Micro teaching the legacy

Since my micro teaching deck of character activity I have used this card deck many times, with colleagues at development days and with different cohorts of students. But what changed is how I frame it, how I pre-emptively give people permission to struggle with it, and to find it uncomfortable and to sit with that. Because in fact that is an important reflection in itself. It’s much easier to first build a comfortable supportive space with a longer session so it has worked well as part of longer sessions rather than with the pressure of only having 20 minutes.

Taking into account the strong and softer reactions I took the feedback and redesigned it slightly to deliver it to my team. This time to avoid the negative assumptions that were made I changed the question, in fact, I removed the question in a way. So instead of ‘How would you support a student in this situation’ I asked my team to use the cards I pulled to reflect on their teaching practice, they could pose a question if it helped them but I didn’t prescribe one.

Something interesting happened here again, one of my colleagues really struggled, he wanted to know what other people’s questions were, and what kind of questions could it be? Could I share some examples? Others volunteered to share theirs but I asked them not to. I really encouraged him to try to just do what felt intuitive to him and respond in whatever way felt most natural.

I left this session thinking that it really wasn’t for him and that he probably hadn’t enjoyed it or taken anything from it. I made peace with that in my head, because teaching a diverse group of people means not everything will resonate with everyone in the space. But I did feel slightly defeated and wondered how I could include him more or what tweaks I could make to make it more meaningful for him.

Now that same colleague delivers this same activity to students and we have since built collaborative sessions together that incorporate this. This colleague spoke really openly at the next development day about ‘not getting it’ and how he found it difficult but also shared that he has since come to understand the value and now really appreciates it. It has been such a powerful full circle for me.

It was designed to help others reflect but in turn, really helped me reflect on who is in the space and how they might engage with it. It has also reaffirmed the power of difference, something I teach and encourage in students constantly. I’ve never been a fan of ‘this is how to do XYZ’ and have always presented methods and ideas that don’t work for me but could work for students. I contextualize and explain why and this allows them to do the same.

Now as a result of what started as a little idea for a micro-teaching session my colleague and I are able to articulate and evidence that live in the teaching space in front of students which I think it really powerful. We talk about the resistance he felt to the task and the turnaround and we talk about our differing approaches- he is very practical and grounding and I am more emotional and intuitively driven-  which really empowers them to understand their value and values and to be able to reflect on that and articulate it.

It also speaks to collaboration, very important in careers, and encourages them to think about who they need around them, do they like me, or need someone more practical to ground them. Or do they like my colleague need someone to push them out of their comfort zone and allow more flow? All important reflections for their career and practice. We often through various mechanisms and language imply students need to be good at everything, even CAF can be used in this way. What aren’t you good at? how can you improve? The same for lots of entrepreneurial language and frameworks such a SWOT. But what I’m trying to do in my teaching is move away from this, I want students to reflect yes, and use CAF yes. But not as a method to punish themselves for not being good at something. But as an INISIGHT. We talk about deficit models and growth mindset but I want to reframe some of that as an insight model. What can you learn about yourself (reflect) and what does that mean about the career/ practice choices you make (action)

So in action what does that look like?

I’m not good at storytelling – okay great so I need to be part of a team with people where I can verablise things and they can help me structure the narrative. Instead of let me take a course or do some training or dedicate 50 hours I don’t have to this area.

I’m not very resilient – maybe the problem is not me, maybe there are harmful practices happening in my workplace, things that need addressing. Can I stay and be part of the change? or is that too big an emotional labour? if so what can I do to make a change?

Of course with a caveat that improvement, perseverance, and growth are all valid and encouraged but at what cost?