On the Decision-Making Process in Teacher Education – Teaching Certificate Seminar
In this paper I wish to examine the connection between professionals’ decision-making processes and the way they are trained. The focus, of course, is on teacher education and teachers’ decision making, but the same dynamic exists in many professions. Teacher education offers a relatively clear view of decision making both when observing veteran teachers during the practicum and when watching peers as they try their hand at teaching a class.
Decision making is something every person undergoes in daily life as well as in professional life. It requires knowledge of the options a given situation presents, and that knowledge is acquired through broad prior experience which allows us to make the right choice. When a teacher must decide how to handle a particular situation in class—both in terms of classroom management and in terms of presenting the content to be taught—they draw on pedagogical knowledge accumulated over time to create a climate that supports learning, and they try to flex the planned lesson in light of the immediate classroom reality. A new teacher comes to the classroom with extensive theoretical knowledge of different teaching methods but lacks the practical experience to choose which method fits which situation. A novice teacher’s decision making resembles trial and error more than the measured process characteristic of a veteran teacher. Over time, each teacher builds a personal repertoire of teaching strategies that work for them, and that repertoire becomes the basis for quick and sound in-class decisions.
The tools provided to teachers during their training aim to prepare them for a wide range of problems they will face in class, in school, and within the education system at large. These tools come from a variety of disciplines and are adapted to the field of education. They cover many topics and are meant to help the beginning teacher understand the different layers of the teacher’s role. The teacher functions as a kind of mediator between the educational system to which they belong and the students in front of them. On the one hand they must be faithful to the general curriculum dictated by the system; on the other hand they bear responsibility toward the students. Both layers run through all the topics taught in teacher education. With these tools, the teacher can address problems that arise in class and grasp the different factors that generate them. The decisions a teacher must make in a given situation depend on the knowledge they acquired through these tools.
This paper seeks to clarify the essential difference between the decision-making processes of the veteran and the novice teacher. What knowledge does a teacher acquire over the years that allows them to teach smoothly and effectively? Can that knowledge be transmitted without trial-and-error processes during teacher education? I will present research that addresses precisely this problem alongside theories that frame the issue, and I will examine it through the lens of the training process I underwent with my peers. The study is qualitative and reflective, written from a personal point of view. From this perspective, I hope to arrive at critical conclusions that will offer a clear picture of the training process, with particular focus on decision making.
Methodology
The research was conducted through my own experience of teacher education this year, conversations I held with fellow trainees, and analysis of the tools and topics covered in various courses. As part of the program I also completed a practicum at Municipal High School E (Ironi Heh). In light of this practicum I describe and analyze several events that occurred during observations and while teaching lessons there. These observations are part of the study, as I examine them against the tools I acquired and the ways I used those tools during the practicum. The idea behind this methodology is to reconstruct the decision-making processes operating behind the events described in the observations, using post-event conversations with peers and my own reflection. All this is done in relation to the various tools I acquired and how they help me understand each event.
This is not a quantitative study: there are no empirical or statistical data through which I analyze decision making. Rather, from the personal experience of training, I consider how I perceive the acquisition of knowledge in the program and how my peers describe what we are going through. Reflection is the research tool I employ, but it is also the theoretical tool on which I base the paper’s body of knowledge. Reflection is one of the key components enabling decision making. The process of weighing a decision and analyzing the data that lead to choosing a particular option is accompanied by reflection.
Reflection is a—often critical—thinking process intended to analyze a specific situation or event. In this paper I use reflection on reflections that I or others made while making in-class decisions. The word “reflection” has two related but essentially different meanings: reflection about an event, decision, or thought that took place in the past; and reflection that occurs during the event, decision, or thought itself. The chronological difference is clear: the first is retrospective, the second is an attempt to activate reflection speculatively in real time in order to decide on the next action. Reflection-in-action is akin to the unfolding stream of thought in a person’s mind as they act. In teaching, the teacher examines their steps during the lesson and, based on student responses, tries to adjust the lesson on the fly. The teacher chooses alternative paths during the lesson to make it more engaging or to convey the topic more effectively.
