Attention, Class!!! 16 Ways to Be a Smarter Teacher

4. Great teachers exude passion as well as purpose.

The difference between a good teacher and a great one isn't expertise. It comes down to passion. Passion for the material. Passion for teaching. The desire is infectious, says H. Muir, global marketing training manager at SC Johnson, in Racine, Wisconsin. If the teacher has it, the students will most likely catch it.

"Both of my parents were high-school teachers," Muir says. "My mother taught behaviorally disabled students, and my father taught history and government. The most important thing I learned from them is that you need to have passion, and it has to be genuine. It isn't something you can fake. Students can tell whether you care or not."

5. Students learn when teachers show them how much they need to learn.

Teaching adults has given Tom McCarty, director of consulting services at Motorola University, an appreciation for the old adage, "When the student is ready, the teacher will appear." Some of the people who show up for the Six Sigma continuous-improvement workshop aren't ready, because they don't think they need to improve. They don't see the gap between where they are and where they need to be. Making them aware of that gap is one of McCarty's first objectives.

"Is your team aligned around customer expectations?" he'll ask. "Of course we are," one of the team leaders will reply. McCarty will then ask each team member to write down the top-four customer priorities and post them on the wall so that everyone can read them. "If there are 15 team members, you'll get 60 different priorities," he says. "Once they see that for themselves, they'll turn to me and ask, 'Can you help us here?' "

6. Keep it clear even if you can't keep it simple.

One of the chief attributes of a great teacher is the ability to break down complex ideas and make them understandable. These days, the same can be said for business leaders, says Gary Grates, executive director of internal communications for General Motors. In fact, he says that the essence of teaching -- and learning -- is communication. "The biggest issue that leaders face is whether people understand them," says Grates. "Whether you're talking about Wall Street, partners, customers, or employees, people must understand the organization's story -- where it's headed, why you are making these changes, how you work, and how you think. Otherwise, you're going to lose valuation, sales, new opportunities, or employees. That's why teaching is important."

7. Practice vulnerability without sacrificing credibility.

To some people, being a teacher -- or a leader -- means appearing as though you have all the answers. Any sign of vulnerability or ignorance is seen as a sign of weakness. Those people can make the worst teachers, says Parker Palmer, a longtime instructor and author of The Courage to Teach: Exploring the Inner Landscape of a Teacher's Life (Jossey-Bass, 1997).

Sometimes the best answer a teacher can give is, "I don't know." Instead of losing credibility, she gains students' trust, and that trust is the basis of a productive relationship. "We all know that perfection is a mask," says Palmer. "So we don't trust the people behind know-it-all masks. They're not being honest with us. The people with whom we have the deepest connection are those who acknowledge their struggles to us."

Acknowledging what you don't know shows that you're still learning, that the teacher is, in fact, still a student. For the leader of an organization, this is a delicate balancing act, says Mike Leven, former president of Holiday Inn Worldwide and now chairman and CEO of U.S. Franchise Systems Inc. "While it's okay not to know a lot of things, people do depend on you to know the answers to certain questions. You don't want people asking, 'Why is he running the company?' "

8. Teach from the heart.

The best teaching isn't formulaic; it's personal. Different people teach Shakespeare in different ways because of who they are and how they see the world. Or, as Palmer says, "We teach who we are." The act of teaching requires the courage to explore one's sense of identity. If you don't fully know yourself, Palmer says, you can't fully know your students, and therefore, you can't connect with them. People compensate by using clever technique until they figure this out. Maybe, he says, the jazz musician Charlie Parker put it best: "If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn."