SKILLFUL TEACHING | THE MISSING ELEMENT IN SCHOOL REFORM
had to acquire their expertise over many years and usually alone through their own initiative and perseverance. But there are simply not enough of them. The stark fact is that there are larger numbers of underprepared teach- ers. And blaming them for skills they don’t have is unfair. There is a massive gap between the knowledge and skills they bring to the classroom and the knowledge and skills they should and could have with proper training and support. The fundamentals of high-expertise teaching have not been provided to or expected of large portions of our teacher corps.
There are seven kinds of professional knowledge (Figure 1.1) that are central to high-expertise teaching (Saphier, 2017). In addition to Generic Pedagogy (the fo- cus of The Skillful Teacher) and Content-Specific Pedagogy, five other important knowledge bases bear on the success of teaching and learning. Five of them— Content Analysis, Academic Discipline, Individual Differences in Learners, Be- havior of Individuals in Effective Organizations, Effective Communications with Family and Community—are seldom found in teacher preparation programs or other systems that influence teacher capacity.