Donald Schön[1] is one of the scholars who deal with this subject. In his book he distinguishes between two kinds of reflection: reflection-in-action and reflection-on-action. He first defines a special kind of knowledge, knowledge-in-action, and when we use it to make decisions based on what we have learned, he calls it knowing-in-action. This is not a concrete, transferable body of knowledge but a practical knowing that can be enacted in the midst of action. Schön argues that these concepts are essential to all fields involving professionalization. The knowledge acquired during professional training is the knowledge that serves us in reflection-in-action. It is knowledge we cannot fully articulate, but we can perform it—like the difficulty of explaining in words how to ride a bicycle: the doing is simple, the explanation resists language.
Schön describes professional training as shaping precisely this body of knowledge. By “training” he refers to the apprenticeship or practicum that many professionals—including teachers—undergo. Training is the trainee’s period of practice. The trainee arrives with theoretical knowledge about the profession, and now must use that knowledge to practice the craft. A teacher comes to practicum with theoretical knowledge about how a lesson runs and what the teacher’s role is, but only standing in front of a class can they put accumulated knowledge to use. The practicum places the trainee in situations that demand decisions based on what they know. Decision making for the trainee means consulting the theoretical tools they acquired while reflecting on the situation and determining which tool will best serve the task at hand. The teacher’s task is to bring students to a state of interest in learning, and once their attention is secured, to teach them.
“He reflects on the phenomena before him, and on the prior understandings which have been implicit in his behaviour. He carries out an experiment which serves to generate both a new understanding of the phenomena and a change in the situation.” (Schön, 1983, p. 68)[1]
Schön portrays the reflection that accompanies decision making as a kind of inquiry. The teacher undergoing training functions, in effect, as a researcher in the pedagogical field. Reflection enables them to think of new and creative solutions unconstrained by mere professional routines. Training does not offer an automatic script telling the teacher how to act in a given situation; it requires judgment in choosing the right tool to address the circumstance. Reflection allows the teacher to examine the assumptions on which they have based their behavior, to study the phenomenon, and to try out a solution that is new to them—like an experiment. The attempt yields new understandings of the situation and changes the situation itself. In this, the teacher’s training parallels a research process.
Reflection-in-action is the phenomenon I am trying to explore in this paper. It cannot be studied in isolation; it always appears in response to a dynamic situation that calls for change. Reflection operates like an internal dialogue in which the teacher asks themself: Am I acting rightly? Is there another way to act? Why did I act in this way? The dialogue allows the teacher to critique their own actions and affords a second view of the situation and how it might be improved or altered.
Decision making is the process of weighing options against each other with the goal of choosing the one best suited to the situation that prompted the decision. Imagine a teacher teaching a class who, picking up on hints from students (glances or body language), realizes they are not getting the material across. Now the teacher must change the lesson—choose a new path to draw students back in. The choice depends on the specific situation: every class is different, composed of a unique mix of students; the teacher must find a solution that unites them and enables learning. The teacher examines, according to their knowledge and skills, the possible approaches and tries to grasp the students’ stance toward the teacher, toward one another, and the teacher’s response to the students. When all these elements are brought to awareness, we are in fact engaging in reflection, which leads to a decision that guides action. Of course, this does not make us immune to mistakes: a carefully chosen decision can prove to be wrong despite thoughtful consideration, and we may have omitted a relevant detail when “computing” the data. One role of training is to narrow the options so as to reach decisions more quickly and efficiently. Here reflection-on-action—retrospective reflection—comes into play: in-action decisions are shaped by conclusions drawn from prior reflection on similar events.
Donald Freeman[2] is another scholar who has written on decision making, especially in education and particularly in teaching English as a foreign language. In his article, Freeman proposes a model for understanding teachers’ decision making. The model comprises four components: Knowledge—the teacher’s knowledge of the subject matter, the students, and the class level; Skills—what the teacher can do, such as presenting a topic or answering questions; Attitude—how the teacher behaves toward students, how students respond to that behavior, and how the teacher responds in turn; and Awareness—the degree of attention given to a particular event. These three—knowledge, skills, and attitude—form the basic mechanism of decision making, and they are integrated through the fourth component, awareness. When an event draws the teacher’s attention, it rises to awareness and is processed through each of the three components; after being examined within each, a decision is reached about how to handle the event. Together, the four components describe how thinking operates during teaching. Awareness arouses and monitors the attention paid to knowledge, skills, and attitude. Reduced attention to any of the components can result in lower quality teaching; balanced awareness that seeks a solution attentive to all three will yield better teaching.
