A Good Enough Teacher

1.22.10 By Adina Schecter

I currently teach in a multi-age, multi-level alternative high school program, but my first step in a classroom (as an adult) was seven years ago in a fifth- and sixth-grade classroom in Cambridge.  My mentor teacher worried about her students all the time.  She would wake up at 2 am and worry about Tamara’s moodiness, Rodney’s refusal to follow her instructions, and that Jasmyn only spoke a few words throughout the day.  One day she came into school and told me she asked a famous Harvard educator, “How do I know if I am a great teacher?”  The answer this renowned professor of education gave was, “You don’t have to be a great teacher; just be a good enough teacher.”  After telling me this, she was quickly distracted by the next classroom demand, but I haven’t ever forgotten that line and what it means.

A good enough teacher?  That doesn’t sound good enough AT ALL.  With all the research out there now about what makes an effective teacher, with all my love and passion for my students, with a huge amount of pride as a BTR graduate, I want to be the best teacher, the ultimate teacher, the one who knows how to make a difference every day in my students’ learning. I also will admit that I want my students to have the highest MCAS scores out of anyone in the school (but I don’t believe in merit pay - another blog for another time). I am now in my fourth year in the teaching profession.  I continue to wake up at 2 am and worry about my students, regret how I handled certain situations, and toss and turn about whether students will benefit from working in partners or trios for the next day’s activity.  Good enough just doesn’t cut if for me.  I am always trying to get better. 

Yet as I mature in my teacher development, I now realize that I didn’t really get what the famous Harvard lady was saying.  Actually, I don’t really care what she meant, but I know I can learn from what she said.  I completely believe that there are standards for good teaching that we must hold for every teacher.  I appreciate those standards because they helped me learn how to become a better teacher and make the job less about the person and more about what the person is doing that is effective.  At the same time, the profession is more complex than just a checklist of things that great teachers do.  The reality of my days is that I try to do the things that “great teachers” do every day, but I have moments of greatness and moments of mistakes; moments of effectiveness and moments of failure.  In the end, calling myself “great” or calling myself a “failure” is not helpful to me.  In fact, sometimes I just get frustrated when someone tells me I am a great teacher.  I feel the need to confess all the things I have not been able to do to help my students. Most of my students are not on track to graduate. Does this mean I am not a great teacher?  Does this mean I am not even a good enough teacher?

Instead of plaguing myself with these questions, I have decided to stop ranking myself on the “great teacher scale.” It really stresses me out and it is a waste of energy.  Whenever that “Am I good enough or even great?” comes into my head, I’ve trained myself to stop and use the energy to think of new, creative steps I can take to support my students.  Instead of “Did I pick the perfect poem for today’s lesson?” I think “What did my students get out of reading this poem?  What did they learn?  Which poem can I choose for tomorrow that will support them more?”  Instead of focusing so much on what I am doing, I focus more on what they are thinking and doing. The brain energy is put into helping them achieve more, which is so much more useful. 

I will never stop trying to be that vague level of greatness all dedicated teachers aspire to be, but I’ve learned that being good enough is, in fact, sometimes great.  Here is a story that sums it up.

About a month ago, my students facilitated small group discussions with Charlestown faculty and outside guests about the novel Native Son.  In a circle discussion format, students raised some of the most difficult topics the book addresses, such as how racism continues to impact young people of color.  Students expressed their personal connection to the novel’s main character, Bigger Thomas, and analyzed the complexity of Bigger’s decisions a a young, black male in Chicago in the 1930s.  One of my students, Shay, reflected on how the law responded to Bigger’s misunderstood actions: “When he committed the murders, all that was seen was anger, hate, and murder.  From both blacks and whites, besides Max, not one man dared ask Bigger why!  Why he murdered, why he was angry, why he did feel as though he would never amount to anything. This was because he was black, he was black and had nothing.  They were white and had everything.”  In that moment, among faces of all ages and backgrounds in the room, Shay gave voice to Bigger’s silenced thoughts and emotions.

In their reflections, students said they never shared with others what they shared that day with strangers.  The event was a culmination of rigorous analysis of a challenging text connected to new personal and emotional understandings of how they see themselves and others in the world.

I barely said a word that day.  This was their experience to have, not mine.  Many of them did not come to school the day before or the day after.  I left school that day feeling like I was a good enough teacher, and it was one of the greatest feelings I’ve had since becoming a teacher.