Leaders are often frustrated with teachers who say they don’t have time to try new teaching strategies. But remembering that listening to complaints can tell you about what someone cares about, leaders can listen deeply to look for a way to reframe the conversation.
Saying, “I don’t have time,” could mean the teacher is concerned about all the stuff she already has to teach. She has things well-planned and from experience, she knows about how long it takes for kids to learn this material. If she tries some new strategy, it could mean the instruction would take longer because she would be in a learning curve of her own. And then she wouldn’t get through all the curriculum material she is responsible for teaching.
OR it could mean that students wouldn’t understand the material in the same way in which she is familiar. Maybe it wouldn’t coordinate with her informal tests as well. So there would be extra time to get that all aligned.
To the teacher, trying out a new instructional strategy starts a whole domino effect of change that could use up valuable time and may not have any better learning results than what she is getting now.
These are all legitimate concerns—not stubbornness.
A savvy leader would brainstorm with the teacher about how she uses her time and what her deeper concerns are. Then they might consider ways to tweak the new strategy so she can adopt parts of it without slowing the pace of instruction. Or try it out with one piece of content where she isn’t currently getting the learning results with the students that she would like.
This empowers the teacher to use her expertise about her students to apply the new teaching strategy in a way that makes sense and adds value, rather than being a burden, to her teaching.
What complaint are you hearing from teachers? What could it be telling you about the deeper concern?
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