The skillful teacher : on technique, trust, and responsiveness in the classroom /

Brookfield (Teachers College, Columbia University; author of Developing Critical Thinkers, 1987, and Understanding and Facilitating Adult Learning 1986) illustrates practically his major scholarly interests in this readable, innovative, and perceptive book on college teaching. Drawing on the extensive, but rarely acknowledged, insights of adult education and learning literature, as well as his own teaching experience, the author uses a conversational and anecdotal style to "grapple with the challenges and crises of college teaching." With "critical thinking" as an essential means of building a democratic society, Brookfield argues that the professional teacher grows into the truths of college teaching by developing and learning to adjust methods to better fit the ever changing contextual factors of the teaching-learning process. The central goal of "critically responsive teaching" is accomplished by using a variety of student and teacher feedback and responsiveness techniques to overcome student resistance to learning, to gain student trust, and to encourage students and teachers to meaningfully challenge the validity and propriety of "established" or habitual educational practices and ideas. Along with many practical classroom techniques, a substantial reference list, and useful index, the final chapters on the political realities and phenomenological truths of college teaching alone are worth the price of the book, especially for prospective, new, or veteran college, adult or continuing education teachers. -R. L. Brod, University of Montana