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Building a Better Teacher: How Teaching Works (and How to Teach It to Everyone) by Elizabeth Green
athienel's review against another edition
5.0
I had to read this book for my coaching class & I'm really glad I had to. I'm not sure I would have pushed myself to finish it if I wasn't required to, but it was actually a fantastic book. Sometimes it was daunting to read because she would go on and on to get to a big point. And the chapters were long, but the information was really good & important. I would recommend it to every teacher.
smallness's review against another edition
Really interesting dissection of how to teach. Wish I had known or thought about these topics this way (or had been taught to think this way) when I was considering becoming a teacher out of college. Much respect to the good teachers in our lives.
banandrew's review against another edition
3.0
"The Americans produced wonderful intellectual work on what teaching could look like, but they had failed to implement any of it."
TLDR: an optimistic overview of educational theory and policy in the last fifty years as it has applied to the American education system.
Elizabeth Green follows a few key American educators over the past decades, many of whom have bounced between academia and the public education system while trying to improve teaching. She weaves in the history of statistical methods, standardized testing, and educational policy changes that have been interspersed with developments in education, and explains the way they interact and, more often than not, the barriers that they create to applying educational theory more effectively. But the overall narrative is a positive, optimistic one, as the book illustrates a continuously iterating approach to how we educate and how we evaluate teacher effectiveness.
It's interesting to compare this book to the world of modern ed-tech startups. "Building a Better Teacher" makes no mention of MOOCs, Coursera, Khan Academy. Elizabeth Green simply describes the key problems we've identified in public education, typically around teaching style and class structure: how teachers keep the attention of young students, how they encourage group discussion and interactive exploration of ideas. In a nearby sphere, Audrey Watters writes and speaks about how the one problem today's ed-tech startups meaningfully solve is distribution---and while this is great for many users, it doesn't at all address the critical problems that Green describes in the American public school system.
The writing reads like a Gladwell book---with more of a storytelling bent than an academic one, it's easy to pick up and tear through the 300 pages in just a few hours. There's a little too much focus on the personalities involved in the education world at the expense of time spent on actual education theory and policy. But that only barely detracts from the main narratives that the author shares.
All that said, I'm not an educator and I'm not at all versed in the world of education theory and policy. I don't have enough context to judge the accuracy of the book or the forward-looking optimism it leaves the reader with. I'd be interested to hear from others who've read this and have other recommendations in the field.
TLDR: an optimistic overview of educational theory and policy in the last fifty years as it has applied to the American education system.
Elizabeth Green follows a few key American educators over the past decades, many of whom have bounced between academia and the public education system while trying to improve teaching. She weaves in the history of statistical methods, standardized testing, and educational policy changes that have been interspersed with developments in education, and explains the way they interact and, more often than not, the barriers that they create to applying educational theory more effectively. But the overall narrative is a positive, optimistic one, as the book illustrates a continuously iterating approach to how we educate and how we evaluate teacher effectiveness.
It's interesting to compare this book to the world of modern ed-tech startups. "Building a Better Teacher" makes no mention of MOOCs, Coursera, Khan Academy. Elizabeth Green simply describes the key problems we've identified in public education, typically around teaching style and class structure: how teachers keep the attention of young students, how they encourage group discussion and interactive exploration of ideas. In a nearby sphere, Audrey Watters writes and speaks about how the one problem today's ed-tech startups meaningfully solve is distribution---and while this is great for many users, it doesn't at all address the critical problems that Green describes in the American public school system.
The writing reads like a Gladwell book---with more of a storytelling bent than an academic one, it's easy to pick up and tear through the 300 pages in just a few hours. There's a little too much focus on the personalities involved in the education world at the expense of time spent on actual education theory and policy. But that only barely detracts from the main narratives that the author shares.
All that said, I'm not an educator and I'm not at all versed in the world of education theory and policy. I don't have enough context to judge the accuracy of the book or the forward-looking optimism it leaves the reader with. I'd be interested to hear from others who've read this and have other recommendations in the field.
almartin's review against another edition
5.0
Pinprick-sharp summary of the science, pre-history and current political context of our present teacher quality debate. There's the old saw about how you know you succeeded w/r/t a politically divisive subject when you anger both sides; Green has done something much more rare (and difficult); namely, written a compelling synthesis bridging of two very different viewpoints. Start with the NYT mag article, but if you have any interest in education/education reform, definitely pick this up.
In broad, possibly reductionist strokes, you have the reform and Gates foundation community (of which I loosely consider myself a part) on one side, who has read the Hanushek stuff about the *incredible* importance of teacher quality, is frustrated by the glacial pace of change, and has embraced standards and accountability as primary tools for improving education.
On the other you have Ed School/union/remnants of progressive/unschooling crowd, who recognize first and foremost the skill and judgement required to teach, view teacher autonomy as a primary tool for improvement, and feel attacked and unappreciated by everyone above.
