55 Teaching Dilemma: Ten Powerful Solutions to Almost Any Classroom Challenge

Luke Lawson is a teacher and administrator in Vancouver, B.C.

As the title suggests, this book identifies 55 teaching dilemmas and 10
ways—all presented in a list form—to deal with them. The dilemmas
include cheerfulness, tolerance, assertiveness, attention to detail,
sustainable energy, and kick-starting the day.

There is little new here. In fact, many of the solutions presented in
the lists are self-evident. For example, the solutions to dilemma
31—“managing timing and pacing”—include the following: always
plan well; be in class before the bell rings; talk at a brisk pace;
model punctual behaviour. Any teacher who does not do these things
automatically should probably not be in the profession.

Many of today’s so-called educators are becoming like those
management gurus who routinely churn out formula titles along the lines
of “seven ways to do this” or “ten ways to do that.”
Paterson’s simplistic book exemplifies this unfortunate trend.