'Not Rolling the Dice' - in praise of safe teaching
The tendency to take risks when preparing lessons is often regarded to be a feature of excellent teaching. The idea that 'great teachers take risks' comes up again and again on blogs, in books, and in discussion. I have to admit that I'm not always clear as to what this actually means in practice. Risk may have gained this glowing reputation because it is associated with lessons and activities that are a bit unusual or left-field, and therefore represent an excitingly creative diversion on the trudge through the school day. It may be that a willingness to innovate and experiment is seen as inherently worthwhile, or that risk-taking is somehow daringly anti-Ofsted, with the risk-taking teacher functioning as a laudable maverick, cocking a snook (and what a startlingly wonderful expression that is) at a culture of robo-teaching-by-numbers which has swamped us all, Somerset Levels-style, over recent years.
There's probably some truth in this - a degree of variety in approaches to teaching seems sensible, and there undoubtedly are teachers who can make risk-taking pay off (I'm reminded of a colleague who, in a formally-observed lesson, delivered the reasonably detailed instructions for a successful Year 12 Physics practical entirely in a language he claimed to be a dialect of Venutian). Nevertheless, I can't persuade myself to sign-up to the cult of risk in teaching - I struggle with the endemic risk-aversion-aversion which seems to imply that risk is a fundamental good, and that for lessons to be exciting and engaging, we need to strive for ever-more original, risky ways to get students learning.
At root, my view is that teaching lessons is already inescapably and utterly riddled with risk at almost every turn, and that therefore the search for even more risk seems unhelpful. To illustrate, if we assume that an indicator of successful teaching is that students think deeply about a relevant, appropriately challenging concept or set of ideas, there are some stand-out risks that seem to recur, both in my own classroom and in many of those that I've visited over the last ten years. They include risking that:
- students are bringing necessary knowledge to the lesson, so they'll be able to access what it's about
- students will know how to produce quality work without this being carefully modelled to them, particularly when particular literacies are required
- students will be able to take part in lessons which are ambiguous or unclear in their intent, whilst still thinking purposefully about things which are useful to them
- if using hands-up questioning, students without their hands up are listening and thinking about the right things
- if giving students time to think, they will think about the right things (interesting one this - is it just me who during think time can only seem to think about the fact that I'm not thinking about the thing I'm supposed to be thinking about?)
- unstructured group and pair work will help all students to think deeply and not be dominated by individuals or go off-task
- students will be able to retain concentration long periods of direct instruction without overloading working memories
- students will think deeply when directed to read comments that teachers have written on their work
- if we get them to raise their thumbs, or write something on a post-it note at the end of the lesson, this is adequate or useful proof that they've thought deeply
-just because students may be enjoying an activity, they are learning from it or gaining in any way which is beyond their immediate sense of fulfilment
The list of risks that we take just through attempting the most 'bog-standard' lesson could go on indefinitely. My point, I suppose is that we really ought to focus on managing these 'level one' risks, before inviting more risk, rolling the dice by trying out activities which 'might just work'. I realise that this could be taken as an argument for hyper-traditional, creatively-stultifying teaching, but it's not that really. Instead, it's that teaching seems so inherently complex that there's enough risk to manage in just trying to teach clearly and effectively. I'm also mindful of the fact that, where risky, creative teaching is tried and doesn't work, students from more advantaged, highly-literate backgrounds are far more able to cope with this - to enjoy the fun whilst still working out the point of it all somehow - than students who need greater clarity.
Too often, it seems to me that we put emphasis and gloss onto risk in teaching, and too infrequently do we talk about preparing lessons which are safe; in fact the concept of teaching being 'safe' is often used as a synonym for boring, dull practice. I worry that this is harmful in that it can be taken to promote a style of teaching with an excessive focus on lessons to be diverting, unusual, quick-paced and original, and that this is a style which is both incredibly difficult to sustain, and patchy in its outcomes. This illustrates the problem with risk-taking, in that it is, well, risky I suppose, and the students that we are teaching only get one shot at this. I realise that the comparison of teaching with medicine - would you want a risk-taking heart surgeon - is a bit tired and doesn't really stand up to scrutiny, but it may have more pertinence than usual in this case.
