Teachers Weakness In Teaching

 Do we teachers know our weakness in our teaching? I am sure most of us do not think that we have weaknesses in our teaching. Have we ever done any self check lately? What about self evaluations. Here I would like to share a few tips that I manage to get from an article published in the net "How to Find Your Weakness as a Teacher" by Suzanne Capek Tingley, Veteran Educator, M.A. Degree. Here are 4 tips given.

1. Utilise another set of eyes : - All the time we are only focusing at the students we are teaching. There was never an instant when there are other eyes looking at us besides our students. When you have someone knowledgeable sitting at the back of our classroom while we are teaching, would be a very good way of having another eyes looking and evaluating us. In one instant a teacher invited a veteran and respected teacher to sit behind the class and observe him teaching. At the end of the lesson this was what the veteran commented "You presented a very good lesson to only half of the class". Why was this? The teacher was unknowingly teaching only those sitting on the right side of the room. The teacher made good eye contact with those students and calling on them most often. Maybe it's because they are more responsive thus those on the left hand side was neglected and they know it. So you see, we are most of the time very selective and bias towards our students. Do get the whole class involved in our lessons.
2. Survey your class often : - Your students know what works and what does not. They are the ones being educated. Our common mistake was that we are focusing on what we are doing and not on how the kids are responding. Most of the time we tend to focus most on what we are doing as teachers rather than trying to read the kid faces', responses and behaviors. To identify weakness in our lesson we usually check for understanding of our lesson. The most common way was by asking "Do you understand"? or "Does everybody understand"? and you will get an answer such as "Yes teacher!" The kids are anxious to leave the class and they will think about what had been taught tomorrow. The best way to know whether the have understood what you have taught is to ask questions such as " How do you find the area of a triangle?" Getting a correct answer would suggest that they understood you lesson. Regularly ask the kids what they like and don't like, what are areas of the lesson that they need further explanations and what suggestions they have to improve the class. Kid appreciate being asked for their opinion.
3. Look through your students' eyes : -   Researchers Chip and Dan Heath* says "People who already know how to perform a task may have a hard time how it feels to be a beginner". It's just like trying to follow our mother's recipe. "If the dough is sticky add flour". she says. the questions is, How sticky is sticky? The same goes with our kids. We forget that they don't know what we know. Chip and Dan Heath suggest that we break the lesson into smaller chunks and remembering that the kids may take longer time to complete the task. Asking the kids along the way will reveal our weakness in giving instructions.
4. Be aware of your weak spot : - Sometimes our weakness are the result of our habits. We tend to say or do things without thinking. In order to grow professionally we have to be aware of our weakness at all times. Most of the time we make assumptions about the kids without knowing what is their life like outside. We don't know about the challenges some kid are experiencing. Comparing our kids with other kids is another mistake. The same goes when we compare their siblings with them. Some teachers spend most of the time calling the male students or the female ones. This will create a negative environment in the class amongst the kids. Take time to reflect on your behavior in class as often as possible.

As teachers it is important that we constantly strive to be the best educators we can be. Constantly asking your students, fellow teachers and administrators for feedbacks is the best way to help you identify arears of weakness that you need to improve and work on. No one is perfect. By turning your weakness into strengths will benefit you and your students along the way. Let's do our best to be the best in teaching profession.

*Chip Heath is the Thrive Foundation of Youth Professor of Organizational Behavior in the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University. Dan Heath is a Senior Fellow at Duke University's CASE center, which supports social entrepreneurs.