Birding taught me four ways we can better prepare our early-career teachers for the classroom
By Ronak Shah
During a quiz, two students whisper in the back of my room. I notice, but stay quiet. I have one chance to redirect them. Forty-seven seconds into their conversation, while my back is to them, I spin around, make eye contact, and say, “I know, right?”
They pause mid-sentence, shocked. “How did you hear us?”
“This may come as a surprise, but when the room is silent, I can hear you whisper.”
Many of us have had teachers with eyes in the back of their heads. They respond to a murmured question in a room full of conversation, and they can pick up gossip over the whirring of an ancient air conditioner. Cognitive scientists call the ability to filter signals from noise the cocktail party problem (Carr-Ellis 2024). In teaching, we sometimes call this radar, and we use it every day (Owens 2006, 3). Radar doesn’t just let me hear conversations in my room. I can tell if there’s someone skipping class in the bathroom down the hall while my door is shut.
Thirteen years in, I credit my radar with some of my success as a teacher. But it’s far from instinctual. It’s something anyone can develop with practice and coaching, and mine used to be terrible. As I gained experience, I started to lose sight of my growth trajectory. I forgot how I got better, and struggled to help new teachers grow their own skills.
That was until I got into birdwatching, and re-learned exactly how I built my radar.
Birdwatching is an astonishingly multisensory experience. You use your eyes to scan for the slightest disturbances in a still forest. Was that a wing flapping or an acorn falling? When the wind and rain pick up, you scan more vigorously, discerning the types of motion that leaves and branches make when pressed by different forces. I learned what I could see, and what to look for.
Simultaneously, you’re listening for calls and knocks that distinguish one bird from another. Was that one bird or two? Was that the same bird I just heard a half mile back? Novel sounds became distinct notes. It’s like hearing a song, and suddenly recognizing it’s a familiar tune.
Finally, you’re combining all of these sights and sounds with texts, guides, and knowledge about what species are likely in an area and when they migrate. A birder filters what to attend to and what to ignore. Could that actually be a rose-breasted grosbeak at this time of year? Is that sound more likely to be a red-bellied woodpecker or a northern flicker?
Authentic experience, practice, and constant feedback from experienced birders made me better at birdwatching. As I learned to harmonize the information from my eyes and ears, I felt myself developing a radar. And if I could learn to build my radar as a birder, anyone can build that skill as a teacher.
These are four ways that worked for me to start building your own radar.
First, practice noticing things in your room. On the birding trail, I learned to slow down and notice every slight movement and sound. This helped me perceive things I didn’t even know I could notice. It works in your classroom, too. See things, hear things, and name them out loud. Point out to kids that you notice their new shoes, their haircut, their handwriting, their posture. Whether compliments or just statements of fact, you’re building the muscles that create a strong radar. What’s more, this practice helps you get an understanding of the differences in your room, both in terms of identity and in learning style. This knowledge will be crucial later on as you develop strategies to reach diverse populations of students.
Second, maximize your preservice teaching. Just as I learned birdwatching on the trail, rather than in a book or classroom, teachers grow fastest by actually being in schools. This is why teachers report student teaching as their most valuable preparatory experience (Truwit 2024). But most education majors only get 10-15 weeks of it (Levine 2006, 64). Teachers in alternative pipelines receive even less (King and Yin 2022), and they burn out faster (Walsh et al. 2007). Preservice programs that offer more of this experience grow stronger, more burnout-resistant teachers (Ronfeldt et al. 2020, 551). Whatever you get, go all in.
Third, observe as many different teachers and school settings as you can. My birding skills improved by moving beyond my backyard, to lakeshores and prairies and dense thickets. If I could do my early career again, I would follow a similar strategy, taking PD time to observe a variety of teachers. I wouldn’t limit this to your school, grade level, or content. Cast a broad net to see what’s possible, what challenges feel familiar, and what teaching styles are out there. Teachers who work in settings similar to their student teaching are consistently more effective (Henry et al. 2013, 439) and teach for longer (Goldhaber et al. 2020, 214), but only a quarter of teachers get this match. That shouldn’t stop us from seeking it out.
