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PERSPECTIVES ON URBAN EDUCATION FALL 2010 | PAGE 47 On Joyous Teaching... By Catherine L. Belcher, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles Happiness and pleasure on Sat- those who inspired me to work in edu- worked in education in the first place. urday - they come with sunlight, cation. I’ve thought a lot about the ex- In class, we spend a great deal of beach runs, good friends and long pertise of the teachers I have known, of time considering all that is “wrong” dinners. But joy, joy resides exclu- their exceptional caring, of the years of with our current public education sively in Room 31. experience. Mostly, though, I find my- system, constantly unpacking pov- (Caroline, second year teacher, Los self thinking about the joy they showed erty, racism, inequality and the like Angeles, Calif.) for their work. In each of these teach- in classes based in critical pedagogy, ers there lived an energy, a creative practitioner research, and sociocul- I have been much absorbed lately spirit that pervaded their efforts – a tural analysis. Given their high stress with thoughts of the great and unfor- spirit I fear we are ultimately losing to teaching placements, I find myself a gettable pedagogues I have known. scripted curriculums and standardiza- cheerleader of sorts, advocating for You likely hold a similar cast of charac- tion. The joy in educational work is optimism. Teachers can be intellectu- ters in your mind: the all-knowing, sly leaving us, and with it, I fear the best als! Teachers can conduct their own 4th grade teacher, the ecstatic history and brightest will leave as well; ei- classroom research that both helps buff, the kind, wise woman who made ther that, or they’ll never come at all. them become better practitioners and you feel safe while she magically taught Deciding how I feel about the situ- informs the field! Teachers are pro- you math, the incredibly enthusiastic ation, and how it lives in my profes- fessionals who can progress in their first year teacher who had so much to sional life, where I am positioned to work and contribute to their work- learn, but whose energy was absolute- serve as both advocate and critical place as leaders! Teachers can help ly contagious, the one who believed eye, is proving a struggle. Often, I kids grow to become critical thinkers you could do it when you thought you am uncomfortable with where I land. and skilled, savvy students! Teachers couldn’t, the English teacher who in- I hold the distinct privilege of work- are advocates for social justice! Teach- troduced you to Jane Austen and made ing with both preservice and novice ers are role models! It is head-rush it matter, the gifted artist who taught (first and second year) teachers in ur- inducing, exciting, exhausting work. you to stand on stage and shine, the ban Los Angeles. The majority are I am beginning to wonder, though, one who made you want to be a teacher. Teach for America students, which, for if the divide between what I want for I find that these days I can’t stop the purposes of this essay, only serves to them and the current reality of the thinking about them – probably be- provide a sense of their age (so young!) profession is growing too wide to rec- cause I have become a teacher of teach- and level of perseverance (extraordi- oncile. After all, the particular vision ers and after a few years am starting narily high). Others are traditional of teachers and teaching I advocate is to come to some understanding about teacher education students working to- not measurable through a standardized what that really means. The weight of wards credentials and master degrees. test. I am likely proving more hopeful it is both welcome (I want this to be vi- I worry about all of them. Their energy, than real, and if that is the case, then tally important) and daunting. Because love, determination, and intellectual perhaps I need to take a more honest being a teacher of teachers in 2010 re- capacity, which should be welcomed approach with my students. How- quires an understanding that while the and nurtured, are instead constantly ever, I don’t want to lose the joy, en- teaching profession has always faced stifled, most often not by the children ergy, and hope we share, especially challenges to its professional stand- and difficult working conditions under since those can prove difficult to find. ing (“you only work 9 months a year,” which they function. Those who elect Complicating the issue further, “those who can’t do, teach”), nothing to teach in today’s urban classrooms I find I am hitting a wall as well, one in the past compares to the current expect to face complex challenges. quite familiar to professors, established deskilling, “technicizing” and, frankly, They don’t necessarily expect their joy by academia. While I teach at an insti- overt debasing of teachers. And I can and desire for the work to be extracted tution that values teaching, it is clear see this in my students’ eyes. When so from them, quite painfully, by exter- that I need to be getting on with other much genuine enthusiasm hits