I didn’t think a great deal at first about Dan Meyer’s idea of teaching being an art/science that can be sliced into very (infinitesimally thin) slices, but as time went by I found myself using the concept more and more.
Here’s one thin slice that immediately helped me understand what Dan was on about:

In my first year, I realized I often phrased my instructions as questions, tossing out weak mandates like “Would you guys please get down to work now?” because I wanted to be liked. I worked at balancing kindness and firmness (“I need you guys to work quietly now.”) so that we could work and learn more.

After reading Other People’s Children, I reflected on the possible differences between Japanese pedagogical rhetoric (teacher-talk) and that of a white, Western, middle-class male. I reflected on this some more when a colleague returned me a short piece of Japanese I’d written and which he’d proof-read for me, saying, “Use the short form of the verb, not the long form. It makes you sound kinda feminine.” Hmmm. So I started implement that change in my teacher-talk right away. It seems to be working. At least, I notice when I lapse and don’t use it, I get these looks like “Does he seriously expect us to do this?” When I use it, there’s no debate.

Another “slice” is telling students at the outset of each class exactly what that session’s objective is. I did this last semester. I haven’t done it this semester yet. It’s easy for me to dream up good ideas like this; it’s harder to gather the data to then assess whether it’s a strategy worth keeping or not. Would a strategy like this translate into actual immediately measurable results? I didn’t gather any data (other than the usual semi-annual student evaluations which were no worse and no better than previous years), which in turn did not inspire me to continue this practice.

I’ll have to re-think my lesson plan so that it includes more regular assessments of teaching/learning objectives. The only trouble is… that’s hard work! (Damn!).