By Morgan Rooney, Educational Development Coordinator, EDC
Change is hard. It can be hard to see when it鈥檚 necessary, or to envision concretely what it might look like, or to actually implement it. When it comes to teaching, there are a lot of factors working against change: our workload, our perceptions of ourselves and our teaching efficacy, and our awareness of the many and intractable problems that hinder and constrain universities, professors, students, and learning generally. As a recent series of events in the new year have reminded me, however, perhaps the thing that gets in the way the most is habit.
The last leg of my commute home provides the pedestrian with two options: one can either take the pathway through a little park area that ends with a set of stairs, or one can take the sidewalk in a right-angle fashion. When there鈥檚 no snow, the former saves you about twenty seconds and allows you to fleetingly enjoy a tiny slice of nature. When the snow comes, the stairs are gated off and the pathway isn鈥檛 plowed. You鈥檇 think that would be the end of the first option. But no, after each snowstorm, people dutifully blaze a trail, bypassing the stairs via a side route that can quickly transform into a treacherous streak of ice. If you鈥檙e one of the first to attempt it after a fresh snowfall, the 鈥渟hortcut鈥� ends up taking much longer than the more circuitous route. Even when the trail is well worn, the icy, uneven conditions ensure that no time is saved.
I鈥檝e been watching this phenomenon play out for a few weeks now鈥攁 fresh dumping of snow followed by, without fail, the re-emergence of that trail鈥攚ith a sense of bemusement tinged with chagrin. After all, not only do I use the trail when it鈥檚 there, but lately I also find myself trudging through the snow when it鈥檚 not, joining the ranks for those who work to re-establish it. No time is saved; nothing is gained. The original function of the 鈥渟hortcut,鈥� in fact, is entirely undermined by the conditions I can鈥檛 help but acknowledge, but I trudge on anyway. The obvious question arises: 鈥淲hy am I participating in this stubborn ritual?鈥�
This absurdist drama鈥攊n which I am a consciously critical but nevertheless cooperative actor鈥攈as reminded me of the tyrannical force of habit in general, but especially in relation to teaching. In defence of my own practice as an instructor, I will say that I pride myself on taking a student-centred approach to my teaching, incorporating active learning into every lesson and implementing a number of strategies to empower my students with a sense of ownership of the class and of their own learning. But that said, I have lately found myself wondering how often habit is actually, and perhaps secretly, driving my decision making. How many times have I taken a well-known trail, so to speak, that saves no time or labour, or that no longer delivers on the promise that was its raison d鈥檈tre?
Two examples immediately spring to mind. First, I routinely collect feedback from my students about how a class is going, but I鈥檓 starting to suspect that I鈥檝e been using those opportunities to explain myself more than to initiate student-driven changes. Similarly, I have long bemoaned students鈥� failure to complete weekly readings, and yet my assessments haven鈥檛 changed much in the last few years. These, too, are instances of me stubbornly participating in ineffective rituals that, in other contexts, don鈥檛 escape my notice.
Like others, I imagine, I had been consoling myself with thoughts such as 鈥淚鈥檝e been at this for a while and know my business鈥� and 鈥渟ome problems are too systemic for any one instructor to overcome.鈥� New lesson plans and assignments take time and effort, and students work more and read less. There鈥檚 no sense 鈥渢ilting at windmills,鈥� right?
Well, actually, thinking back to the novel from which that expression derives, there is some sense in tilting at windmills. The loveable but absurd Don Quixote might have been off his rocker, mistaking windmills for giants, but every decision he made was fueled by one simple, worthwhile idea: that we must fight to make the ideal real. It is not enough to do things this or that way, to embrace seemingly intractable realities as inevitable, just because that鈥檚 how it鈥檚 always been done. Embracing that position, Cervantes wants us to see, is even more mad than Quixote鈥檚 fantastical knight-errantry.
When it comes to teaching, the challenge is to take or make new paths, even when so many things seem to scream at us, 鈥淭here is no other way to do it.鈥� Conscious self-reflection on its own is not enough, either, or at least it hasn鈥檛 been in my case. The only way to combat the tyrannical force of habit, I have recently concluded, is to actively seek out and embrace change. When I collect feedback from my students, I鈥檓 now committing myself in advance to implementing at least one or two changes they suggest regardless. When I see, as I have long seen, my students failing to keep up with the readings, I鈥檓 now seeking out new ideas and developing new assignments and grading schemes in search of something that will do more and better. Any improvement is better than the status quo, and any ground gained is precious.
By their very essence, re-trodden trails cannot lead us anywhere new. To find new paths, we have to jealously guard ourselves against a deference to habit, and we have to demand change of ourselves even when so many forces seem to insist that no change is possible, necessary or desirable. If you can make only one change in your approach to teaching this year, I would urge it to be this: commit to change. Commit to it not as a one-time event or temporary aberration but rather as a foundational principle in your pedagogy鈥攏ot because your teaching is flawed or wanting but because, as Cervantes reminds us, the miraculous, absurdist impulse that drives every step forward in the human enterprise is simply that search for better, even if (especially if) we鈥檙e not entirely sure it exists.