The Four Rs: And One Giant A

A century ago, America, deluged with immigrants, its schools severely taxed to meet the learning needs of all students, came up with a convenient shorthand for what education was about: "The Three Rs", by which they meant, reading, writing and arithmetic.

Apparently, "orthography" was not on the list, so instead of a handy acronym, like RAW or WAR, they settled on the ironic-- now iconic --moniker, "the three Rs."

Well, new century, new challenges. Still plenty of new immigrants. But now, instead of guiding youngsters gently along the garden path of reading, writing and arithmetic, our society demands that they be endlessly tested to "prove" once and for all that they have been educated in the three Rs.

If only life were so certain, so controllable, so quantifiable... so easy...

We all know as teachers, that the three Rs are a necessary but not sufficient education in the modern world. A student can carry a calculator, depend on spell check, even get books on tape--but in no sense could you say that he or she is well-educated if they only have those three abilities.

So, in terms of teaching excellence, I have devised a new set of Rs, not three but four of them. And, if a teacher masters these in their approach to youngsters, I submit that they have done a high quality job of providing a lasting foundation upon which students can build the rest of their life.

And we are all lifetime learners, despite the mania that presumes a child not well-educated by 17 is doomed to ignorance for the rest of their life.

Anyway, here they are, the Four Rs:

1. Relationship.

Most teachers understand that their relationships with children are hugely influential in the way students respond to the class, whether it is the material or other students. What most teachers do not understand is that there are principles underlying successful relationships with children. Most of them are common sense things, like courtesy, caring, consideration, but some are less obvious, like building assets in a relationship, staying positive, securing trust, working on clear communication. This R deserves a post all by itself, but for now, let's acknowledge that teaching is an interconnected series of successful relationships. A teacher needs to look at their work as being about people and finding ways to connect with them, connect through them and allow connections to happen amongst them.

Oh, and let's not forget something terribly important about relationships: today's work world, in the way it is experienced at an individual level, is much more about successfully working together with other people than it is about successfully out-competing others.

2. Relevance.

This one gains in importance as a young student climbs the ladder to high school, but holds true at every level of education. A teacher is attempting to "sell" young people on the importance of learning defined content. Now, a teacher can say: "This will be on the test, so you have to know it." And, actually, that works with about 20%-30% of students. But, and this is key: you will not get excellence in student effort, and especially, student retention of material, if you do not find ways to make your content relevant to students.

Think about it: there are more forms of entertainment more available in ever more mobile ways than ever before. The human creature is attracted to messages and information which he or she find most important, useful or inspiring. If students get the idea that learning is dumb, useless or uninteresting, they will simply tune it out and spend more time where they feel more stimulated. On the other hand, where they are "caught" by content, inspired or struck by its import and relevance, they will work hard to learn more and retain more.

People master a subject because they want to, not because they have to. If teachers can show students why something is relevant to their lives, nature or the human condition, the odds of capturing them increase exponentially.

3. Reflection.

Did Socrates say, "The unexamined life is not worth living"? One of the great sources of wisdom and inspiration, in fact, I submit, the essential source, is the imagination and creativity that resides within us. In another post on this site, I wrote about the "pedagogy of interiority", which is really about our ability to navigate inner thresholds of awareness, strength and resilience. I submit that this is the truly great resource of our country because inventions, innovation, creativity--the very source of knowing itself--is a product of inner or self-knowledge. In an economy where "thinking outside the box" is essential, where earning our livelihood is much more dependent upon creativity, imagination and innovation, there can be no overrating this.

It is the teacher's job, now more than ever, given the electronic gadgets that dominate young people's lives and prevent them from journeying within, to ask students to probe their inner self, to figure out their values, aspirations, desires. Self-reflection and self-knowing promote a sense of completion and fulfillment on many levels, including spiritual fulfillment, and results in greater mastery and retention of learned material. Again, this deserves a more substantial treatment than I give it here--particularly how this can be accomplished through assignments--but at least the main point is clear.

4. Realness.

Not to be confused with relevance, "realness" is all about the way the teacher conducts him or herself in class, in school and in life. Academia should not be principally about book learning. The proper subject of any class is reality itself, phenomenon, people, events--the reality that we share each and every day with each other.

Teachers are a manifestation of that reality. For some students, perhaps many students, that makes being in a classroom a real drag because there is nothing "real" about the teacher. But it doesn't have to be this way. In fact, the one essential thing a teacher needs to bring with them to school is their own unprepossessing sense of who they are: what makes them "real."

Teaching isn't about doing a job, or just making a salary, or just going through the motions of instructing an equation or a theory, it is about being real enough, open enough, strong enough to confront whatever pops up on any given day, whether that is a death of a student, the challenge of a parent at war, or the struggles of a family in divorce. If it's out there, then it should also be available to the teacher as a means of showing more clearly that being alive means confronting reality, looking it bravely in the face, not hiding from it.

These are my four Rs for a new century, a new education and a new economy. But, in truth, these four have always been the core of teaching--- along with a teacher needing to possess a high degree of content mastery. Teachers, after all, also have to be truly excellent in their field because that is what inspires and wins respect from students. (Gosh, how did I get through 4 Rs and not use the word "respect?")

Anyway, take these four aspects of teaching and throw them in a mixing bowl and stir them around and you know what you get?

Authenticity.

That is the one master organizing principle of being a quality teacher.

So we go full circle, and this is terribly important for new teachers to understand: the most important thing to do or be in terms of your teaching is just to be yourself. If you are authentic, true to your vision, values and integrity as you have thought about and constructed these, each of the 4 Rs above will take care of themselves.