Like all teaching, the work involved in helping others with their teaching is embedded in relationships. In the case of professional relationships, the content is about something outside of the two or more individuals in the relationship. The potential contents of human relationships are so large and broad that some decisions must be made concerning which content is most relevant, appropriate, and useful at any given time in any given situation. Since we cannot respond in all the ways that are possible, choices have to be made. Others are made because it is thought that teachers either want or expect them, or will attend carefully to them.
Some choices reflect philosophical commitments.
The principles outlined below are recommended for use when considering what content to focus on when interacting with the teachers and student teachers we want to help. The rationale underlying this principle is that the focus on understandings helps the teacher acquire knowledge, ideas, insights, or information he or she can keep and use after the inservice educator has left the scene. It seems reasonable to assume that modified understandings are more likely than prescriptions and directives to help teachers to generate appropriate new behaviors by themselves. To illustrate, one teacher complained that she had been unable to stop one of her kindergartners from persistent hitting of several others in her class. In such a situation, the inservice educator might want simply to prohibit the teacher's hitting by citing a rule or regulation or a philosophical position.