Alongside this, the notion of safe = boring takes us close to the heart of what really makes excellent teaching; the sincerely-held and daily-lived conviction that what we teach students in schools is in fact not boring at all. In the last few weeks, I've been privileged to witness students learning, in not especially risk-taking ways, about a range of utterly fascinating topics, from the structure of Bach's chorale preludes to modern European history; from compounds and elements to balance of payments in Economics, from exquisite poetry to a load of A Level maths that was mesmerisingly interesting at the time, but which my lack of practice and supporting knowledge make impossible for me to recall even the slightest detail of now, three days later. This is engrossing, worthwhile stuff, the safe, well-organised, passionate teaching of which leaves the possibility of boredom a small risk indeed.
There's probably some truth in this - a degree of variety in approaches to teaching seems sensible, and there undoubtedly are teachers who can make risk-taking pay off (I'm reminded of a colleague who, in a formally-observed lesson, delivered the reasonably detailed instructions for a successful Year 12 Physics practical entirely in a language he claimed to be a dialect of Venutian). Nevertheless, I can't persuade myself to sign-up to the cult of risk in teaching - I struggle with the endemic risk-aversion-aversion which seems to imply that risk is a fundamental good, and that for lessons to be exciting and engaging, we need to strive for ever-more original, risky ways to get students learning.
At root, my view is that teaching lessons is already inescapably and utterly riddled with risk at almost every turn, and that therefore the search for even more risk seems unhelpful. To illustrate, if we assume that an indicator of successful teaching is that students think deeply about a relevant, appropriately challenging concept or set of ideas, there are some stand-out risks that seem to recur, both in my own classroom and in many of those that I've visited over the last ten years. They include risking that:
- students are bringing necessary knowledge to the lesson, so they'll be able to access what it's about
- students will know how to produce quality work without this being carefully modelled to them, particularly when particular literacies are required
- students will be able to take part in lessons which are ambiguous or unclear in their intent, whilst still thinking purposefully about things which are useful to them
- if using hands-up questioning, students without their hands up are listening and thinking about the right things
- if giving students time to think, they will think about the right things (interesting one this - is it just me who during think time can only seem to think about the fact that I'm not thinking about the thing I'm supposed to be thinking about?)
- unstructured group and pair work will help all students to think deeply and not be dominated by individuals or go off-task
- students will be able to retain concentration long periods of direct instruction without overloading working memories
- students will think deeply when directed to read comments that teachers have written on their work
- if we get them to raise their thumbs, or write something on a post-it note at the end of the lesson, this is adequate or useful proof that they've thought deeply
-just because students may be enjoying an activity, they are learning from it or gaining in any way which is beyond their immediate sense of fulfilment
The list of risks that we take just through attempting the most 'bog-standard' lesson could go on indefinitely. My point, I suppose is that we really ought to focus on managing these 'level one' risks, before inviting more risk, rolling the dice by trying out activities which 'might just work'. I realise that this could be taken as an argument for hyper-traditional, creatively-stultifying teaching, but it's not that really. Instead, it's that teaching seems so inherently complex that there's enough risk to manage in just trying to teach clearly and effectively. I'm also mindful of the fact that, where risky, creative teaching is tried and doesn't work, students from more advantaged, highly-literate backgrounds are far more able to cope with this - to enjoy the fun whilst still working out the point of it all somehow - than students who need greater clarity.
Too often, it seems to me that we put emphasis and gloss onto risk in teaching, and too infrequently do we talk about preparing lessons which are safe; in fact the concept of teaching being 'safe' is often used as a synonym for boring, dull practice. I worry that this is harmful in that it can be taken to promote a style of teaching with an excessive focus on lessons to be diverting, unusual, quick-paced and original, and that this is a style which is both incredibly difficult to sustain, and patchy in its outcomes. This illustrates the problem with risk-taking, in that it is, well, risky I suppose, and the students that we are teaching only get one shot at this. I realise that the comparison of teaching with medicine - would you want a risk-taking heart surgeon - is a bit tired and doesn't really stand up to scrutiny, but it may have more pertinence than usual in this case.
Alongside this, the notion of safe = boring takes us close to the heart of what really makes excellent teaching; the sincerely-held and daily-lived conviction that what we teach students in schools is in fact not boring at all. In the last few weeks, I've been privileged to witness students learning, in not especially risk-taking ways, about a range of utterly fascinating topics, from the structure of Bach's chorale preludes to modern European history; from compounds and elements to balance of payments in Economics, from exquisite poetry to a load of A Level maths that was mesmerisingly interesting at the time, but which my lack of practice and supporting knowledge make impossible for me to recall even the slightest detail of now, three days later. This is engrossing, worthwhile stuff, the safe, well-organised, passionate teaching of which leaves the possibility of boredom a small risk indeed.
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