The four components offer a static picture of the teacher’s role. A fifth component that introduces a dynamic picture is decision making itself: using and combining the four components. In fact, “awareness” is reflection-in-action. When awareness mobilizes knowledge, skills, and attitude in order to decide, it is performing reflection: analyzing an event in real time through those components.
Freeman then turns to teacher education, which he divides into two facets: training and development. Training typically involves two people—the novice teacher and a mentor, often a veteran teacher. The novice consults the mentor, shares dilemmas about decisions made, and the mentor takes an active role by observing lessons and offering feedback. The purpose of training is to improve the teacher’s decision-making capacity. Freeman distributes the four components across the two facets of preparation: training focuses on knowledge and skills—components whose development the mentor can directly observe, suggest strategies for, and assess in the classroom. Development, by contrast, focuses on attitude and awareness—components that are not directly visible; to gauge their growth one must elicit reflection from the novice about specific events to understand what has changed. The mentor must draw the novice’s attention to situations they may not have noticed and help refine their stance toward lessons and students. Training’s components (knowledge and skills) are external and observable, and the process can “end” once the novice can handle various situations using the acquired knowledge and skills. Development, on the other hand, is internal and personal; it likely never ends, as teachers continue to grow in awareness and refine their attitudes throughout their careers. As Lortie (1975) puts it:
“Teachers are largely self-made; the internalization of common knowledge plays only a limited part in their movement to work responsibly.” (p. 80)[2]
Freeman concludes by citing Lortie: what turns a novice into a more expert teacher is not merely the knowledge acquired or a set of special skills, but the ability to adapt one’s attitude to different situations and to expand one’s awareness of what is happening in the classroom. Decision making—guided by the teacher’s awareness—is the most crucial capacity a teacher must develop to become more experienced.
Delores Westerman (Westerman) is another researcher who studies teachers’ decision making, particularly the novice–expert contrast. In her study she compares the decision-making processes of veteran and beginning teachers. Data were collected in four stages and included two groups—veterans and novices. Both groups were interviewed shortly before a lesson; the lessons were videotaped; shortly after, each teacher watched their video while being interviewed about in-lesson decisions; later they answered additional questions about the lesson; and after some time they watched the video again, this time muted, while explaining what was happening. These stages align with the study’s basic assumption that decision making comprises three phases: before action, during action, and after action. Pre-action decision making anticipates problems that may arise and plans the lesson to allow solutions. In-action decision making requires quick choices in response to evolving classroom situations. Post-action decision making resembles drawing lessons from the event to prepare for future teaching. The research design supports analysis of each phase for both novice and veteran groups.
Westerman’s study yields several conclusions about differences in the thinking of veterans and novices. In pre-lesson decisions, imagination plays a crucial role: teachers must envision likely student responses to particular topics or prompts. Veterans, drawing on experience and knowledge of students, can imagine the lesson realistically and anticipate responses; novices struggle to do so and their mental image of the lesson is often unfaithful to reality. During lessons, veterans differ markedly from novices: they can improvise, allowing a student-raised idea to reshape the lesson even if a different plan was prepared. This flexibility and familiarity with their plan enable veterans to deviate productively from it and thereby spark student interest. Novices tend to be less flexible and try to stick to the plan.
Post-lesson decision making, too, echoes the pre-lesson phase: every lesson is an additional experience that helps a teacher more accurately envision the next one. Veterans draw broader lessons from reviewing their teaching because their knowledge contains categories for classifying lesson information and making better decisions for future planning. Novices cannot absorb all the information a lesson provides; they focus on surface events and visible behavioral changes, while missing deeper cues an experienced teacher would detect. Novices must accumulate experience in order to draw fuller conclusions from their lessons.
The study further notes that veteran teachers can identify problems as they arise by reading students’ reactions and body language, locating the source of a problem, and providing a quick, appropriate solution. Veterans have a wide range of instructional strategies and make decisions interactively. They monitor the class, recognize emerging issues, and select responses from schemas they have developed for solving problems. Such schemas allow rapid decisions grounded in past experience with similar issues; each schema contains several options depending on classroom conditions. Veterans develop a sensitivity to classroom climate and, through accurate analysis, can deploy their schemas to resolve problems.
