Teachers need to be academically indulgent.  I'm not sure if I'll stick with that term in the long run, but it seems to fit what I've been thinking about lately.  Let me explain.  For those of you just joining in, I'm using my Fulbright grant to study how teachers and kids talk to each other.  There's a longer explanation in the sidebar to the right, but I'm basically interested in the idea that what teachers say (or don't say) matters and that teachers need to be more conscious of the verbal tools they choose to use in the classroom.

Recently, I've been thinking about two brief student-teacher interactions (one from yesterday in the UK and the other from several years ago in the US) that are helping me figure out how to describe the kind of teaching that involves making the right verbal choices to support learning:

Interaction 1
A class is looking at a photograph of a tiger with its mouth open.  Students are asked to write down similes about the tiger that could eventually be used in a short story.  When students share their similes, they all describe the tiger as scary.
Student 1: It has teeth like blades.
Teacher: Ooh, very scary. 
Student 2: Whiskers like a spider's legs.
Teacher: Good, I'll write it down.
Student 3: It has whiskers like old ladies' hair.
Teacher: Oh, that's great, that's beautiful!  But does it make the tiger sound fierce?  Would I be scared of a little old lady with white hair?  No, let's think of different similes.

Interaction 2
At the end of recess, a child comes to his teacher with a rock he found on the playground.
Student: Look at this rock.  Can I bring it in to show the class?
Teacher: That's really interesting, but we're not studying rocks anymore.  Leave it outside.

In both of these cases, teachers saw success and then changed the terms.  In the first example, the teacher hadn't said anything about the similes needing to make the tiger seem fierce.  If the teacher had used the same flexible thinking as his student, he could have acknowledged that the "old ladies' hair" simile was taking the discussion in a different direction and asked if anyone else could think of a simile that made the tiger seem vulnerable.  In the second example, every teacher can relate to the feeling that there is so much to teach in the course of a school day that we just don't have time for Roberto to share his chunk of asphalt when we're supposed to be learning about water.  But thinking a little more flexibly, why not invite the rock into the classroom and allow Roberto a few minutes to share his find at snack, or the line at the bathroom, or dismissal to teach the class not only that you can still think about what you've learned earlier in the year but that your curiosity and connections and intellect and academic engagement have value.  When we we tell Roberto to leave the rock outside, we unintentionally say, "I wasn't that interested in rocks in the first place.  But we're studying water now, so bring me a puddle and then I'll be happy."

So for now I'm using the term "academically indulgent" to describe a teacher that sees his students as intellectuals with ideas to be indulged (and also nudged along toward some learning goal) instead of as adversaries whose rocks and other wrong answers insidiously prevent us from getting through the lesson.

Multiple-Choice Question
What would you say when, after finishing a unit on cartography two weeks ago, a student asks, "Can I make a treasure map?"

A.  We do social studies at 3:00.
B.  We learned about maps two weeks ago.
C.  Sure, at indoor recess you can find some paper.  Why don't you see if anyone else would like to join you?