The Third Thing

by Sharon Warkentin Short 

       Every now and then, an idea from a book changes forever the way you think about something. This was my experience when I read The Courage to Teach by Parker J. Palmer (Jossey-Bass, 1998). Parker challenges the traditional teacher-centered model of education not by defending a student-centered alternative, but by introducing a “third thing”—a subject-centered approach. Gathered around the subject that draws them together, neither the teacher nor the students control the learning experience, but all are held accountable to the subject itself.

            This style of teaching replicates the process by which all knowledge is gained: it is the work of “a community of people looking at a subject and debating their observations within a consensual framework of procedural rules” (p. 104). Rather than merely delivering to students the conclusions of their community of learners, subject-centered teachers invite students into the community to participate in the process of coming to know the subject. Sometimes this kind of pedagogy produces that awkward moment when a student catches the instructor in a contradiction or an inaccuracy. To Parker, such a moment is cause not for embarrassment but for celebration, because it demonstrates that “students have direct, unmediated access to the subject, and they can use their knowledge to challenge my claims” (p. 118).

            Parker’s “third thing” corresponds to a quality that many students rate highly in their evaluation of their professors, which is “passion for the subject.” This passion, Parker observes, is more than simply excitement or fascination with the content: “Passion for the subject propels that subject, not the teacher, into the center of the learning circle” (p. 120).

            I have realized that, for all my commitment to the active involvement of students in the construction of their knowledge, I still often default to standing between the content and the learners rather than gathering around the content with them. For me, the most enjoyable aspect of teaching is often the learning that precedes the presentation to the class. I like to collect, study, organize, summarize, and deliver neat packages of information to my students, but in that process all the immediate interaction with the subject matter is mine. How much richer my students’ experiences would be if I invited them into exploring that subject with me.

            I love the little rhyme by Robert Frost that Parker quotes to capsulize the joy of gathering around a subject and coming to know it together as teachers and learners:

We dance around in a ring and suppose,
But the Secret sits in the middle and knows. (p. 105)