Learning How to Preach

I've been learning how to preach. Over the last two weeks I have been teaching two preaching practicum classes as intensives. That means we meet every day for two weeks. So, for the past two weeks I have been listening to four sermons a day - grading them, reflecting with the student, critiquing the sermons with the help of the whole class, and reading exegetical journals to see how students got from the first reading of the text to the final draft of the sermon. And, in the process, I have been learning how to preach.
One of the wonderful things about being a teacher is the reality that the teacher always learns more than the students. However, in this forum, I do little preparation. There are no lectures to give, only reactions to the sermons preached. All these students have already taken the basic preaching course and have been trained in what to do to put a sermon together. The practicum is just that - practice. The opportunity to do on the job training. It is a valuable and important part of the seminary experience. However, that doesn't mean that, as a teacher, I am not learning as much or more than the students. I am.
Thinking through the sermons that I hear is a wonderful learning experience. Hearing how the other students react to and work with the sermons they hear is another wonderful teaching-learning tool. I've learned more in the last two years about preaching than I have in many years. It's not just the books I've been reading or the classes I've been taking but it's the student sermons I've been listening to on a regular basis. When we moved to Pasadena I wanted to visit many churches and hear many preachers and experience many worship styles. That has not worked out in the way I thought it might (I have been doing Interim work almost since I arrived). However, I have listened to more sermons than I ever have in my life. Between being a TA and being an adjunct teaching practicums, I have been listening to 15-20 sermons each quarter - and sometimes as high as 50 sermons in a 3 month span. This listening process has been rich and wonderful.
My suggestion to those who are preaching weekly is to find a way to listen to others preach, too. I don't know that the television is a good source of good preaching, but there are other ways to use the Internet and find some valuable sermons to hear. Get some tapes, borrow some sermons from a neighborhood pastor or church archives, or find a way to purchase some videos of great preachers (there are video series out there featuring great preachers and one called the Chicago Sunday night series that has some real names). I have learned that there is much to learn from listening to others.