A favorite "Teaching Artifact": My original Parker 75 Fountain Pen, a gift from Bonnie, my wife, in 1966.
This pen is my constant companion, and has accompanied me across the world 11 times over the years.
It was once run over by an army tank in southeast Asia--and found two weeks later.
Its battle scars are well and truly earned.
 
  "In the quiet hours when we are alone and there is nobody to tell us what fine fellows we are, we come sometimes upon a moment in which we wonder, not how much money we are earning, nor how famous we have become, but what good we are doing." - A.A. Milne -

Reflections on Teaching and "Artifacts"

Please allow me to begin this section with an apology for what must surely seem an arrogant and egocentric treatise. I am not, and have never been, comfortable with "tooting my own horn". I much prefer to go quietly about my business and let others do the same. However, it appears that, as a part of this portfolio, I must somehow justify my existence as a teacher. This brief essay is an attempt to show, in some way, my "effectiveness" as a teacher.

In looking at the wonderful work of my fellow iMET students, I find myself at a loss for "artifacts" to display. There are a few: Power Point presentations I use in conjunction with my Computer Repair and Macintosh Maintenance classes, the Video Production curriculum I plan to use next year (now that the equipment is available), a short lesson on the chemistry of electricity...that's about all I have to show.

I was feeling rather uncomfortable about the dearth of things I have to "show and tell", until it occurred to me that I am not in the business of creating "artifacts" to show to others. My business, and my goal, is the development of students, not things.

So, having little to "show" for myself, let me do a bit of "tell" in the hope the reader may understand my approach to teaching, what little I may have accomplished, and the wonderful people who are my students. My telephone number is in the local directory, and I freely give students my email address and cell phone number. I have never had a student abuse the ability easily to communicate with me, and welcome their calls and notes, whether during the school year or during vacations and holidays.

I have the exceptional good fortune to relate well to most (alas, not all) high school students. For whatever reason, students seem to have little reservation in letting me know what they think, or in asking for my help. While most of these are students in my classes, a considerable number are not--indeed some are not even students at the school where I work; they are friends or siblings of students who have come to know me. My help is sought in nearly every subject, most of which I am not "qualified" to teach in any official sense. Students come to me for help with math, with chemistry, physics and biology, with history, civics and economics, and very often, with English--especially for help with understanding poetry or Shakespeare and with writing papers, essays and such. This last is odd, as I have never taken an English class in college, and did poorly with it in high school. There are at least eight former students of the school now engaged in college or university study who regularly e-mail their papers to me for correction and editing. Just why students elect to seek my advise in subjects far outside my limited official qualification, rather than turning to their math, science, history or English teachers, is not something I fully understand, but it is a fact. It is a large part of what makes my job so enjoyable.

To give a specific example of the kind of "effectiveness" students seem to find in my teaching, I shall relate an episode which occurred only two days ago.

Adam graduated from Lindhurst High School in January of this year, a semester early. He took computer repair and computer networking classes from me, and we got to know one another quite well. Adam was an excellent student, with a real interest in the subjects I taught, and a maturity well beyond that of most 17-year-olds. He had already given thought to his future, and had decided to join the Navy as soon as he graduated. I spent some time in the Navy (back in the days of the tall ships), so we had a common interest there as well. Adam is now in the Navy, and has remained in contact with me since his graduation. I had three letters from him while he was in boot camp, and he has called several times since, just to keep in touch. Adam is currently stationed at the Naval Submarine School (NSS) in Groton, Connecticut. He is by two years the youngest member of his class.

As I was preparing to leave home for a Friday evening iMET class, Adam called. We briefly discussed our mutual well being, spoke of the activities of other recent graduates and generally enjoyed a pleasant talk. At that point, Adam described the subject matter he is now studying at NSS. "We are learning about basic DC and AC circuits. I'm the only one in the class who already knows anything about them." he said. We had done a very brief discussion of DC circuits in computer repair, and Adam is one who both listens and remembers.

"How far have you gone," I asked, "Have you done series, parallel and series-parallel networks?"

"Yes," he replied, "We've only been doing it since Monday. We spent the first day on simple series circuits, then Tuesday and part of Wednesday on parallel circuits, Wednesday afternoon and Thursday on combination circuits. We had a quiz today. The instructor drew circuits on the board and we had to answer questions about them. His drawings didn't look like the circuits in the book, and everyone was confused by them. I tried to ask him to redraw them, but he wouldn't listen. I'm the only one who passed it."

"Well, how are you doing with it?", I asked, "Not having any trouble staying at the head of the class are you?" This was a serious question, as I expect Adam to be at the head of such a class.

Adam indicated that he was well out in front of his classmates, in fact, while everyone else had been given four hours of extra study based on the Friday quiz, Adam had been given two days off. That is the sort of performance I expect from Adam, but he indicated that there was one thing that was giving him a bit of trouble. I asked if he had a pencil and paper--he did. Please recall we were talking on the telephone. I began to draw simple circuits on paper, telling Adam what I was doing so that he could recreate my drawing at his end. It took a few minutes of discussion before I was clear about the specific problem he faced (the determination of power dissipation of individual components in a series-parallel circuit). We began with simplest-case situations, and added complexity until he indicated we had reached the point that was troubling him. By asking him to answer questions, compute currents and voltages within the circuit, I was able to determine that his drawing was indeed a correct representation of mine, and that he was understanding what we were doing. We spent perhaps 15 minutes going over the material, along with a couple of other details I thought might put him a bit ahead.

When we finished, Adam said, "You can teach this over the telephone better than the guy here does in the classroom. The teacher here insists we do everything his way. He knows the stuff, but doesn't know how to teach it. I tried to make some suggestions on how to make it easier to understand, but he didn't want to hear it." Adam is one of those students who doesn't say much, but when he has something to say, it is well considered and worth hearing. His suggestions were given from a student perspective, not in an attempt to contradict or criticize, rather indicate to the teacher the points where the students were becoming confused. His navy teacher would do well to listen to him. I learned much from Adam. It is gratifying to hear that he thinks he has learned something from me.

The day before Adam called, I received a letter from Jennifer, another "star in my crown" who graduated in June. Jennifer is now in the Army in boot camp in South Carolina. I hope and expect that I will continue to hear from Jennifer as she goes about her life, whether just to keep in touch, or for help and advise on whatever she thinks I can do for her. Can anyone wonder that I enjoy what I do?

This, then, is the kind of "artifact" I hope to develop: a student with a purpose and goal, a student with the eagerness to learn and succeed, a student who will seek help when needed and try to help others when possible. Over the past three years, I have had the enormous gratification of developing 12 or 15 such "artifacts". At least in their minds, I have earned my pay and my title.
 
 

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