Rebel WITH a cause

First Meeting of 2020

DART assembled this morning for the first meeting of the new year, welcoming old members back and new members into our fold. The premise of DART is a group of like-minded people that want to research and develop their practice but in discussions this morning we questioned if this is what hinders us as educators.

When looking for a new school, or your first one as an NQT, we are constantly told to find the one that is the right fit for you. Does this mean though, that as educators, we are aligning ourselves with ideas that feel safe to us rather than ones that challenge and develop our views? Now, just a disclaimer, this doesn’t mean going to a school that’s not right for you. What I mean is do we arrive at a school with new ideas, an alternative way, and then find that because we want to be ‘safe’ and ‘conform’ we listen to those that have been there a while that say ‘that won’t work’? Is our conformity leading to a lack of development of our ideas?

Rebel Ideas

These are things that were questioned this morning during DART as we read ‘Rebels versus Clones’, a chapter from one of our recommended reads for the new term, ‘Rebel Ideas’ by Matthew Syed. “Groups have an in-built tendency to become clone-like’’ is something we tend to automatically apply to students. After all, is it this ‘clone-like’ tendency that means students struggle with independent work as they seek the safety of the collective? It is safe to say, our reading threw up a lot of questions. It started us thinking about our own practice though and if as teachers we have become clone like in our thoughts.

Every school has rules and an overarching concept of how to teach. No matter how many years we’ve been teaching, we’ve seen fads come and go. Just look to Twitter to see the fads teachers across the country have experienced. But we have to question whether, in our collective thought, we have become too comforted by doing the same as we normally do because it is safe. If Twitter mirrors this so that people can feel they ‘fit in’ perhaps.

My Takeaways

It is in groups like DART that we can question this and admit, not that it’s a crime, that we may have become comfortable. DART is a safe space to challenge those ideas, bring to the forefront our wants as educators and work on any insecurities. DART is a safe space but may, just maybe this is the perfect place to challenge our ideas and bring fresh though to our classroom.

We may all have the fact that we are educators and work in the same school in common but we all have different experiences, subjects and knowledge. What a perfect way to challenge our safety in our educational ideas.

The main thing to take away from ‘Rebels versus Clones’, for me anyway, was that when you have your toughest classes, toughest topics or a challenge you need to face, forget the clones and seek out someone who is going to challenge you. Bounce the ideas back and forth. Challenge the safety. Because if you can do this for yourselves, then you can model it perfectly for your kids.

By ETA