IAS 31182

About this course

What makes a great teacher? A good one? A mediocre one? What does it take to inspire students to do their best work? Those are some of the questions we'll be asking ourselves in this course about the way teachers have been portrayed on film. Many of the movies we'll be watching in whole or in part are docudramas based on real life educators. Others are straight up documentaries where we can see real teachers at work. Still other films will be entirely fictional. Most will be set in educational institutions but others will take place largely outside of them. In at least one film, we'll encounter a student of another species. What attitudes, philosophies and techniques best nurture learning?