It happens all the time.
I’m sitting at the table with a teacher working on lesson planning or adjusting intervention based on new data. We consider options for instruction and the teacher will at some point say, “I know my principal (or the district, or the team lead) wants me to do _________________, but I don’t believe that is what’s best for my students. It seems like the only reason I’m supposed to do that is to raise our assessment scores.”
Honestly, at times, I’m not entirely clear on how to encourage teachers to stand up for their convictions and speak out against ill-informed mandates.
What I am clear on is the frustration teachers feel when what they believe and what they feel pressured to implement in their classrooms is at odds. Gravity Goldberg speaks straight to this issue in her new book, Teach Like Yourself: How Authentic Teaching Transforms Our Students and Ourselves.
You need this book
Dr. Goldberg connects with the reader from the start by sharing her own journey as a teacher, learning (sometimes in painful ways) the difference between teaching in authentic ways and teaching that left her feeling more like an imposter. Several pages in, the reader is at once comfortable with the transparent and honest conversational tone in this professional book about personal transformation.
Writing a book about teaching like yourself is a challenge because I can’t simply tell you what I did and suggest you do the same. That would really be missing the whole point of being your true self. What I can offer you are the practices I have witnessed in myself and countless other teachers as we’ve come to own our teaching in truly powerful ways.
Teach Like Yourself appealed to my own experience. Over the years, I’ve felt torn between what I believed and what I felt constrained by others to do. This book is not only about individual teachers and their experiences, it also delivers on research and actionable practices. Within its pages you’ll find the perfect combination of personal anecdotes, self-care strategies and educational research.
Each chapter includes space for personal reflection, advice from the author and other practitioners, along with videos that extend the content. It’s the perfect resource for coaching yourself or partnering with peers for a collaborative book study.
Dr. Gravity Goldberg’s Five Practices for teaching like yourself are at once simple and yet profound.
- Name Your Core Beliefs—making instructional choices that align with the values you hold for
how students learn in deep and lasting ways - View Your Teaching as a Practice—being open to trying things out, taking chances, reflecting and
learning from every days’ experiences. - Build Balanced Relationships—forming relationships with ourselves, colleagues, students and
their families to strengthen our competency as teachers. - Drive Professional Growth—leaning into areas of growth that transform our practices.
- Take Care of Yourself—pursuing the self-care necessary to be our best professionally and
personally.
These Five Practices make up the content of chapters one through six with the seventh and final chapter entitled, Teaching Bravely. Dr. Goldberg shares compelling thoughts in sharing with readers what we lose when we choose not to teacher like ourselves.
During this time when there is pressure to teach like someone else from the media, politicians and ill-informed policies, it is time for us teachers to speak up and show up. The best way to show the naysayers and so-called experts who don’t really have a clue about what makes teaching the important craft it is, is for us to choose to teach like ourselves.
I’m no longer at a loss to speak with teachers when they’re conflicted about teaching like someone else or choosing to teach like themselves. I’m ready to share what I’ve learned.
And, I’ll have a book recommendation at the ready.
