students.  Aoki states that “teaching so understood is attuned to the place where care dwells, a place of ingathering and belonging, where the indwelling of teachers and students is made possible by the presence of care that each has for the other” (Pinar & Irwin, 2004).  The most impactful teachers I remember were those who were welcoming to all students and showed everyone, no matter their abilities or behaviours, that they were seen and heard in the classroom environment.  I have a former colleague whom I taught both her children, who mentioned that one of their kid’s favourite things at Christmas is pulling out the silly ornament I made for my classes.  They loved taking it out and putting it on their Christmas tree. They were in my classroom for years, maybe even a decade now.  They always remember me and my class.  They may not remember everything in the curriculum in that course, but they remember me and the impact I had on them… they also remember the catapults I had them make and the egg-launching competition we did with them.  But they look back kindly on their middle school years because my time makes them feel welcomed and have room to succeed.  The influence this profession can have on the lives of the students that pass through our classrooms can be impactful even when we, as teachers, do not see it as that.

Pinar, W. F., & Irwin, R. L. (2004). Layered Voices of Teaching: The Uncannily Correct and the Elusively True   1    (1992). In Curriculum in a New Key. Routledge.