ELT News Think Tank

Panelists: Chuck | Marc | Peter | | Chris
Date: April 2004

Topic: "Who do your students see?"

Chuck Sandy

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Through my association with Cid Corman, I began to understand what was central to all great teaching, no matter what method that teacher employed -- and every great teacher I can think of was different: some were lecturers, some questioners, some storytellers, others facilitators in one way or another. What they all had in common, though, was that they brought their entire being, with humility, and without pretense, to every teaching moment, and in fact, to every moment. They talked and they listened, carefully. Like Cid Corman, no great teacher draws lines between the public and the private: they live the line because they are the line, and we meet them at that intersection where the public meets the private, as they come out from their inwardness to meet us, to listen, and again, I will tell you the secret: listen.

"Teaching, like any truly human activity, emerges from one's inwardness," writes Parker Palmer in his book, The Courage to Teach. This is the same book in which he poses the central question: "Who is the self that teaches?"

This is the question I've been exploring over the past year, as I've begun to close the gap between my professional and my private life. Late last year, I told you about bringing my love of poetry to class with good effect. Now I'll tell you that I've begun to bring my whole life to class, with equally good effect. The self who teaches is the self who is: the same one. I begin most classes with a story, as Cid always did, from my life, and then weave who I am into everything I do. Though I still use textbooks and have theories I believe in, I've stopped hiding behind them. I'm still moody and unstable at times, but I'm no longer afraid of sharing that with my students, and they generally reward me by sharing themselves with me and with each other – and I listen, as carefully as I can, as they listen, to each other. I'm by no means a great teacher, but I feel I'm back on the right track to becoming one, and as a new school year begins, it is my intention to stay on this track -- and it is with this same intention, with the same purpose in mind, that I share all of this with you now.

Even as teachers, we rarely talk with each other in depth about teaching, about what it is to be a teacher, yet I have come to believe that this is absolutely necessary. We need to talk more about our inner lives, and we need to listen more and more carefully, to each other. For as we do, we come to feel more at home, less fearful, more whole. As Palmer says, "at home in our own souls we become more at home with each other," and as we listen to each other, we discover the secret. What secret?

"I will tell you the secret.
Listen.
        What is it – you ask.

I keep telling you:
        Listen."
                -- Cid Corman

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Panelists: Chuck | Marc | Peter | Chris

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Chuck Sandy, Chubu University

Co-author of two series from CUP, Passages and Connect

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