Teaching by Heart: One Professor's Journey to Inspire

by Thomas J DeLong

The best teachers are leaders, and the best leaders are teachers. Teaching by Heart summarizes the author's key insights gained from more than forty years of teaching and managing. It illustrates how teachers can both lift people up and let them down. It proposes that the best teachers are also leaders, and the best leaders are also teachers. In examining how to lead and teach, renowned Harvard Business School professor Thomas J. DeLong takes the reader inside his own head and heart. He notes that, as teachers, we often focus more on our inadequacies and missteps than on our strengths and unique talents. He explains why this is so by dissecting and analyzing his own experiences--using himself as a case study. The book's goal is to help readers learn about the intricacies of teaching and managing, and to impart lessons about how teachers can create a unique teaching atmosphere. To do this, the author analyzes the process of creating a curriculum, preparing for an eighty-minute class, managing the fifteen minutes before class begins, and evaluating the nature of the teaching experience after the session concludes. Along the way, he connects specific classroom behaviors with leadership issues--in organizations, in teams, and in personal relationships. He also asks--and answers--some provocative questions, such

Genres: Education, Teaching, Audiobook, Nonfiction, Business, Leadership, Biography

240 pages, Hardcover

Published January 14, 2020

Reviews

[Trinanjana · Rating 2 out of 5]

part memoir part insights about the educational system this book is more about the author's journey and less about the systems and issues and innovative methods of teaching. Most of the time I couldn't associate myself with the book. its a pass for me.

[riley]

read for class – I agree with the lukewarm reviews, this book is very repetitive and I'm not sure who it's "for"

[Haley Lancaster · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quite frankly, if you were not at least a high school teacher this book is not going to be very relevant. Part memoir, part advice, Delong details his experience teaching at the collegiate level, and his brief stint in the business world. While I agree with a lot of his musings on good teachers being good leaders, and vice versa, large passages of the book felt like I was trapped in one of his Socratic narratives from his college classes.
What is most relevant is his section towards the end of the book about the benefit of evaluation and feedback for good teachers. Quite honestly, I wish that he frontloaded the book with that and spent more time on this issue. Secondary classroom in the K through 12 structure are extremely isolating, with our feedback only being tied to evaluations. His description of a collaborative setting in which professors honestly evaluate each other both before during and after teaching sounds like an academic fairy utopia. Honestly, I wish that it would happen more in the high school setting.
While I appreciate his honesty about his own anxieties as a teacher, he spoke of them so often I myself was beginning to get anxious. While I agree wholeheartedly in positive relationships making classroom management better, he is working in an academic setting in which all of his students are engaged and invested in being there. HBS students are not K through 12 public school students. There are no practical tips for engaging and teaching the disengaged student, or the student coming with a heavier backpack.

[April · Rating 2 out of 5]

Like many other reviewers, I'm just not sure who/what this book is for. It's kind-of memoir and kind-of pedagogical philosophy, but it doesn't quite work as either. There were moments that I felt like what he was saying was solid, but there wasn't anything really NEW about anything.

I have a feeling he's a great teacher that a lot of business students really love and that people told him he should write a book about how he does it. But it doesn't translate well into something that a teacher can really take and apply. With advice like "be authentic" (which is clearly important in teaching) without anything really new to say about hit except his own experience, it didn't feel like much to take away.

Especially because it is so removed from K-12 teaching, the title feels a bit misleading. All of the advice can be applied to teachers at every level, but the steps he takes to do these things (like going into his classroom 20 minutes before each class to prepare and transition or having a class, a meeting, and a student appointment ALL IN ONE DAY!) didn't translate well into other levels of teaching. By trying to universalize his business leadership and teaching in business school across all teaching and leadership, it lost much of its impact.

Maybe college professors would find this more helpful. It seems that reviewers didn't really think it was all that helpful for leadership in general either, so...

[Greg · Rating 5 out of 5]

I happened to read this book during the celebration of World’s Teachers Day. What a fitting coincidence! It is not every day that I get to read a book about the experiences of a professor in one of the best business schools of the planet. For the reading experience I am so grateful.

What makes this book really great for me is its readability. For the entire time I spent reading this, it feels like Professor DeLong has been my constant companion, providing me the eyes of what it feels like to be a professor in Harvard Business School.