Finally, seek out a trusted mentor who wants the best for you even when you feel at your worst. There are lots of skilled birders out there, but to learn from them, I also need mutual trust and understanding. Just as I needed feedback when I misidentified a feather or call, early teachers maximize their growth with great coaching (Goldhaber et al. 2020, 213). Strong mentorship has consistently been shown to improve teacher effectiveness (Boyd et al. 2009, 416) and longevity (Ronfeldt et al. 2013, 319). It can serve as the equivalent of an additional year of experience (Ronfeldt et al. 2018, 405). Some schools and districts invest in this, because long-term retention of high-quality teachers pays for itself (Learning Policy Institute 2024). But even if you're at a school with no established coaching or mentorship program, look out for educators who you feel trust and affinity with. Ask them to observe you, give you feedback, or watch footage of you teaching. We all want to work alongside great teachers, and teachers are unsurprisingly ecstatic to share what they know with others.
Today’s teaching force is less experienced than ever (Redding and Nguyen, 2021), with a widening gap between veteran teachers and novice ones (Ingersoll et al. 2021, 234). That makes it more important than ever to ensure our new teachers are adequately prepared with authentic experience and high-quality mentorship. Learning to birdwatch reminded me of the collective responsibility all educators have to our early career teachers. You have a right to demand that investment from us. Be observant, and assertively seek out growth, as you build a lifelong career in the classroom.
Resources
References
Boyd, Donald J., Pamela L. Grossman, Hamilton Lankford, Susanna Loeb, and James Wyckoff. 2009. “Teacher Preparation and Student Achievement.” Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis 31 (4): 416–40. https://doi.org/10.3102/0162373709353129.
Goldhaber, Dan, John M. Krieg, and Roddy Theobald. 2020. “Exploring the Impact of Student Teaching Apprenticeships on Student Achievement and Mentor Teachers.” Journal of Research on Educational Effectiveness 13 (2): 213–34. https://doi.org/10.1080/19345747.2019.1698087.
Henry, Gary T., Shanyce L. Campbell, Charles L. Thompson, Linda A. Patriarca, Kenneth J. Luterbach, Diana B. Lys, and Vivian Martin Covington. 2013. “The Predictive Validity of Measures of Teacher Candidate Programs and Performance.” Journal of Teacher Education 64 (5): 439–53. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022487113496431.
Ingersoll, Richard, Elizabeth Merrill, Daniel Stuckey, Gregory Collins, and Brandon Harrison. 2021. “The Demographic Transformation of the Teaching Force in the United States.” Education Sciences 11 (5): 234. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci11050234.
Ronfeldt, Matthew, Emanuele Bardelli, Matthew Truwit, Hannah Mullman, Kevin Schaaf, and Julie C. Baker. 2020. “Improving Preservice Teachers’ Feelings of Preparedness to Teach through Recruitment of Instructionally Effective and Experienced Cooperating Teachers: A Randomized Experiment.” Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis 42 (4): 551–75. https://doi.org/10.3102/0162373720954183.
Ronfeldt, Matthew, Stacey L. Brockman, and Shanyce L. Campbell. 2018. “Does Cooperating Teachers’ Instructional Effectiveness Improve Preservice Teachers’ Future Performance?” Educational Researcher 47 (7): 405–18. https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189x18782906.
Ronfeldt, Matthew, Michelle Reininger, and Andrew Kwok. 2013. “Recruitment or Preparation? Investigating the Effects of Teacher Characteristics and Student Teaching.” Journal of Teacher Education 64 (4): 319–37. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022487113488143.
Walsh, Kate, Sandi Jacobs, Chester Finn, and Michael Petrilli. 2007. “Alternative Certification Isn’t Alternative.” Thomas B. Fordham Institute, September 1. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED498382.pdf.
|
|
Mr. Shah is a 7th grade science teacher at T. C. Howe Middle School in Indianapolis. He's taught for 13 years, and is also an avid birdwatcher. His writing has been published in Newsweek, Education Week, and Hechinger Report. |