Don’t Yank the Sage From His Stage

“In most college classrooms,” wrote Alison King in a seminal 1993 article, “the professor lectures and the students listen and take notes. The professor is the central figure, the ‘sage on the stage,’ the one who has the knowledge and transmits that knowledge to the students. […] In this view of teaching and learning,” King argued, “students are passive learners rather than active ones.” And, she continued, “such a view is outdated and will not be effective for the twenty-first century.”

Instead of the transmittal theory described above, King championed a constructivist theory of learning according to which “knowledge [is] constructed—or reconstructed—by each individual knower through the process of trying to make sense of new information in terms of what that individual already knows”—a process called “active learning.” What students need, according to this view, is not a “sage on the stage” but a “guide on the side.” “Essentially,” King explained, “the professor’s role [as a ‘guide on the side’] is to facilitate students’ interaction with the material and with each other in their knowledge-producing endeavor.”

What students need, according to constructivists, is not a “sage on the stage” but a “guide on the side.” King’s article is a somewhat more modest proposal than contemporary readers familiar with the terminology might expect. But reformation efforts often trigger more revolutionary impulses in others. By 2014, Charles D. Morrison of Wilfred Laurier University was not only referring to “the now-clichéd shift from ‘sage on the stage’ to ‘guide on the side’” but was also declaring that it was only “a good start.” Four years later, Ted Dintersmith even approvingly described a school that “has no teachers, just a few adult ‘guides’ who aren’t expected to be subject-matter experts or allowed to answer questions.” Since then, there has been no shortage of academic papers, magazine and journal articles, and blog posts calling for or celebrating the death of the sage on the stage.

There has been no shortage of academic papers, magazine and journal articles, and blog posts calling for or celebrating the death of the sage on the stage. During this time, the “guide on the side” has become almost inseparably intertwined with the concept of the “flipped classroom”—a connection made explicit by Chris McMaster, who writes, “Simply put, flipping the classroom is a shift away from a focus on what the teacher says to an emphasis on what the learner does. This is often portrayed as taking a guide on the side approach instead of a sage on the stage, lecture-centered approach” (emphases in original). This means, as Catherine Lewis notes, that “the traditional lecture is a student’s homework[,] and in-class time is spent on collaborative, inquiry-based active learning.”

There are a number of telling implications in the glowing terms used to describe the flipped classroom and the guide on the side—implications that reveal even more telling assumptions. For example, Thomas Kehoe et al. declare,

If executed correctly, a blended curriculum or a flipped classroom enhances what higher-education teachers want from students: self-guided reading and research, discussion and critical reflection. As Gibbs (1992) argues, the aim of all university classes is not to transfer knowledge within the confines of the teaching space, but rather to motivate self-guided, reflective learning.

It is undoubtedly true that many higher-education teachers aim to motivate self-guided, reflective learning. But it should absolutely not be the case that they don’t also aim to transfer knowledge, even within the confines of the teaching space. And the “sage” is in a far better position to accomplish both objectives than is the “guide”—especially when he is allowed a stage to do it from.

Relegating the teacher to a secondary (or even tertiary) supporting role as a “guide on the side” implicitly devalues what it is that sets him apart from his students: his education, knowledge, and professional experience. We reduce him to a mere repository of information. This may have initially been a bug in the system, but, in any case, it is now a feature. The transformation of the teacher’s role from “sage” to “guide” and the corollary “flip” of the classroom have been aided by obsessions with “power,” biases against “privilege,” and efforts to dismantle “systemic” and “institutional” structures of “oppression”—all of which are represented by the “sage on the stage.”

One of the consequences of this impulse is a loss of authority: Even if he also happens to qualify as a “sage,” a “guide on the side” simply doesn’t command the same respect that the “sage on the stage” does. It is surely no coincidence that, as measures of student engagement and learning are demonstrably falling, anecdotal evidence suggests that teachers at every level are disrespected, even abused, by students who see them more and more as semi-skilled service workers. This is more than legitimate grounds for grievance by highly educated and experienced professionals. It negatively impacts the teacher-student relationship and creates further impediments to student learning.

In more immediate and practical terms, though, the sage on the stage is able to model and promote real learning in ways that a guide on the side cannot.

In more immediate and practical terms, the sage on the stage is able to model and promote real learning in ways that a guide on the side cannot. The work that ostensibly takes place in the flipped classroom can be replicated outside of the classroom. The teacher can guide student learning through assignment prompts, one-on-one discussions during office hours, emailed responses to questions, and feedback on assignments. Guided learning can also come through student-organized study groups, peer editing, and academic support services. There is no shortage of opportunities for self-reflective, active learning—and potential guides to facilitate it—outside of the classroom.

Contrary to widespread characterizations, the sage on the stage does far more than merely transmit information to a necessarily passive audience. The same is not true of lectures delivered from a sage’s stage. Contrary to widespread characterizations, the sage on the stage does far more than merely transmit information to a necessarily passive audience. The lecture, write Amanda Fulford and Áine Mahon, “should … be seen as a special form of human encounter.” And it is a human encounter that allows for the kind of “guidance” that the flipped classroom may or may not actually provide in practice.

This is particularly true when the lecture is delivered live. Students not only are able to think critically about the material that is being presented, but they may also be able to ask questions about it and receive answers in real time. They may even be able to engage in dialogue with the lecturer.

In the best lectures, though, the sage on the stage isn’t merely able to temporarily assume the role of a guide: He acts as a guide in his role as a sage. A good lecture isn’t the regurgitation of information gleaned from sources that could be provided directly to students to be read on their own. It is the product of the kind of active learning that teachers seek to promote—a synthesis of information, critical analysis, and informed interpretation on a specific subject, carefully prepared within a particular context for a target audience for specific purposes. In this, it serves as a real-world example of “active learning.” In a piece titled “In Defense of Lecturing,” professor Mary Burgan notes that lecturers serve as “models of knowledgeable adults grappling with first principles in order to open their students’ understanding. […] The phenomenon of a grown-up person capable of talking enthusiastically and sequentially can show students how they themselves might someday be able to think things through.” Lectures thus provide students with the opportunity to see that “the passionate display of erudition [is] valuable in itself—regardless of the rewards of approval or popularity.” Those students “rarely … have the chance to observe intellectual mastery and excitement in their daily world. When they find it on a campus, it validates the life—the liveliness—of the mind.”

This describes why I wanted to become a teacher: I was blessed as an undergraduate to behold “the passionate display of erudition” in the courses that I took—most forcefully and memorably in the lectures delivered by teachers whose effectiveness came first and foremost from the depth and breadth of knowledge that they possessed. Their displays of intellectual mastery did more than simply validate the life and liveliness of the mind. It motivated me to do the work that real learning requires. Indeed, it made me want to do the work—because it taught me to enjoy it.

None of this means that direct instruction is always the best approach—that there is no room at all for facilitated “active learning” in an occasionally “flipped” classroom. In practice, almost every sage occasionally leaves the stage to guide from the side. As Peter Stanton argues, “the ideal teacher should be able to act as both a sage on the stage and a guide on the side, and they should carefully evaluate when it’s most valuable to use each approach.”

What I do mean, however, is that the guide on the side is no substitute for a sage on the stage. Students do, in fact, need a sage—for his education, knowledge, experience, and expertise. And if students are to receive the full benefit of these things, the sage needs his stage—even if he may occasionally leave it to guide from the side.

David C. Phillips is an English teacher who lives in Greensboro, North Carolina.