Up to this point I have discussed Schön’s concept of reflection[1], teacher decision making in Freeman’s model[2], and Westerman’s findings comparing veteran and novice teachers[3]. A question emerges: is the novice’s decision-making process the same as the veteran’s? The veteran teacher’s decisions appear rapid and efficient, but they are not inventing new solutions each time. Once particular schemas become standard responses to recurring problems, the veteran no longer makes decisions in the same way a novice does. The novice is building schemas from scratch—still in a trial-and-error phase where every decision is new. It is no wonder veterans can decide more quickly and efficiently: they are choosing among known schemas.
The novice teacher’s training provides theoretical and practical tools for running lessons—what content to teach, how to teach it, and to whom. The practicum includes observing veteran teachers and teaching a small number of lessons, typically one-off sessions with little continuity. These lessons are supervised; the class is affected both by the unfamiliar teacher and the veteran teacher’s presence in the room. The practicum simulation is highly constrained and often accompanied by nerves; its effectiveness is therefore limited. The realities of schools constrain the practicum, and the current format represents a compromise—perhaps the best possible—but still one that cannot equip the trainee with every needed tool. The practicum is accompanied by the delivery of tools and knowledge, but these are broad categories through which the trainee must process experience. Through such categories the novice analyzes the nascent experience and makes decisions. Each decision involves sifting through the mass of knowledge acquired and analyzing the current classroom situation that demands a choice. Each teacher builds their own set of schemas according to the categories learned and the individual skills that helped them solve particular problems with particular decisions. The veteran has already filtered abundant experience through those categories; they are fluent in using them and can predict which decision leads to which outcome. Thus, the veteran can provide correct and efficient solutions, while the novice struggles to find efficient, timely ones. On the other hand, the veteran may operate by routine—combining well-worn skills, knowledge, and practiced decisions—whereas the novice, though slower and less efficient, may generate new solutions and create original schemas, sometimes different from other teachers’. The novice–veteran contrast thus risks a stereotype: the experienced but jaded teacher who operates efficiently yet routinely, versus the fresh, impulsive novice brimming with new ideas. Of course, every veteran was once a novice, and their schemas are the reasoned outcomes of experimentation and inquiry.
The theoretical knowledge acquired during teacher education is rich and varied. Teachers learn across domains related to education and gain practical knowledge for teaching. Theoretical courses include educational psychology (focusing on students’ cognitive abilities, mental states, and ways to address them), sociology of education (the social role of school and teacher historically and today, including demographic data and stratification), and classroom management and teaching methods (examples and explanations of different ways to teach, as well as alternative practices such as games, group work, and simulations). There are also courses about the education system itself—its bureaucracy, politics, and historical development. More specific knowledge covers literacy and the effects of socioeconomic status on literacy levels; learning disabilities and related knowledge; teaching in the internet age, which seeks to bridge generational gaps and equip teachers to use online tools to diversify their pedagogy; and sociological and psychological knowledge about adolescents, the main student population.
Alongside these are courses that blend theory and practice, such as lesson planning (how to design and write lesson plans), content-specific courses—in my case, English as a second language (how second languages are learned and how best to teach them; general issues in language teaching and their historical development). Two additional courses are more practical: subject-specific pedagogy designed to prepare us for the school year (practical ways to teach specific topics in English), and the practicum seminar, which both covered the concrete material we would have to teach and hosted discussions of our weekly experiences at the school.
These courses (specifically in the teaching certificate program at Tel Aviv University) and similar courses in other programs comprise the body of knowledge acquired by the trainee. Each has a critical role in shaping the teacher’s understanding of the craft; theory and practice together create the closest simulation to real teaching. The knowledge will continue to shape teachers as they grow and will serve them in decision making along the way. The practicum is where teachers take the knowledge they acquired and try to turn it into action: entering a (high) school, meeting veteran teachers, observing their lessons, sitting among students and recording impressions. We met students, helped proctor exams, sat in the staff room, and saw how a school runs—from the principal’s morning pep talks to staff gossip in the smoking room. Given one day a week, I feel we absorbed a lot from engaging with the school and staff. I use the plural because I was not alone; the course schedule made one day especially convenient for most students, so we were usually five to seven trainees—more precisely, five women and me, the only male student.
The empirical core of this paper, as noted in the introduction, is a set of events from the practicum year, examples of decision-making situations in which I try to describe the reflective processes operating behind the scenes. These are events I witnessed. Through post-event conversations we analyzed the causes and the thought processes involved.
