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TE 822 Final Project

Narrative Analysis: What Multiculturalism Means to Teachers

“Building a Better Teacher: How Teaching Works (and How to Teach it to Everyone)” –

Elizabeth Green

Kirstin Reigler

Michigan State University

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Introduction:

New teachers field tons of responsibilities; learning their management style, building a

creative and safe classroom environment, navigating curriculum, and finding a place to fit in

amongst their colleagues to name a few. Most teachers would describe their first 3-5 years of

teaching as their learning years. Every year, teachers are required to attend district provided

professional development sessions. In most states, teachers must continue their education to

obtain new certifications and to keep their certifications valid. Continued education may look

like attending professional development sessions outside of district provided professional

development, and it may look like obtaining a masters degree (or higher) in a certain sub-area of

education. It is clear that teachers are always learning, adapting, and obtaining knowledge for

their classrooms and their pedagogy. So, why is it that one of the most common things we hear

about educators is that “teachers are born to teach”? Is this true? Are teachers just born natural

teachers? Are teachers wired differently than bankers, chefs, accountants, and painters? Are

teachers wired differently? What makes teachers, natural teachers? Elizabeth Green decided to

explore this myth about teachers, and wrote a book about her findings. “Building a Better

Teacher: How Teaching Works” by Elizabeth Green was published in 2015, and gave the general

public true insight to what it means to be a teacher, and addresses the myth that teachers are

“born teachers.”
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Summary of Text:

Green begins by putting the reader in the place of a teacher beginning a class period in which

you will be teaching 26 5th graders the mathematical concept of rate. Green walks the reader

through the discussions had with the students, the misconceptions presented, and the snap

decisions you, as the teacher, must make in order for the class period to be consider successful.

Green shows the reader how much teaching is truly an art, and goes on to describe the common

misconception that teachers are just natural-born teachers. Despite the idea that teachers are born

with natural abilities to be teachers, and be good at it, the United States level of teaching quality

is disappointingly low. The United States consistently scores lower than other countries on state

and national achievement tests. President Obama enforced new and improved teacher evaluation

systems to keep teachers accountable and increase the overall quality of the teaching force in the

United States. However, Green explains that these new teacher evaluation systems simply label

the teachers as proficient, or minimally effective – furthering the myth of “you’re either a

natural-born teacher or you aren’t.” None of these ideas presented help teachers to become

better. These ideas in the prologue set the foundation for “Building a Better Teacher: How

Teaching Works” and allows Green to dive into her experience with different professors,

teachers, and professionals in education towards dispelling the myth of teachers being “naturally

good” teachers. Green goes on to introduce the educational professionals she collaborated with to

dispel the “natural teacher myth.”

At this point in the text, Green begins to shift to the pedagogy styles these professional

experimented with in their classrooms to better educate their students and become the best

teacher possible. Green begins to describe a new kind of teaching style that began to spread

throughout the education program like wildfire – TKOT (tee-kot) or “This Kind of Teaching” –
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created by two of the educational professionals Green has collaborated with. This is where the

text truly takes off. TKOT is the foundational skeleton of Green’s text and the main focus of

what teachers can do both inside and outside of the classroom to be the best educators possible..

Green gives in depth accounts of situations occurring in classrooms where TKOT is taking place

in the United States. At this point, the TKOT community begins to broaden their horizon and

find that Japan’s educational framework nearly mirrored TKOT. The staff at Michigan State who

had been pouring themselves into the idea of TKOT, began to collaborate with educators from

across the world to learn what worked for them, and what they believed made “great” teachers.

Together, professionals from the United States and Japan collaborated to find the best way to

translate ideas into practice in the classroom. In addition to focusing of the pedagogy of teaching,

Green begins to delve into what these professionals viewed as the best types of management

styles in their schools and classrooms. Green goes on to give detailed accounts of how schools

were or weren’t successful pairing TKOT and specific styles of behavior management. She also

goes on to describe the environment for the educators in these schools, and how educators

worked together in a new way. Rather than planning lessons individually, teaching them

individually, and reflecting individually – professionals planned lessons collaboratively in teams,

taught them with others observing or watching recordings of the lessons, and reflecting together.

Green ties all of the pedagogical thoughts together by saying at the end of the day, the goal of

TKOT in all classrooms was academic discourse led by the students. If educators could achieve

academic discourse in their classrooms, led by students – they will have become a better

educator. Pairing with success in classrooms, Green goes on to describe the ways administration

had kept educators accountable in their classrooms and made sure they were growing

professionally and applying their knew knowledge daily in their classrooms. Administration in
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TKOT schools began implementing new teacher evaluation systems that focused more on the

foundations of the teacher as a professional opposed to the surface level feedback of the simple

lesson observed. Green ties all of this knowledge together – TKOT, behavior management,

administration styles, teacher accountability, and the research showing the benefits of these

things – to disprove the myth that teachers are not naturally born as great educators, rather there

are many different routes, struggles, accomplishments, and so on that truly makes educators

great. Being a professional in the realm of education, Green ends the book by putting her money

where her mouth is per say, and teaching lessons for an entire day in a upper level classroom.

