Teacher as A Researcher

As a teacher, we will constantly have to be the one to evaluate and grade our students. In some subjects it is very easy to grade, like math for instance, but in english it can be a tad bit more difficult. According to You Gotta Be the Book by Jeffrey Wilhelm, teachers serve a role as a researcher in the classroom. "They are continually evaluating, interpreting, and making decisions- or they wouldn't survive two minutes in the classroom" (196).  In this, Wilhelm makes it a point to show how necessary it is for teachers to follow their "researcher" role. Without doing so, we basically fail as teachers.

In sum, he is saying that as a teacher we have to be so observant and it is critical for the students. We have to provide appropriate criteria and observe these students progress through class work and discussion. In many cases, this could be a hard task to accomplish due to spark notes, and  also you could give credit to someone who doesn't deserve it. We constantly decipher those who are preforming at a regular pace and actively involved in the class itself. We kind of become experienced as the ones who assign the text and in that, we are the ones to gather the right answers and information and make sure the students match theirs to ours.

Another way to look at all of this is when Wilhelm says, "Teacher research has helped me reimagine my role as that of a democratic worker: reading and learning with my students in collaborative fashion; helping to establish a community where we listen to, value and learn from each other; and establishing democratic values and processes as we read and learn and work toward better was of being, understanding, and acting both as individuals and as a community" (196). I think Wilhelm has one of the most appropriate views as a teacher, and it is one we should all adapt.

With the perspective of being a researcher, we are able to see educating as a whole new process, which isn't taught by right and wrong answer. We approach teaching by a community action, we come to a consensus of a solution and work along together to determine what the text (or assignment) means. I believe this approach would be very beneficial to the teaching population. I would provide a link but if you simply google "teacher researcher" on google books, the results are amazing and endless!