What Is Teaching? Inside the Black Box of What Teachers Do

Abstract

The article emphasizes the importance of taking a broad approach to understanding the act of teaching, especially in the context of teacher evaluation. It attempts to shift the commonly held notion of teaching as a one-directional act of instruction provided by teachers with the aim to inform, help, and advise learners in their efforts to attain pre-set curricular goals. The wider stance takes into consideration teacher-student relationships and various overt and subtle acts of differentiation and scaffolding that the teacher carries out to facilitate effective student learning and enhance student motivation and engagement. Such a wider perspective is especially relevant in developing rubrics for assessing instruction quality in an environment largely dominated by discourses on assessment and accountability in education—both in teaching and learning.