Our practicum began in November, about two months into the school year. When we arrived, the school was already in full swing with fixed schedules and hurried teachers. The head of English received us, shared the timetable, and told us which teachers we could observe. English usually has more teachers than other subjects, giving trainees more choices of lessons. Following a single civics or Bible teacher all year can become monotonous. We chose to go with teacher L. to her 8th-grade class. When we arrived, some students were waiting in the classroom and some in the corridor (after the bell). As she entered, students started calling out about the museum. It turned out the class was scheduled for a museum trip at nine. Consequently, students had not brought their English books or binders (though they had come to class). The teacher told them an announcement on the school website said there would be an English lesson. Throughout this, we stood by the door waiting for explicit instructions on where to sit. L. declared that the lesson would take place and told us to sit at the back. I confess my initial inner reaction was critical—“how unprofessional”—but L. pulled out handouts and began the lesson as if nothing had happened. She distributed a short text and then grammar exercises. The lesson proceeded flawlessly and, at the end, they went to the museum.
I asked L. what had happened with the website and the museum. She replied: “You can’t rely on computers. If something can go wrong, it will. You always have to be ready. The show must go on.” At first these sounded like clichés, automatic responses. But her answer distilled the essence of decision making. The first part is Murphy’s law—if something can go wrong, it will (especially when humans are involved): human error recurs. L. argued there is always a chance some students, or even all, will arrive without books. The teacher must be ready for any scenario and maintain an unruffled demeanor when things go awry. L. took in the information about missing books and immediately switched to an alternative plan to keep the lesson moving. Her decision-making system operated quickly and efficiently: she had a contingency plan and used it.
L., an experienced teacher, explained simply one of the craft’s secrets: the only thing that must not break is the teacher’s concentration on pulling out the right solution. Over the year I kept noting this phenomenon and tracked how it worked in class. Teachers have prepared responses; they hold an arsenal of phrases and quips they deploy in certain situations. Often the issue is deviation from the plan or a detour into an off-topic thread. In such cases, the teacher must gently steer the lesson back. A novice might shut down a student’s tangent by asserting it is off topic and plow ahead. A veteran will try to “go with” the student—receive the idea and use it to reach the next planned point. Rejecting a student’s line of thought may cause them to close up; a teacher who allows self-expression will likely gain an engaged participant. To leverage student remarks, the teacher needs broad general knowledge to connect the student’s idea to the lesson’s next idea or topic—requiring flexible thinking and acceptance of students’ thought processes as legitimate.
As part of the practicum, we each had to deliver a “demonstration lesson,” like an audition, with the practicum instructor observing. Other lessons we taught were observed by the regular classroom teacher or, at times, by no one. I watched my peers’ demonstration lessons and spoke with them afterward to focus on the cognitive processes they experienced.
Y., an English trainee, prepared a well-designed lesson on “crime.” She brought a short text and had many activities ready—prepared for anything. The worst happened: the class did not cooperate. To run a lesson you need an audience—responses and full engagement. The students’ attention was minimal, perhaps after PE or with a test looming—or both. These 9th-graders broke the basic teacher–student contract: they did not disrupt or act out; they simply sat quietly and refused to respond. Y. tried to coax them, asked guiding questions, but communication did not happen. Her last resort was writing: if they wouldn’t communicate aloud, perhaps they would silently. As her patience wore thin, she assigned a brief writing task and asked for volunteers to read. Some students who had written began to read, and with the blessed bell, Y. managed—if only briefly—to extract minimal communication. Afterward she told me, “They just weren’t there. Their heads were somewhere else. I tried four different tasks to wake them up, but they simply didn’t want to participate.” She left frustrated; the lesson she envisioned did not materialize. Yet she stayed composed, moving from task to task despite the non-communicative atmosphere. The writing task was not planned; it was a last-ditch idea. We cannot know whether the students engaged only because the bell was near, but I had the impression some truly wrote a sentence or two and, having written, decided to read. Not a full success, but after zero communication, it was an effective partial solution.
