The 3rd teacher

For over one century, educators and scholars have been producing practical, anecdotal, empirical, and research evidence to exorcise our profession from the romanticised image that learning is a lonely and painful intellectual activity. The image of the mad scientist working on his own in a poorly lit room hidden in a castle has inspired numerous fiction stories; some turned into memorable movies. Variations of these iconic images acquired universal appeal, crossed cultural boundaries and lodged deeply into our collective consciousness. This basic unit of thought, immortalised in the children’s stories and disseminated as common sense knowledge of reality, is what we, as educators must demystify. 

We work simultaneously on several fronts. While we acknowledge that self-taught, self-directed and independent learning is a valuable component of any learning process, the social dimension of learning plays a fundamental role in education. 

We begin by acknowledging the role that the parents play in the educational partnership. Naturally, the parents are the protagonists from the day the baby is born. The presence and participation of the parents tend to fade a little as the child grows. In a progressive school, we prefer to view the parents' participation as one that changes in nature rather than diminishes as the student grows older. In this sense, we are in continuous communication with parents to renegotiate new forms of engagement with the school and assist parents to re-adjust their means of involvement in their children's learning and development. In a way, we call the parents the children's first teachers and the schoolteachers, symbolised by the homeroom teacher, the second teacher. 

Educators recognise the critical importance of learning from their peers in the school life of a student. Many educators of a social constructivist persuasion (like me) believe learning with and from friends is a vital component of schooling. Quite possibly, this was the essential element we felt deprived of during the pandemic. We don't refer to our friends and colleagues as teachers. Instead, they are our co-learners. 

Perhaps this social dimension of the learning process is best encapsulated by an ancient African proverb: it takes a whole village to raise a child. This proverb is present in different forms in many African languages, such as one knee does not bring up a child (Sukuma, Tanzania), One hand does not nurse a child (Swahili, East Africa). The spirit of these proverbial statements converges towards the notion that the community shares the responsibility for the education, socialisation and integration of children.  

If these are not enough teachers to participate in your child's education, educators have identified another teacher, known as the third teacher. Inspired by the educational-ideological work done by Loris Malaguzzi in a small village in the region known as Reggio Emelia in Italy after the end of WW2, a comprehensive approach to learning emerged, often labelled as the Reggio Emilia approach to education. One of the main facets of this radical approach is the role of a stimulating classroom environment on every child's learning and development. The environment as the third teacher is an idea that goes beyond emphasising the importance of a pleasant classroom environment (that is, attention to space, cleanness, noise control, wall colours, etc.) and press us educators to conceive the learning environment as an entity that establishes a relationship between learning material and the student. What we present and how we present to students, Malaguzzi claimed, has a significant impact on the level of intellectual stimulation and general engagement. It is common knowledge that the science labs and the gym stimulate distinct behaviour and expectations in students. Still, there are more subtle ways to organise and present our lessons and arrange the learning material to foster the third teacher to exercise its role. 

In the early years, teachers extended these ideas into an art form. Nature-inspired materials and hands-on materials surround us to stimulate sensory experiences in the early years' area. Classroom and outdoor spaces are diversified and interactive to encourage exploration, modification, and discovery. 

Motivated by the success of the environment as the third-teacher, we have been extending this notion to the whole campus. Indoors we have moved out of the classrooms to reconceive break-out learning spaces, corridors, the use of the ground floor and its connection with the first floor, school entrances, the central atrium are gradually being reconceived. In this vein, a number of transformations were initiated last summer, continued during this academic year, and will be finalised during the summer break. These include the creation of the art studios, the relocation of the library to the ground floor, which will house the research institute and maker space, a new café area, completion of the tech hub, relocation of the college counselling office to the central atrium as well as the re-furnishing of the mother tongue classes in the atrium. Combined, the heart of the school (the atrium) will feel like a vibrant educational village or the piazza of the village. 

These changes are all underpinned by our commitment to raising the profile of sustainable environments. The notion that our third teacher is a sustainable, environmentally aware teacher will be more visible in the modifications of the outdoor spaces out-of-classroom activities. 

This year we initiated an Eco Club designed to influence sustainability projects and develop a school-wide sustainability policy. The Eco Club is an authentic community-based entity that enjoys the participation of primary and secondary students, teachers and parents. From October next academic year, you will notice the evidence of their intervention and advocacy: waste management will change, biodiversity will become more prominent in what is already a relatively green campus, and a forest school will emerge in line with the designs proposed by our students. 

Sustainability, wellbeing and the curriculum go hand in hand. The physical changes that will become noticeable from September have also inspired our teachers and coordinators to reflect on and review the curriculum programme. We are planning for the next academic year, with a greater and more overt emphasis on the connections between wellbeing, sustainability and the traditional subject topics like sciences, biology, maths, economics, nature, arts and design.  

as we make progress I will post pictures here to show the transformation.