such a nal entities who claim to support edu- things (publishing, serving on commit- hard, immobile wall, it gives one pause. cation and students of color. Namely tees). I accept the fact that I was well So, in working to put together my (but not always and not solely), school aware of academia’s publish or perish thoughts, and in honor of a too soon boards, NCLB proponents, overtaxed traditions long before I became a pro- departed, joyous former classmate, I administrators focused on test scores fessor, but I posit that schools of educa- think of why I became a teacher, why I and standards, and burned out teach- tion should serve as stronger advocates became an education professor, and of ers who probably should never have for the space teaching occupies in our PERSPECTIVES ON URBAN EDUCATION FALL 2010 | PAGE 48 careers. We are, after all, the teachers energy and devotion to their students REFERENCE of teachers and it is time, I believe, to serves as my exemplar. In the end, my talk more deeply about what that truly students set me straight. They may hit means. Certainly, we must advocate their own walls, but while that steals hooks, bell. (1994). Teaching to for teaching that moves beyond tradi- their energy, it does not diminish their transgress: Education as the tional boundaries, that creates a class- dedication to their students. My stu- practice of freedom. New York: room space where, in the words of bell dents’ joy in this regard is, thankfully, Routledge. hooks, we bear “witness to education as contagious. I asked my class of second the practice of freedom” (1994, p. 11). year teachers to write to me about what Such teaching, based in critical peda- “joyous teaching” meant to them, and gogy and a “quality of care” (p. 194), they did so with gracious enthusiasm. requires passion, dedication, and love. Some answers reflected their exhaus- Hopefully, these characteristics abound tion: “If I had to define joyous teaching in the teachers we teach, but how will it would probably be related to the idea we know if we do not take the journey of exhaling at some point throughout ourselves, collaborating and reflecting my day” (Jessica). Other responses re- with them as colleagues in the process? flected their depth of concern: “I would The best teaching classrooms, at say my most joyous teaching mo- all levels, function as communities, as ments come when my students get into shared group experiences where co- something in a deeply emotional way” created learning takes place. In these (Devin). Another reframed the ques- spaces, professors engage in the very tion (and rightly so): “ . . . but the infec- type of teaching they espouse to their tious nature of joyous learning is what students, allowing for both an equal makes teaching a joy for me . . . ” (Nick). exchange of ideas, and grounding in A different student very simply stated, the “real” world. Again, bell hooks: “I am learning to appreciate where they To the extent that professors bring come from (Why do they yell? Why this passion [uniting theory and are they angry?). When I know them practice], which has to be funda- I learn to love them. When I learn to mentally rooted in a love for ideas love them, I love to teach them” (Britt). we are able to inspire, the classroom If we truly believe in social justice in becomes a dynamic place where education, at all levels, we must advo- transformations in social relations cate for the space and time to allow such are concretely actualized and the teacher growth to happen. I believe this false dichotomy between the world begins in a fundamental determination outside and the inside world of to not forget the gifts our best teachers the academy disappears. (p. 195) gave us, and to grow those in both our students and ourselves; and to decide Such pedagogy is hard work and, that when we hit the wall, to hit it loud- much as good research, it takes time. ly and forcefully, in the full conviction It requires constant reflection and that someday soon, it will indeed fall. emotional energy not necessarily rec- ognized or awarded by academia (or Catherine Belcher is an Assistant public schools for that matter). I’d like Professor in Language and Culture to imagine, though, that if university in Education at the School of Edu- teacher education programs became cation, Loyola Marymount Univer- loud advocates, and highly visible ex- sity, Los Angeles. She teaches and emplars of break-the-mold teaching, writes about urban teaching, Latino that somehow we might break open educational history, and the role of the ever-narrowing vision of what culture in the classroom. Her forth- “teaching” means. For in the end, if coming book, Teaching Harry Potter: we, at the university level, can’t man- The Power of Imagination in Mul- age to shift the teaching paradigm ticultural Classrooms (Spring 2011) at our own institutions, how can we explores three teachers’ experiences continue to expect it of our students? utilizing popular culture and media I occasionally share my frustrations to break perceived and prescribed cur- in class, and find that my students’ ricular boundaries in their classrooms.