S., another trainee, prepared a simple lesson: Facebook. She introduced relevant vocabulary and aimed for discussion. The 8th-grade class was very communicative that morning, and the topic was close to their hearts. A show of hands at the start revealed that every student had Facebook. It was clear the lesson would be a success. S., who had prepared several activities, did not reach most of them; the lesson evolved into a lively dialogue between teacher and students and among students themselves. She asked: Should she join Facebook? What’s good and bad about it? Personal stories from their feeds? What can you do on Facebook? Is a Facebook friend better than a real-life friend? And many more guiding questions that allowed 8th-graders, in English, at 8:30 a.m., to express themselves. S. treated every response with patience and seriousness and tried to include everyone. Students added observations from their own perspectives, and you could see their English improving simply through practice talking about something that interested them. S. left very pleased. She had barely used her prepared activities, but she felt connected to the class and that her message came across. She made a sound decision in choosing the topic: she guessed most of the class had Facebook and would be interested; she did not expect all of them to have it.
M., another trainee, taught a lesson on “volunteering” to 10th-graders. Two girls were especially active—there’s a backstory. A week earlier, in the staff smoking room, I heard a teacher describe a fight between two girls in 10th grade. The girls were cousins from the same family, and a youthful conflict had escalated into violence. The smoking room is where teachers feel comfortable sharing gossip and crucial information about the school—things you don’t always hear in the main staff room. Back to the lesson: as M. asked a student’s name, I realized these were the cousins. They were not participating so much as engaging in a mutual argument. M. of course had no idea about the feud and, inadvertently, fanned the flames. The debate was whether youth-movement leadership counts as volunteering. M. herself didn’t know the answer—leaders are unpaid, but participants pay dues—so she explored the concept with them, asking why they thought as they did. Voices rose; some insults flew, but M. kept asking guiding questions about their disagreement. Eventually the girls tired of M., who was “interfering” with their fight. They cooperated with her only to fight one another; the other students knew about the feud and gave them a stage. When I later told M. what I knew, she laughed and immediately understood. She said she was happy the girls participated and tried to let them express themselves. The missing information might have hindered her; had she known, she might have silenced them. Yet she used their “scouts” example—unplanned—to develop the lesson’s concept of volunteering. After that, the girls fell silent and did not participate. On the one hand, M. was indifferent to their feelings—they sought to vent, and she focused only on content. On the other hand, that indifference allowed her to run a smooth, professional lesson.
A., another trainee, taught “Places in Israel” to 8th-graders. She designed multiple activities around a unit in the textbook and counted on students’ general knowledge of Israeli geography. The class cooperated. She had trivia-style cards: on one side a photo of a place, on the other four possible names (one correct). Students took turns; some recognized places, others guessed right. A. drew a blank map of Israel on the board and marked each place as it was named. The lesson flowed; most students participated. She then asked students which places they had visited and what they did there. A. let students share, essentially telling something about themselves through where they had been and what they had done. Later she and the students read ads in English for tourist attractions around Israel. A. wove in details she had heard from the students, matching students to ads—e.g., a student who visited Jerusalem to an ad for a guided tour there. The personal information helped her reach more students and tailor content. In teacher–class relations, it is important for the teacher to know individual details about students—hobbies and interests can help engage everyone and sustain attention. At the start, we put name tags on students; A. could call on each by name, boosting motivation. Name tags supported that personal connection; often practicum lessons are taught without knowing names, and the personal bond is lost.
M., a veteran teacher at the school, was one we observed. She knows how to run a lesson, sense the class’s mood, and adapt. I watched her with various grades; I’ll use an 11th-grade example. She told students about a radio program she had heard that morning. She asked who listens to the radio in the morning; the iPhone generation looked puzzled—who listens to radio nowadays? She continued, described the program, and asked their opinion on the topic: Japanese scientists had succeeded in producing fuel from seaweed. The broader topic was global warming and the quest for clean alternative fuels. The rest of the lesson was routine: reading a text, answering questions, writing short paragraphs. Transitions between segments were seamless, thanks to her elegant entry via the radio story. After class, M. told me it had all been planned; the students “swallowed the bait.” She is the sort of teacher with a short fuse who prefers to stay fully in control: “You have to know when to loosen the reins,” she said, as if the class were horses. She has her methods and stock phrases. She is razor-sharp; no student gets off easily. The students were disciplined and accepted her authority. But M. seemed worn down—tired of the “game.” So much control that she no longer knows when to let go. Her decision-making system is so automatic that she is no longer deciding so much as executing pre-set outcomes. As a student-observer I believed every word about the radio and the environment, but once I learned it was staged, I felt deceived. Do students sometimes feel deceived when a teacher treats them not as mature learners but as a herd to be fed knowledge? Can students sense when a teacher is not being straight with them? M.’s example illustrates an aspect of veteran knowledge one might prefer not to acquire: decision making can become a burden once it turns into an integral, automatic system.
