Excerpted responses given by Terry Jozwik on October 12, 2007 to questions generated by Methods 290 students. Mr. Jozwik has been a teacher at Glenbrook South High School in Glenview, Illinois for 32 years. He currently serves as the Instructional Supervisor of the Social Studies Department. He is a 1974 graduate of Illinois State University.
1.) How do you teach controversial historical or social science topics to your students? What role should a teacher’s personal beliefs and interests play in influencing their teaching?
Strive to be as objective as possible. The role of the teacher is not to clone students, but to ask the right questions that guide their thinking on any given topic.
2.) History and the social sciences have a tendency to be categorized as “boring.” How do you keep your students interested and engaged? How much student work outside of class is realistic and appropriate?
Strive to create engaging lessons. Lessons that students have an emotional attachment to in some way tend to be effective. Recent research indicates that students are motivated to learn when they can see a personal attachment to what they are learning. Yes, students are self-centered…perhaps most humans are too. Also, be sure to create good, thought provoking questions to discuss in class, or for assignments. Most great questions begin with “why” or “how.” Other ways to engage students – be a great story teller, as everyone enjoys a well told story; have students create good products (something that they are proud of); at the end of class, save 5-7 minutes to ask “so what did we learn today that is really important?” Be sure to ask them to reflect on what is important. Don’t assume they will do this on their own. As for homework, make it meaningful and relevant. Avoid busy work that takes time, but is of limited value to busy learners. Be conscious of the oftentimes hectic schedule of students these days. Strive to be humane.
3.) What are the most important characteristics of an effective new teacher/student teacher
and what are the biggest mistakes of inexperienced teachers?
Know your subject matter inside and out. Be well read in the subject area. Have a passion for the content. Be enthusiastic in the classroom. Create engaging lessons. Share ideas with colleagues in the department. Be personable. Be a team player. Have a sense of humor and toleration for ambiguity. Don’t be afraid to take a few sensible risks and make a few mistakes (no one expects perfection). Biggest mistakes – you may be close in age to students, however, you cannot see yourself as their friend. You are the teacher and can be friendly, but not a friend. Friend and teacher have different definitions. Work on classroom management skills. What successful veteran teachers do to manage a class may look easy, however, these techniques have been honed with years of practice, trial and error.
4.) What role, if any, should textbooks and other curriculum materials have in effective teaching?
College courses still use textbooks, so high schools must too. That being said, be sure to use additional resources in your classroom – handouts, articles, websites, films, utube, etc. These enrich learning.
5.) If you could implement one policy change in the teaching of history and the social sciences, what would you choose and why?
Less dependency on Scantron form objective testing. Though high quality objective tests can be written and can be of value, too much of a dependency on them leads students to do nothing more than hunt for a right answer. In life, many problems to solve often have more than one right answer. Students must experience assessments that engage them in thinking about competing right answers. Students need to write more, research more and create more. They must have a vested interest in constructing meaning, not merely memorizing someone else’s meaning. Students need to engage in the work that historians actually do.
6.) What are the typical expectations of administrators and department chairs in terms of formal lesson planning?
Lesson planning expectations will vary from school to school. At GBS all teachers are on a team and the curriculum is established. There is a great deal of idea sharing between colleagues. How a teacher chooses to deliver the curriculum is up to them. I do not require daily lesson plans, unless a formal evaluation is to take place. It is probably a good idea for new teachers to write lessons plans that help them to focus instruction.
7.) What do department chairs and administrators look for in resumes and interviews?
Substantive course work, interesting people with varied experiences, a passion for the subject to be taught, and a passion for teaching adolescents; also, someone with good people skills - who is articulate, creative, and has a sense of humor; also has a flexible mind, rather than a rigid one. Ability to leap over tall buildings is good too. Teaching is not easy. Be someone ready to accept a difficult challenge.
8.) How has your teaching philosophy and actual instruction evolved over the course of your career and why?
When I first began teaching I spent a lot of class time on the details of history. Details are important, however, my teaching has now evolved to focus on the really “big ideas” that students need to know and remember. I used to spend more time lecturing and talking at students, and I now have realized the importance of varying instructional activities. I now spend more time crafting really thought provoking questions that students care about, and I also spend more time teaching students how to create thought-provoking questions too. I now spend more time listening to students and crafting lessons that address student interests an/or needs. Some things that have not changed – I still believe that every student in my class can learn something, and that I have to care about all of them, even the ones that are difficult to like. There will always be students that are easy to like and ones that are harder to like. It is possible that the student that I like the least, needs me the most. What if no one else cares about him/her? This makes our job hard…and vitally important.
9.) How has the relatively recent obsession with standardized testing and accountability influenced the craft and career of teaching history and the social sciences?
Standardized testing is a two edged sword. It can be a good thing when it truly focuses attention on what low ability students really need to know. It forces educators to not just have these students merely do fun things in the classroom, but also to hold them accountable for learning what must be learned. On the other hand, we have to do more in our classrooms than teach students to be good test takers. In the real world it will be a rare occasion when an objective Scantron test assesses job performance. We also have to be careful to not neglect the average and academically talented students as we pay more attention to getting more low ability students to meet state standards. The bright students are future shakers and movers. To neglect them does a disservice to the future.
