Tutorial Friendly & Fair Teaching

On this page

  1. Order of work
  2. Definition teacher-centred education and student-centred education
  3. Reflecting on your teaching
  4. Differences: primary and secondary education
  5. Differences: preventive and curative
  6. Professional language Friendly and Fair Teaching
  7. Tools FFT
  8. Fixed sections
  9. Form of address
  10. Starting with FFT – Across the school?
  11. Credits

Welcome to the tutorial of Friendly & Fair Teaching. We share all information with our visitors for free and without any obligation. If you have any questions please contact us or sign up for a personal on-line course.

We recommend that you first read this Tutorial before starting with our course material.

Introduction video

For more information check out our other introductory videos here.

1. Order of work

We invite everyone to find their own way through our course material. We recommend this order of working:

  1. First read this page in its entirety. Then you’ll understand why we present our information in a specific or particular way and why we have adjusted the layout accordingly.
  2. Then read the overarching introduction to the course.
  3. Choose a perspective to start with.
  4. Periodically have a look at our Overview. Read this image related to the five perspectives from bottom to top. There you see the consistency of all elements of Friendly & Fair Teaching.
  5. To choose another perspective, read our goal and fill in our questionnaire. Also read the notes to the overview

To avoid getting lost in all this information, use the breadcrumb trail at the top of the page that starts with the text “You are here. If you want to know which page you are on in the middle of a page, move the mouse over the tab of the browser and you will see the title of the page.

On the right side of this page, you will see a menu that allows you to reach all the angles and modules. If you use your mobile, you can reach all the pages with this link.

2. Definition teacher-centred education and student-centred education

Typically, the information of this tutorial applies to both ‘Teacher-centred education’ (You are teaching the entire class – you take the initiative) and ‘Student-centred education’ (working independently where each student takes the initiative). If there are differences in approaches for teacher-centred education and student-centred education, we break the information down into two columns, each with its own image: beret or cap:

Teaching the entire class

In certain cases, it is useful and functional for a group to receive guidance. This could include agreeing on procedures, introducing new topics, or learning a specific skill that everyone needs. Providing guidance or leadership in this way falls under ‘Teacher-centred education’. By this Friendly and Fair Teaching means:

  • To Explain
  • Short exercises with the entire group that follow the explanation. You expect all students to participate in these short exercises. In some of these exercises you determine who works with whom. By determining the group composition, you ensure that now and then students meet other students.
  • In this approach to teaching you have the role of ‘Presenter‘.

If your teaching method resembles this, at ‘Behaviour management strategies‘ use the left column under that says ‘Teaching the entire class’.

If you have your students work for a large part of the lesson on exercises that follow your explanation, at ‘Behaviour management strategies’, use the instructions in the right column with the heading: ‘Working independently’.

There is a pitfall to the one-sided offering of ‘Teacher-centred education’

Working independently

In certain cases, students achieve more if they have a certain amount of freedom. You can think of:

  • choosing assignments themself,
  • self-assessment of assignments,
  • making their own plan,
  • decide for themselves who they work with
  • work at their own pace.
  • Your role in this way approach to teaching is ‘coach‘.

The more you let your students decide for themselves, the more time you should give them to make all these choices. If your teaching method is similar to this, then use at ‘Behaviour management strategies‘ the corresponding right column under the heading ‘Working independently’. Then use a method of assessment that suits this way of working.

If students work for a long time on exercises you have determined, also use the right column under the heading ‘Working independently’.

There is a pitfall to the one-sided offering of ‘Student-centred education’.

Friendly and Fair Teaching advocates alternating ‘Teacher-centred education’ with ‘Student-centred education’.

Pedagogues do not leave children to nature, imagining that those same children would then be able to spontaneously build a democratic society – everything indeed points to the opposite – but they create situations that are both accessible and challenging and in which children can learn at the same time. what has been imposed on them as their freedom to explore.” Meirieu (2016).

On this site, differences in information regarding ‘Teacher-centred education’ (Teaching the entire class – you are in charge) and ‘Student-centred education’ (Working independently in which each student sets their own course)are split into two columns, each with its own image: beret or cap (see the two images above).

