The Skillful Teacher

Developing a Working Philosophy of Teaching
To some teachers developing a working philosophy of practice may
seem a complete irrelevance, an intellectual game played by a few
teachers in the humanities and social sciences who consider them-
selves intellectuals and who have the time to indulge in this aca-
demic fancy. My position is that, like it or not, we all operate
Surviving Emotionally
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according to a working philosophy of teaching. To me a philosophy
of practice is a daily reality that shapes much of what we think and
do. We may not acknowledge the reality of this philosophy, and we
may call the intuitions, assertions, and convictions influencing us
something other than a philosophy. But the reality is that, to echo
Gramsci (1971), we are all philosophers, at least where our educa-
tional practice is concerned. For example, all teachers possess a set
of beliefs concerning what their role should be in the classroom.
They may not express this very clearly to themselves or to others,
but they will probably employ various metaphors to speak about
how they are coaches, cheerleaders, enforcers, or sparkplugs for
learning. The beliefs that lie behind these metaphors may not be at
the forefront of teachers’ minds; indeed, these beliefs may only
become apparent when circumstances seem to be pushing teachers
into behaving in ways that feel unfamiliar and uncomfortable. In
trying to understand why they feel so uncomfortable with a certain
course of action, teachers sometimes realize it is because they are
contravening a belief that they were unaware they held.
In the same vein, every teacher has an intuitive sense of what a
good class looks like, of when they have taught well, and of who is 
a good student. Again, any time teachers feel that they, or their stu-
dents, are wasting time, this necessarily implies a notion of what they
think represents a proper and effective use of time. This notion of
how to use time and energy to good effect reflects, at heart, a philo-
sophical commitment to an ideal of what constitutes good education.
The collection of implicit beliefs outlined above (that, as I say,
all teachers possess whether they admit it to themselves or not) con-
stitutes a working philosophy of practice. Such a philosophy
addresses the role teachers should play in the classroom, what a good
class or good student looks like, what it means to have taught well,
and what it means to have wasted time. Beliefs about these practices
seem to be objective and purely descriptive. In reality they are nor-
mative; that is, they are based on preferences and values comprising
what we think should happen in the world. Even teachers who say
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their practice is based on objective, empirically grounded notions of
education—for example that a good class is one in which students
display predetermined behaviors and competencies—are acting nor-
matively. They are implicitly supporting one vision of learning and
teaching contained in a particular set of standards to the exclusion
of other possible visions.
Of course, any working philosophy can be full of contradictions,
unrelated to real life, or just plain immoral. The fact that we have
a philosophy does not make that philosophy good, useful, or right.
Perhaps we act in the way we do because a superior has told us to.
Or, perhaps our actions are purely mimetic—we are trying to look
like our peers on the assumption that our peers’ behaviors consti-
tute an ideal we should realize. It could also be that some implicit
beliefs we hold about what we, or our students, should do contra-
dict each other. For example, we may sincerely desire our students
to be self-directed learners capable of planning and conducting peer
learning without teacher assistance, while equally sincerely believ-
ing it to be our duty to intervene as soon as we see a student in dif-
ficulties. Also, actions flowing from beliefs that seem right to
us—perhaps concerning the best ways to use our power or to disci-
pline students—may to others seem immoral or naïve. My point is
that all teachers act according to a philosophy of teaching, whether
or not they choose to acknowledge that fact. The ideal is to be
aware of that philosophy so that its morality, accuracy, and utility
can be judged by the person subscribing to it.