I agree with Max van Manen in that teaching can be a complex enterprise not only when we challenge students to think independently and act critically about their learning, but in the thousand and one things we do every day.
It is this very nature of the job that creates the variety of teachers that exist in our industry. There are a plethora of (inter) active situations that teachers participate in that make the life of teaching hectic, especially when considering the dynamic nature of teaching and that there can be many moments occurring at the same time. Therefore the particular spin or flavor that a student sees in their teachers in their classrooms is indicative of how each teacher interprets and the relative importance (or stock) a teacher puts behind educational pedagogy, the knowledge contained in a subject area, administrative expectations and social relationships. It is this multi-faceted and intertwined job description that causes teachers to often just do what they do in their specific way defined by their particular capacity which makes it very difficult to describe the knowledge used in practical and (inter) active situations. Even if a teacher could describe the situation, they would typically describe it in a capacity that was familiar to them; tangible, grounded, clear and explicable to avoid confusion and make sense. Teachers could point out what was easy or hard or could indicate their beliefs in situations, but most of what was undergone in a particular situation would go unnoticed–Tacit understanding
Max van Manen described tact as follows: “Any particular teacher action, while at first sight may seem singular in meaning, intent, and structure, action really is multi-layered, multi-dimensional, multi-relational, and multi-perspectival. The meaning of any teaching act is therefore interpretable in a variety of ways.” This definition explains another complication associated with providing a particular description. A particular vantage or understanding of a situation is important in describing it. Just as particular situations can be misconstrued depending on observable situational perspectives, each person’s personal perspective (of themselves, each other and the world around them) also biases the experience and complicates its description.
I agree with Manen that the nature of practical action (interactive contingency) makes a partnership with theory (reflective distance) impossible and that tact is neither theory nor practice, but that it resides in the vacant space between. However, I would reduce Manen’s definition of tact to one that consists of sets containing undeniable truths or facts (or ones that have become accepted as truths and facts) regarding a particular individual’s beliefs system that due to the process of being engrained in that particular individual has become reflex in action like.
I would take the idea of tact even further by inferring that tact has nothing to do with reflection, but is an action and that anticipatory reflection on (future) experiences as well ascontemporaneous reflection in (current) situations are not true forms of reflection as heavybiases exist. Retrospective reflection on (past) experiences is the only real form of reflection and differs importantly from these others in providing a genuinely broader (all-encompassing) reflective experience.
Favorite Quotes:
Three quotes from each section:
Beginning: pg. 1, 2
- Reflection in action is limited to an (inter)active thoughtfulness.
- However, while interacting with their students and while presenting their lessons, teachers usually do not have the time or inclination to truly reflect on any of such questions. (1)
- I was a bit amazed how in my new school most students would shun you if you seemed to be trying to do well in your studies. Gradually I learned the art of pretending to be dumb and dull. (2)
Middle: pg. 6, 13
- It is in the very nature of the pedagogical relation (discretion, prudence, judgment, caution, forethought) that the teacher reflectively deals with children, rather than doing so unthinkingly, dogmatically, or prejudicially. (6)
- Reflective educators tend to be pedagogically sensitive to their students and to what and how they teach. Therefore, the idea of an unreflective type of pedagogy or teaching would really be a contradiction in terms. Reflective thinking is important not only as a tool for teaching, but also as an aim of education. (6)
- This split awareness of self through reflection manifests itself as a kind of natural schizophrenia whereby one part of the self somehow dialogues with the other part. Teachers often say things such as: “part of me wanted to complete the lesson and another part of me knew that I should stop and deal with the concern that had arisen.” (13)
End: 16, 20
- “tact occupies the place that theory leaves vacant.” (16)
- Pathic definition of teaching: In other words, there are modes of knowing that inhere so immediately in our lived practices—in our body, in our relations, and in the things around us—that they seem invisible (20)
- Instructors à can adopt a more or less calculating or rationally deliberative relational approach to their minute to minute interactions with children. (20)