10.) How do most departments create and recreate their school’s curriculum?
At GBS we have a 5 year cycle for curricular review. All courses will be reviewed by a team of teachers every five years in order to keep courses from becoming static. Other schools have other ways of reviewing courses. This system works for us. It is important to strive to continually improve courses. Life keeps changing at an ever faster pace, so must our courses.
11.) What are some of the biggest misconceptions students have about US History when they first arrive in your classroom?
That U.S. History is about dead, white males. Much has changed in U.S. History courses that address issues of diversity within the American experience. Many voices that were silent in the past are now included in the grand storyline. Another misconception is to view history as something that is over – “Oh, that’s history!” Students need to come understand that much of the past is prologue to the future.
12.) Is history education improving?
Yes, especially at ISU! More emphasis is being placed on a required content foundation of history courses in order to meet rigorous degree/graduation requirements. Also, it is a good idea to get prospective teachers into the classroom earlier than in the past. Students need to observe and do more practice teaching in order to begin to grasp the rigors of being a teacher.
13.) Is lecturing a good strategy for history teaching?
Certainly not every day. Research indicates that students learn best when a teacher employs a variety of instructional methods. Students can listen for about 12 minutes, then they tune out. Some tune back in, and some don’t. Now some teachers are brilliant, dynamic, thought-provoking lecturers. If this is your strength, use it, but certainly not all the time.
14.) What makes your department and school stand out?
Dedicated teachers that have high expectations for students. They work hard and put in long hours - at school and grading papers at home, or coaching and advising in the evening or on weekends. They also care about students as people, and not just as high test scores on a spreadsheet. They are team players that enjoy sharing ideas and resources. They have a sense of humor and compassion and know how to teach both the head and the heart of students. Students respond to nurturing teachers by performing marvelously in a wide variety of academic and non-academic ways at Glenbrook South.
15.) How important are primary sources in teaching history and the social sciences?
They are a good way to get students to develop their analytical thinking skills. On the other hand we have to be careful to not overdo the use of primary resources in the classroom. I do believe that if a student has a rich course content experience, he/she will be able to analyze any document with relative ease.
16.) How often and to what extent do you and your colleagues cooperate?
Daily! There is much sharing in the department on a daily basis. We do have formal team meetings about once a week. Groupthink matters greatly at GBS in all departments.
Borrowing and sharing ideas makes us all better teachers. We look askance at anyone in the department that does not share good materials and ideas.
17.) When teaching a broad topic such as world history, how do you decide what topics to include and what to leave out?
It is best to review Illinois State Standards, NCSS Themes, and National History Standards as a way to filter what needs to be taught. This is not easy when world history courses are expected to cover all of human history from the beginning of time to the 21st century. Try as best you can to determine what students really need to know, understanding that other electives courses in world history do occur in high school, and of course, in college too. Don’t beat yourself over the head too much about what you didn’t cover. At GBS we spend 3/5’s of the year on Western Civilization and 2/5’s on Eastern Civilization.
18.) Have students changed during the course of your career?
Students seem to be busier doing more things these days than ever before. The push to get into the right college is intense at GBS. There also seems to be more skepticism about an absolutely secure future due to increased competition in the world. There is more stress these days, and fallout can be frightening in some cases. There also seems to be more home problems that impact student learning and well-being. On the other hand, most students seem to be better behaved than in the late 70’s and 80’s, and most students still seem to have that wide-eyed ready-to-take-on-the-world look on their face. A good recent trend seems to be that more students are genuinely interested in getting involved in various service activities (e.g., helping Katrina victims over spring break, working in Appalachia, working to end genocide in Darfur, etc.) This is a very healthy trend that is impressive.
19.) Is it your job to help your students become good citizens?
Yes indeed. What other department is more responsible for this than social studies? We must be sure to encourage all of our students to be honest, fair, respectful, responsible and caring citizens. We must be sure to encourage them to contribute to the world and make it a better place. We must get them to appreciate what others have done in the past that makes their present more secure and meaningful, while at the same time we must get them to understand that each of them plays a key role in helping to resolve problems that still exist. “Those to whom much is given, much is expected.” Being a good citizen means so much more than simply feathering your own nest and obeying the laws. All must work to “mend the world.” Social studies instruction clearly exposes students to the work that has been done to make the world a better place for more people, and the work that still needs to be done. We must all strive to inspire our students to act, and to get involved in both individual and collective ways.
20.) What is your favorite subject to teach and why?
I’ve enjoyed teaching U.S. History and World History, but what I truly enjoy teaching the most is World Religions. Students used to explore the “who am I, what am I, why am I here, what happens after I die” questions later in life, or perhaps in college. So many things occur earlier in life for students these days - including the search for deeper meaning. Students appear to want to have a greater understanding of the diverse answers to these questions. I suspect they want to figure out some answers early on, rather than experience a mid-life crisis and then have to redirect. Engaging students in thoughtful deliberation about these questions is very exciting. I’ve been doing it for 23 years and still enjoy it very much.
21.) If you had to a choice to do your life over, would you still choose to be a teacher?
Indeed I would, without any doubt. “A teacher effects eternity – he can never tell where his influence stops.” (Henry Adams). I like the idea of effecting eternity. It makes me feel important. I want my life to matter, and being a teacher makes me feel that it does.