The reformers call unions and traditional districts "the blob"; they call the reformers "privatizers"; somewhere in the mix you have the Tea Party making strange bedfellows; yelling and frustration ensues. The way out is somewhere in between; traditionalists need to recognize that the only way forward is through the intense feedback that comes with standards and common practices (hat tip to the Japan chapter); reformers need to understand that evaluation and sanctions on their own are blunt instruments unlikely to cause transformational change in the culture of teaching on their own.
Green points to Deborah Ball at Michigan and innovators in the charter sector (Doug Lemov; KIPP) as offering a third way forward; given the current rancor over the Common Core I'm not holding my breath, but I will certainly be telling everyone I work with to read this.
(nb: There is a Drew Martin in this book; I am not that Drew Martin.)
In broad, possibly reductionist strokes, you have the reform and Gates foundation community (of which I loosely consider myself a part) on one side, who has read the Hanushek stuff about the *incredible* importance of teacher quality, is frustrated by the glacial pace of change, and has embraced standards and accountability as primary tools for improving education.
On the other you have Ed School/union/remnants of progressive/unschooling crowd, who recognize first and foremost the skill and judgement required to teach, view teacher autonomy as a primary tool for improvement, and feel attacked and unappreciated by everyone above.
The reformers call unions and traditional districts "the blob"; they call the reformers "privatizers"; somewhere in the mix you have the Tea Party making strange bedfellows; yelling and frustration ensues. The way out is somewhere in between; traditionalists need to recognize that the only way forward is through the intense feedback that comes with standards and common practices (hat tip to the Japan chapter); reformers need to understand that evaluation and sanctions on their own are blunt instruments unlikely to cause transformational change in the culture of teaching on their own.
Green points to Deborah Ball at Michigan and innovators in the charter sector (Doug Lemov; KIPP) as offering a third way forward; given the current rancor over the Common Core I'm not holding my breath, but I will certainly be telling everyone I work with to read this.
(nb: There is a Drew Martin in this book; I am not that Drew Martin.)
dmturner's review against another edition
5.0
A clear, readable history of US teaching reform since the mid-20th century. A candid look at efforts such as charter schools, TFA, accountability, No Child Left Behind, and Common Core. A discussion of the Japanese jugyokenkyu process, and the way that the Japanese made the American reform of NCTM work so well when the Americans couldn't that researchers in the US thought it was an entirely Japanese reform. A biographical tracing of the work of Magdalene Lampert, Deborah Ball, David Cohen, and Pam Grossman. And an argument that teachers are made, not born, and that good teaching can be taught.
American public education by its nature lacks an infrastructure for learning to teach, an agreement on what to teach, a set of central subject-matter competencies, and a consistent agreement about what makes for good teaching. David Cohen calls it the "coherence problem." And most of the reforms are of the "black box" variety - changing the input and assessing the output, without looking at what goes on inside the box.
I highly recommend the book. It ought to be a first reading for anyone who wants to teach or supervise teachers, and for administrators who want to help their faculty improve. It is probably too optimistic, and perhaps a little too easy to read, but it gets some important main ideas right and doesn't misrepresent the history of teaching reform in the US.
American public education by its nature lacks an infrastructure for learning to teach, an agreement on what to teach, a set of central subject-matter competencies, and a consistent agreement about what makes for good teaching. David Cohen calls it the "coherence problem." And most of the reforms are of the "black box" variety - changing the input and assessing the output, without looking at what goes on inside the box.
I highly recommend the book. It ought to be a first reading for anyone who wants to teach or supervise teachers, and for administrators who want to help their faculty improve. It is probably too optimistic, and perhaps a little too easy to read, but it gets some important main ideas right and doesn't misrepresent the history of teaching reform in the US.
aprilmay11's review against another edition
3.0
Interesting book I will apply a couple of things to my classes. I like the questions that are asked in a classroom such as how did you get that answer? Instead of just asking them what the answer to the problem is in a math equation. It’s interesting to know that not long ago teachers did not go to college to teach they didn’t feel it was necessary to teach the teachers. It’s also interesting that they can’t pinpoint what makes a good teacher it’s not just that they’re at extrovert introvert skin be good teachers to I liked it
birdy1luv's review against another edition
3.0
Really appreciated how this book was structured. It delves into the complex issue of how to develop great teachers at a reproducible level in a narrative form that I found very compelling.
Short on silver bullets, but gives great insight into the challenges there are in making change on a large scale.
Short on silver bullets, but gives great insight into the challenges there are in making change on a large scale.
hanelisil's review against another edition
3.0
The title was misleading. To echo other reviews, this is more a history of teaching grade school in the USA in the last ~40 years. I learned less about what actually makes a good teacher than I did about very particular schools of thought in how to train public educators. I'm coming away from this not feeling like I know How Teaching Works or How To Teach It To Everyone, but I do understand what it's like to be a student teacher in a Masters of Edu program, probably.