Two final examples are my own—but first a small episode at the start of one of my lessons (not those described below). L., a school teacher, was observing. I thought it might be refreshing if students sat wherever they liked, perhaps even switching seats at the beginning. Interesting idea, problematic execution. I began the lesson and, in English, suggested that the 8th-graders each move to a different seat. Because it was among my first utterances, most did not hear me—and that was fortunate. L. alone heard my foolish suggestion, sprang up, and motioned firmly not to do it. Her look was alarmed; her silence was loud: do not move anyone. The lesson proceeded with students in place. I soon realized how poor the idea was—not only because I lacked information about the students, but because they and the teacher had fought hard over the year to seat each student in the best place for them. I asked L. afterward what went through her mind when she heard me. She said that before I finished the sentence she saw chaos: a year’s hard work to assign seats that minimize misbehavior unraveling before her eyes. Her decision-making system flashed a red line about to be crossed; an emergency requiring immediate action.
A. (me) taught a 9th-grade lesson on “crime,” coordinated with a detective story in the textbook. The class had not yet started the unit. I drew two intersecting circles and asked who commits crimes and who prevents them. Students said “criminals” and “police,” and I wrote those in the circles. Around them I drew a larger circle labeled “law,” since both criminals and police operate within a legal framework. Then I drew another circle cutting across the two from above and asked who belongs there. In my original plan, this was the “detective”—not a regular police officer, sometimes chased by the police, acting partly as cop and partly as lawbreaker. But seeing students’ expressions signaled they weren’t enthused. I searched for another angle. I noticed a cartoon figure on a student’s T-shirt, and remembered superheroes—who also belong in that upper circle with detectives. We shifted into an animated discussion about superheroes and their traits. Students spoke eagerly (in English) about their favorites. Classics like Batman, Spider-Man, and Superman came up, followed by characters less familiar to me, but I grasped the idea. The class became engaged and remained so when we transitioned to detectives and the textbook text. Sometimes you need to deviate a bit to breathe life into the topic. After class, G., the classroom teacher, was enthusiastic about precisely that pivot and said it was an excellent lesson. The initial condition prompting the detour was my awareness that students were not connecting; it was late, they were tired. I preferred to find an energizing entry rather than plod through a dull session—and in a moment found myself discussing superheroes and their relation to crime and policing. I enjoyed teaching it; I felt attuned to the class and that I read the room well.
My demonstration lesson, also mine, was based on a story in the 8th-grade textbook, observed by L. and the practicum instructor. It followed A.’s lesson, so students still wore name tags. The story was about a family shipwrecked on a deserted island. The lesson topic was “life on a deserted island.” I opened by asking if anyone had ever been on a deserted island. Then I asked each student what they would take with them, and what one must do to survive. Each student shared what mattered to them and suggested survival ideas. From their ideas I wrote relevant keywords on the board—many of which appeared in the story—so that when we got to the text, the words were already familiar. Sometimes I translated or adjusted a student’s Hebrew word. Most of the story’s vocabulary ended up on the board; students even used those words. The class proceeded with enjoyment—mine and theirs. They cooperated in reading and answering questions, encouraged by the comfortable opening dialogue. Beginning with cold reading often leads to boredom for students—and sometimes for the teacher as well.
These nine cases show how a teacher’s conduct in class depends on far more than theoretical knowledge. The teacher runs a class while attuned to multiple layers of student life and must be sharp enough to notice cues in time and find appropriate solutions. To explain what veteran teachers seem able to do that novices struggle with, I turn to two additional concepts that emerge from the theoretical discussion: tact and atmosphere. Tact is sensitivity to situations—akin to intuition. Social tact is the ability to grasp another’s situation and act according to accepted, non-formal norms. Social tact varies across cultures. Pedagogical tact is the same sensitivity, operating within the tighter norms of classroom and school culture. Schools have distinct cultures, and novices must acquire the norms practiced within school walls.
Atmosphere or climate—at the school or classroom level—can determine lessons’ trajectories. Failing to notice shifts in student behavior or a noisier/quieter mood can trip up a lesson. To be a teacher is to be part of the school: to sense it, understand students’ general temperament, and try to belong. A teacher who keeps too much distance will struggle to internalize the school culture.
