Teaching To Transgress

by bell hooks

bh When you acknowledge that we are observers, it means that we are workers in the classroom. To do that work well we can’t be simply standing in front of the class reading. If I’m to know whether a student is participating I have to be listening, I have to be recording, and I have to be thinking beyond that moment. I want them to think, “What I’m here for is to work with material, and to work with it the best way that I can. And in doing that I don’t have to be fearful about my grade, because if I am working the best I can with this material, I know it’s going to be reflected in my grade.” I try to communicate that the grade is something they can control by their labor in the classroom. RS I think that’s a really important point. Many students feel they could never presume to evaluate their own work positively. Someone else will decide how hard or how well they are working. And so there is already a devaluation of their own effort. Our task is to empower students so that they have the skills to assess their academic growth properly. bh The obsession with good grades has so much to do with fear of failure. Progressive teaching tries to eradicate that fear, both in students and in professors. There are moments when I worry that I am not being a “good” teacher, and then I find myself struggling to break with a good/bad binary. It’s more useful for me to think of myself as a progressive teacher who’s willing to own both my successes and failures in the classroom.