3. Reflecting on your teaching

Friendly and Fair teaching divides information into five perspectives:
Establishing a friendly tone, Establishing fairness, Planning lessons, Observing learning and Behaviour management strategies.

Each perspective contributes to a good lesson.

The 5 perspectives of Friendly and Fair Teaching

Figure 1:

‘Establishing a friendly tone’ is at the base of this image. Creating a positive learning environment starts with being friendly.

In this illustration, you see the five perspectives as links of a chain. Each link is indispensable.

The five perspectives of Friendly and Fair teaching as the links of a chain

Figure 2: Chain

FFT uses the colours of a traffic light. With green coloured perspectives, you create a positive learning environment. Disruptions, you handle in a friendly way with the orange/red upper link: Behaviour management strategies

4. Differences: primary and secondary education

There are many similarities between primary and secondary education, but there are also differences. When we name these differences, we do so in two columns, ‘Primary education’ on the left and ‘Secondary education’ on the right.

5. Difference: preventive and curative

  1. Preventive: FFT distinguishes preventive actions by which you create a positive learning environment that ensures less disruptions.
  2. Curative: No matter how you teach, disruption can always occur. The way you resolve a disruption is what FFT calls curative. There is then an element of ‘healing’. As a result, the disruption are managed effectively and mostly solved permanently

More information about Preventive / Curative

6. Professional language of Friendly and Fair Teaching

Over time, Friendly and Fair Teaching (FFT) started using professional language.

  • Some terms we came up with ourselves: Ladder of action, Future behaviour letter, Cheat sheet. The folder you use to count Tips, we call ‘Abacus’.
  • Others were coined or first mentioned by course participants: Motivation coach, Tip, Tip book.
  • Still other terms were adopted from experts, such as ‘Managing expectations’ and ‘Student-centred education’. We use the terms: Qualification, Socialization and Subjectivation from Gert Biesta and later slightly widened their  definitions.

In our ‘Professional language‘ page we explain these terms. (‘About us’).

7. Tools FFT

Friendly and Fair Teaching advises teachers to use two folders (each a kind of flip chart) with which they enhance their teaching.

  1. A folder to indicate what your expectations are.
  2. A folder called “Abacus” with which you indicate when your limit has been reached.

8. Fixed sections of the tutorial modules

FFT divides the five perspectives into fourteen modules.

The modules and perspectives have the same structure. With this structure, all perspectives and modules can be used independently to reflect on your teaching and for modifying an aspect of your teaching.

  • Table of Contents
  • Summary module or perspective / Affirmation / Anecdote-Citation
  • Approach: Here we ask about your current and future way of teaching
  • Introduction video
  • News
  • Examples
  • Introduction
  • Importance of-, Starting with
  • Content
  • Summary
  • Image of a light bulb along with suggestions you can apply in your lessons.
  • Video
  • Credits

9. Form of address

  1. Each perspective and each module begins with a bolded paragraph in the third person plural: ….. teachers… to indicate that this module is for all teachers.
  2. Immediately following the first paragraph is a paragraph in the first person singular: …..I….The sentence is worded so that it seems like you are speaking and you are already applying the perspective. You can imagine through this sentence what you will accomplish if you incorporate this module into your teaching style. This is meant as an affirmation (do not confuse this with a quote).
  3. This is followed by an italicized quote with source citation.
  4. Next, a question about your current approach; this serves as a baseline. In this question, you describe your current way of working regarding this module. Interpret this question as follows: “What am I already doing well regarding this module?”
  5. Then a question about your future approach. This question is about the changes you want to make or have already made yourself. Interpret this question as follows: “What improvements/additions do I make to my teaching.
  6. The content then continues in second person: ……you……As if a coach is explaining FFT to you.

10. Starting with FFT – Across the school?

As a teacher, you can start the FFT tutorial on your own initiative via this page or the school administration can ask several teachers to implement FFT. Read this news item

11. Credits

Michel Couzijn – Teacher Educator UvA Michel advised FFT to ask teachers about their current and future approach to teaching. All modules and perspectives start with these two questions.