“Teaching lessons, I relearned one more thing: a person absolutely can learn to teach.” (Green, p.

321, 2015). Green proves all of her claims throughout her book by showing that, despite being

born involved with education – she could be taught to be a great teacher, and it is not a natural

phenomena that happens.

Philosophy of Education:

Being motivated by her goal to change the framework of teacher preparation programs, and

the style of education in our schools nationwide, Green questioned what the best philosophy is to

benefit our students and to ensure our educators and being the best teachers possible. In her

research, Green found that some of the best learning occurred in classrooms that focused

intensely on academic discourse. Over the course a years, Green evaluated “jugyokenkyu” or the

Japanese use of academic discourse both within the classroom for students and outside of the

classroom amongst colleagues, with American teaching philosophy. She found that Americans

viewed education and teaching as an individual endeavor. Educators in the United States plan

lessons alone, teach them by themselves in their classrooms, and reflect individually. Whereas,

Japanese schools rely heavily on the collaboration of educators as a “community of

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professionals” (Green, 2015). Green states: “the only logical conclusion, is that American

education ought to build a coherent infrastructure – clear goals, accurate tests, trained instructors

– to teach teaching.” (Green, 2015). With Green focusing on what should be done as teachers are

being prepared to obtain their own classrooms, as well as what teachers should be doing while

they are in their classrooms both with their students and collaboratively, Green ties in different

aspects of educational philosophies. Essentialism states that educators teach so that their students

acquire knowledge, skills, and values within the classroom and their environment. When

thinking about what to teach, teachers that have the essentialism philosophy of education focus

on curriculum that includes the core contents of education – math, reading, science, social

studies. Essentialism educators focus and accentuate absolute proficiency of academic subjects.

Green shows her support for the essentialism philosophy of education when describing what a

successful classroom looks like in the United States and Japan and the TKOT teaching

pedagogy. Green describes the difference in typical American classrooms and classrooms which

employ TKOT teaching pedagogy. Typical classrooms present 15-20 problems for students to

work on that focuses on the content skill at hand. Whereas, classrooms that employ TKOT

teaching pedagogy present one singular problem during a class period and spend the entire class

time discussing that particular problem in depth. The academic discourse surrounding this

problem fosters higher order thinking skills from students encouraging mastery of content. This

is opposed to a typical classroom where students are expected to have surface level knowledge of

content and use it on multiple problems during a class period rather that truly understanding the

what and why of the skills they are performing. TKOT classrooms are highly regarding as

essentialism classrooms as well as they focus on academic content areas more than behavioral

learning. Green found that behavior management in TKOT classrooms that proved to have high
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success for students and teachers alike, was fairly cut and dry. Educators built their behavior

management plan and rarely addressed it, or needed to with the teaching style they employed.

The classrooms that employed essentialism philosophies of education also used highly

essentialism curriculums. Commonly known “Core Knowledge Schools” established by well

known essentialist Hirsch focus highly on core academic content. The schools Green worked

with and at closely mirror these “Core Knowledge Schools” as their goals are academic

excellence in the main content areas and employ educators who are viewed as highly proficient

in their craft. The only aspect of essentialism that Green did not support was the idea that

classrooms are teacher-centered. Green found that classrooms that were most successful were

those that were guided loosely by the teacher, but had conversations led by the students. The

academic discourse led to mastery of content which is highly essentialism, but the students are

the ones who reach the mastery as opposed to the teacher. Due to the essentialist environment in

each and every classroom, the curriculum in these schools fell into the essentialist philosophy as

well. The teacher is creating the problems and guiding the actual content provided in the

classroom, which is highly essentialist. However, the students take the content and run with it so

to say.

Goal and Visions for Learners and Teachers:

The goal and vision for the learners in the classroom is where we stray from the essentialism

philosophy. In the classrooms that Green views as most successful in terms of students and

teacher, existentialism takes place. The learning is self-directed by students and is focused on the

students and the problem at hand, rather than the educator. Green began to find that the common

thread in classrooms in which both teachers and students were showing mastery of their crafts

were that the teacher always presented the problem then took a step back and allowed the
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students to meet their own realizations of the content. The educator was always sure to gently

guide students to the goal of mastery, but the students were the ones who arrived at the goal

through thought provoking academic discourse. This was always the goal in these successful

classrooms – the learner is the one who arrives at the learner opposed to the teacher simply

presenting it to the students. This form of teaching was relatively new, and relatively

uncomfortable for more teachers as Green did her research. Education as a whole overwhelming

looked like a teacher standing at the front of a classroom and talking at the students about the

content and curriculum. In TKOT, Green found that the vision for teachers shifted completely.