I work as a trainer in my company and the lessons Professor DeLong imparts really resonate with me. I get to learn how he loves his students and the importance of preparation for every class. I also get to understand his frustrations and the politics of his workplace. I learned about his students. Somehow I am still aspiring to study there someday.

Reading this book creates a feeling of receiving a wonderful gift. The lessons the professor imparts to the reader is not just about teaching but an inspiration to make a difference to others. He presents the perspective that the world of teaching is not easy but it is worth it.

[Sami · Rating 1 out of 5]

Like many of the reviewers who have commented before me, I just don't really understand why and for whom this book was written. As an educator, I often gravitate towards books about pedagogical philosophy and teaching strategies. However, despite a promising title, this book was hardly about education at all. Rather, Delong's memoir seemed to be a mostly self-congratulatory reflection on his pathway to professorship at Harvard Business School.
Delong does seem to be passionate about teaching his students and mentoring fellow faculty members, and he does have some powerful insights about how to reach his students and reflect on his own teaching practices, but they're few and far between and the rest of the book doesn't make those nuggets worth it.

[Larry · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was written by one of my favorite professors. I only had a couple classes with him, but the energy he gave off was incredible and he left a lasting impression on me.

Now, if you read this book, and you don’t know Professor DeLonge personally, you may not fully appreciate it. Which is clear from the reviews. In this book, DeLonge shares very personal inner conflicts. He gives you access to his brain which seem completely antithetical to the man I saw in the room. Which makes me like him even more.

Reviews have stated that this book is part memoir and part teacher’s guide. I agree. And if you open yourself to what he shares, it will make you a better teacher, mentor, parent, and/or partner.

[Joy Kirr · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't know the true purpose of this book. He did share many things I've experienced, and I think he tried to put ideas together to share that we'll never be the perfect teacher we want to be.

A few things in my teaching life were reinforced:
Listen. Be present. Know the material. Connect the lesson to the last lesson. Learn about the students. Share stories.

One lesson I'll share with students:
Difficult conversations grow courage.

And I learned the term for why I focus on negative feedback over positive feedback:
Asymmetric Effect with a Negative Bias

Note: I listened to this one free from Libro.FM.

[T Olsen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an interesting book on teaching, but it's very personal and specialized. There are some general tips on teaching, but most apply to smart and very motivated students in the Harvard case system. My experience is from teaching drafted soldiers how to operate a tank, so there aren't many similarities.

[Annarella · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this book can surely interest people who teach but, even if I like them, I found it hard to see it applied to my work (L&D).
I think it's perfect for university students or people in higher education.
Recommended to people who teaches.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine

[Ray Andrus · Rating 4 out of 5]

I would have given it 5 stars, but he referenced "Turn & Talk" (UGH). I listened to the audio version. It was a great reflexive book that helped me, at the end of a school year, think about what and why I've taught a certain way and how I want to adjust for the future.

[Melanie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I would not recommend. While the writing is clear, the content is neither revolutionary nor creative. The author clearly did not go through a formal education program as his "insights" are learned and discussed during teacher preparatory programs for K-12.

[Dimitri · Rating 3 out of 5]

My highlights: https://learning.oreilly.com/u/748020...

[Fatima. B · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5

[Nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an authentic and curious book, both. I say curious, because I'm not altogether sure why the author wrote it. It reads like a memoir of the inner life of his teaching career, and maybe that's enough of a reason to write a book. But it's not clear to me what the sum total of the insights, insecurities, and moments adds up to. It's not a how-to book; we couldn't teach a class after reading it. And it's not a leadership book, except by inspiration, perhaps. If Professor DeLong inspires us to think more authentically and delve more deeply into the insights, insecurities, and moments of our own careers, perhaps that's a good thing and justification.

Perhaps Professor DeLong simply wanted a record of the authentic struggle teaching has been for him. That I respect, of course. But in that sense it's a bit like a diary. And usually we only want to read the diaries of great creative artists or politicians or the like. We want to know their take on the events or the creative works or the momentous occasions. Do we want to have a great teacher's take on his or her career? Is a great teacher's diary worth reading?