Gadamer[4] is one scholar who discusses tact. He distinguishes between social and pedagogical tact: social tact is sensitivity to social situations; pedagogical tact is an intuitive capacity to judge—acting intuitively according to the situation. For Gadamer, tact implies a certain flexibility of thought. It appears as a sensitive response to situations that demand action when no general rules are available. Tact is not a theoretical body of knowledge or a describable set of skills but habits and patterns acquired through experience. Its activity is to analyze and clarify what is happening with students—to try to understand their experience in learning and act appropriately. Tact is a pragmatic tool acquired like any component of language. It is the outcome of the “for and against” deliberations that reflection performs before decisions. Tact is the right decision emerging from the intuition that “this is what should be done now.” Tact is the additional thing the veteran knows and the novice lacks. Behind pedagogical tact stand norms that must first be known before one can act by them; that acquaintance happens during induction—when you are already employed and have a class of your own. It is hard to “teach” the logic of tact without living it. Only after acquiring it can a teacher become an integral part of the school.
In fact, a person does not truly become a teacher until they have acquired tact. As the saying goes: “You are not a teacher until you are a teacher.” One is not the real thing until one undergoes the training in which the profession’s habits are truly learned. The most important of these is tact. It is what the veteran possesses and the novice has yet to acquire. As the examples show, both L. and M. have pedagogical tact—though with different approaches—demonstrated in their professional sensitivity to what unfolds in class. As for the trainees (myself included), our lessons may have gone well, but we clearly lacked pedagogical tact. We tried to rely on social tact to make sense of events; our results owed more to luck than tact. Through such attempts we received hints of the tact we will need, but it is premature to say we have acquired it, even partially.
Training a teacher is like teaching a language. To be a teacher is to speak the language of school and act according to its culture. In the teaching certificate program, students learn this language without yet speaking it. As a language-teaching trainee, I can attest that learning a language’s components without concrete use does not yield functional communication. Pragmatic tools like tact enable the teacher to become an instructional figure who communicates with students. After acquiring tact, the teacher can make decisions smoothly and well. As with spoken languages, mastery requires practice and continual expansion; so too with pedagogical competencies—experience and rehearsal sharpen attention to detail and strengthen the reflective capacity to analyze events.
Teacher training and the acquisition of teaching skills are not entirely novel learning; components like tact can be viewed as recollection. Every teacher was once a student; they already knew, from the other side, the logic of pedagogical tact. A student who spends twelve years in school inevitably absorbs its pragmatic norms—albeit via the student’s perspective, not the teacher’s. Students also learn to read the school’s climate and their class’s atmosphere through personal acquaintance and sensitivity to what happens around them. When teachers train, they learn new things about being a teacher, but in tact and climate-reading they are, to an extent, remembering.
To conclude: the teaching certificate program does not and cannot fully equip a teacher with every tool needed to become a teacher. It cultivates theoretical analysis and familiarity with pedagogical research more than the “how-to” of doing. Perhaps it could be otherwise—perhaps one might teach first and complete the certificate after a few years (as some do). The certificate program strives to expose trainees to school life and to bring them into the work cycle as early as possible, aware that the crucial part of their knowledge is yet to be acquired. That said, within the program I took this seminar, read what I read, and learned what I have written here—precisely about that additional component that is not taught directly. And still, I arrived at these conclusions and became familiar with these concepts—even if some remain only theoretical for me, since I am not yet a practicing teacher. The current framework allows a gradual, smoother entry into the education system—rather than being “thrown into the water.” A first year of teaching without the preparation the certificate offers can be hard and confusing. The certificate enables teachers to understand their role before entering the system. Entering with this broad knowledge eases the absorption of the school’s language and culture.
References
- Schön, D. (1983). The Reflective Practitioner: How Professionals Think in Action. London: Temple Smith.
- Freeman, D. (1989). Teacher Training, Development, and Decision Making: A Model of Teaching and Related Strategies for Language Teacher Education. TESOL Quarterly, 23(1), March 1989.
- Westerman, D. A. (1991). Expert and Novice Teacher Decision Making. Journal of Teacher Education, 42, 292. https://doi.org/10.1177/002248719104200407
- Gadamer, H.-G. (1982). Truth and Method. (G. Barden & J. Cumming, Trans.) from the 2nd ed. (1965). New York: The Crossroad Publishing Company.
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