She found that being hands off, and simply guiding discourse along, was where the best learning

was being achieved in the classroom. Green, and the educators she worked with, found that

despite assuming being hands off might be a “break” for teachers who were used to planning

teacher led lessons – was actually more work. Educators had to be comfortable stepping back,

but also be prepared to guide conversation so it ends at the correct concepts and mastery of

content. Teachers should prepare content that will be challenging, but attainable for students. The

content should be created with all students in mind, and the teacher should be prepared for any

student misconceptions and also be knowledgeable enough to step in in case the conversation

gets off track. The vision was that teachers are more hands-off, but in reality teachers are really

putting more work into TKOT lessons. Not only are teachers putting more work into lessons, in

TKOT teachers are working much more collaboratively than in a typical classroom. TKOT’s

vision of successful teaching includes collaborating with colleagues before lessons to discuss

pro’s and con’s, inviting colleagues into lessons to watch and constructively criticize and praise,

and sitting down with colleagues following lessons to review what went well and what could be
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improved upon. This vision for teachers was wildly out of character for the United States

schooling system however, and the shift wouldn’t be easy.

How Society Plays a Role:

This new brand of teaching appears to be astoundingly successful and beneficial, but to shift

an entire culture of education would not be easy. Classrooms today still employ ancient norms

that were built decades ago in classrooms. The idea of the teacher being the authority, and

students being the subordinate is the norm. In most classrooms, the teacher stands at the front

and teaches a focus lesson while students sit quietly and listen. Students then work quietly

independently and turn in their work for teachers to evaluate. These classroom habits and norms

have been customary for years and have been fostered in a cyclical rotation for years. Future

educators sat in classrooms like this, are sent into their own classrooms with little to no support

and guidance, so they fall back on what they know and the ways they were taught. Not only do

they fall back on what they were taught, they teach the content that is provided for them. Nearly

all curriculums in the United States are fast paced. The goal is to get as much content in the

school year as possible, and curriculums move swiftly and emphasize the repetition to mastery

ideal. Curriculum has students practicing similar problems of a skill set over and over so it

“sticks” then they quickly move on to the next skill. With TKOT, students are presented with a

single problem over the entire class period, and the overall pacing of the classroom depends on

the success of failure of the whole group. Average curriculum and pacing guides encourage

educators to move on once most of the group just “gets it.” This is how education in the society

of the United States works. Teaching is also a very independent career in the United States. Once

teachers are out of their teacher preparatory programs, they teach alone in their classrooms,

reflect alone on their lessons, and continue their education alone. It is not the norm to have
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professionals, colleagues, and/or administration sitting with teachers - novice or seasoned -

while they plan, teach, and reflect on their lessons. Introducing teacher support systems like

Green emphasizes, as well as shifting the entire atmosphere of curriculum and classrooms would

require millions of schools and teachers nationwide to stop what they have been doing for

virtually their entire lifetime and start over. Difficult, is an understatement.

“Building a Better Teacher” vs. “To Teach”:

Elizabeth Green is not the only educational professional who believes there must be a seismic

shift in the culture of education in the United States. William Ayers, retired kindergarten teacher,

professor of education and education theorist, decided to put his thoughts regarding education

into words just as Green did. In his text: “To Teach: The Journey of a Teacher” Ayers dives into

the different aspects of teaching he has seen and his opinions regarding such. Ayers presents a

different lens to education as he can speak from experiences from his own classroom, whereas

Green was pulling stories, experiences, and events from classroom teachers she was working

with or interviewing. Because of Ayers direct connection, his recall of certain educational

experiences seem more raw and presents a different perspective than Green. Green’s goal of her

text is to dispel the myth that teachers are naturally born, and they need intensive support and

guidance on how to better themselves and how to effectively teach in the classroom. Ayers states

that he believes teachers are “called to teaching because they love children and youth or because

they love being with them…” (Ayers, p. 20, 2007). However, Ayers is quick to state that being

called to teaching is much different than excelling at teaching; “…a major obstacle on the

pathway to teaching is the notion that teaching is essentially technical, that it is easily learned,

simply assessed, and quickly remediated” (Ayers, p. 22, 2007). Both Green and Ayers believe

our country need to revamp the entire mindset behind education, so that we can do what is best
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for teachers and for their students. Ayers goes on to describe the largest and most common myths

of education, one being that teachers learn to teach in colleges of education. Green and Ayers’

thoughts overlap in this area, stating that teacher preparatory programs are doing a disservice to

our future educators by missing the essential point of teaching and rarely connecting what is

happening in the lecture hall to the reality of teaching. “Teaching is an eminently practical

activity, best learned in the exercise of it and in the thoughtful, disciplined, and sustained

reflection that must accompany that.” (Ayers, p. 24, 2007). The remainder of Ayers’ myths are

student focused and call out societal thoughts that place children into a cookie cutter approach to

teaching, whereas Green is predominately teacher driven and rarely addresses the students as

learners. When reviewing these two texts, a reader can easily see who is writing which text.

