Paradox in Teaching and Learning

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Palmer’s third chapter speaks about paradox in teaching and learning. He describes paradox, overall, as the inner tension experienced in the heart of every teacher, competing and pulling between laughter and pain, joy and sadness, engagement and apathy. He embraces the soul of the teacher pungently: “teaching...can only be expressed as paradoxes”. Push them yet coddle them, inspire them yet give them thinking time, challenge them yet celebrate their established riches. Parker’s description brings into light the true tension in the hearts of teachers, balancing forces of emotion, identity, intellect, and truth.

Palmer discusses six major ideas of paradox in teaching. Palmer’s first is space being bound and open. In the classroom, students need to have the freedom to encounter knowledge without restraint. However, if rules and structures are not established, things can become chaotic. For example, rules for sports such as soccer and hockey allow for structure in the game which enables an engaging game (bound). On the field itself, players are open to be creative, in their dribbling, passing, and shooting without restriction (open). The space between the two is where soccer excellence happens.

Palmer’s second example of paradox is hospitality opposing a “charged”. Students need to feel safe in a class for learning to occur. Students, however, should not feel safe enough to put their feet up and nap. Our learning environments need to be electric. As I teach students in my class room if they lay their head down I say: “You can sleep at home!” Creating an engaging, safe environment requires an acute sense of the nature of the students and the ability to know when a stretch break is not needed but required....

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...iving money is not smart or safe but buying someone a coffee or sandwich or helping at a soup kitchen is a healthy form of social justice. Add a parable about Lazarus and the students have a healthy balance between the binding word of God and the openness of how we can serve Jesus in our lives.

Overall, Palmer’s description blends nicely to the vocation of teaching through another lens in teaching and learning and that is virtue. Virtue is not a balance with another vice but a middle ground between two extremes. For example, fortitude is not counter balanced with gluttony, but rather fortitude is a middle between laziness and recklessness. The inner landscape of a teacher is filled with many similar paradoxes, that challenge teachers to walk the middle road, to engage students to encounter their material, ask questions, and pursue life-long learning.

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