Ayers is incredibly teacher minded. He addresses behavior management, classroom environment,

student needs and strengths, home to school connections, what teachers need in their classrooms,

the pitfalls of curriculum, and the pitfalls of standardized testing. Each chapter in his text speaks

directly to educators; he empowers them and discusses what he believes are the most essential

things for teacher and student success in the classroom. Green is incredibly research minded and

presents her information as an uninvolved third party. She discusses the problem with our

teacher preparatory programs, the lack of support teachers have in their careers, and the research

that supports a new kind of teaching that proves to be beneficial for both teachers and students.

While Ayers writes from a lens of what teachers can do and what they need to be successful in

their classrooms, Green writes regarding education as a whole and speaks on what needs to be

done as a society. Despite being on opposite ends of the spectrum with their perspectives and

scales, Ayers and Green are much the same after stripping away the research, the experiences,

and the content. Both authors are aware that something needs to change in education today.
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Green and Ayers show that education is hard for teachers, hard for students, and it is getting

increasingly harder with societies political atmosphere. They both speak heavily on the concern

of teachers needing more support in their classrooms, and that there needs to be a shift in what

our teacher preparatory programs look like across the nation. When it comes down to it, Ayers

and Green recognize that education and teaching are one of the most important pillars of our

society, and something needs to change in order for the United States, teachers, students, and

schools to consider themselves successful.

Integration into the Classroom:

The ideas Green presented are considered radical in a typical United States classroom, but as

I read this text I found myself curious about the teaching styles implemented in the classrooms.

“TKOT” focused on working on one single question per class period. As I read about this, I

found myself thinking: “how could you fill up an hour, or sometimes more, with one single

question?” I continued reading, and answered my own question. Green described the deep, rich

conversations students were having about the skill at hand. It was evident that all of the students

in these classrooms were using higher order thinking skills, and soaking in content at a much

more intense level than usual. In my classroom, I will teach my focus lesson about a skill then

present two or three problems on the board that we work through together, then give the students

independent work with multiple questions about the skill at hand as well. My biggest struggle

has been that my students struggle to perform independently, but when we work together

students are capable. With “TKOT” students are forced to be independent, but students that

struggle with a concept still get to be a part of the conversation, so their learning is deepening to

the point that they can become independent with a skill as well. I would like to start off my next

school year using this format of teaching. Our district requires teachers to follow a particular
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lesson format, so I would like to teach “TKOT” lessons twice a week and compare them to my

district mandated lesson formats. I want to collect data on which format is benefitting my

students. I enjoyed hearing Green discuss how all students in “TKOT” style classrooms

participated, regardless of home life, ethnicity, gender etc. Being a resource teacher, I will have a

small group of students who are functioning academically near or at the same level as one

another. This will allow me to build problems that address the content standards, but are also

attainable for everyone in the group. I want to try this teaching style, because I have not felt

confident with how I am teaching my students. My students are making gains, but I feel that I am

not doing my best teaching possible and as I read this text I found that if I could master this type

of teaching, I would feel confident with sending my students on to the next grade.

I also want to reevaluate how I am using observations to better myself as an educator. At this

point, I am not a tenured teacher so I am observed by my administration 4 times a year: twice

announced and twice unannounced. Following these observations, I meet with my administration

and review the lesson. Green went in depth regarding professional growth in “TKOT” schools,

and she discussed how teachers, not just administration, are constantly observing one another.

Prior to these observations, teachers are collaborating to build lessons together, and following

observations teachers spend time together discussing every aspect of the observation. I would

love being able to collaborate with my colleagues more, and I think observations could be more

powerful if they are completed more frequently, and done by colleagues who work with students

daily as opposed to administration who are rarely in classrooms anymore. I plan on discussing

these things with my administration at my end of year review meeting, as I truly believe these

things could be beneficial for myself as an educator, and for my students.

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Education is one of the most powerful and important masts of our society. Green uses her

knowledge and research to break down education and dispel the myth of the natural born teacher.

She starts by analyzing teacher preparatory programs in the United States, breaking apart what is

being done to support teachers in our classrooms and what should be done, and the type of

teaching that is best for students and teachers. Her essentialism approach to teaching the core

content for mastery, tied in with a unique student driven approach shows that classrooms in the

United States can change the norm and be successful.

Ayers, William. (2007). To Teach. Teachers College Press.

Green, E. (2015). Building a better teacher: How teaching works (and how to teach it to everyone). WW Norton

& Company