When I was still in the classroom, I was a busy teacher. I prided myself at being a multi-tasker (still guilty of this one 😀). I could easily carry on conversations while finishing emails, grading that last line, looking for something in my desk…
One day (in the faculty lounge), a colleague was complaining about the lack of respect she was receiving: Students didn’t seem to care about her, her class, or her content; things that were really important to her. Another teacher spoke up. Essentially the second teacher said that if we don’t make our classrooms full of personal learning experiences, we should expect that kind of behavior to continue.
She said that the first thing we could do was to give students our undivided attention when they spoke. For me, it was like those old V-8 commercials—a slap in the head: DUH. If I want you to know that I value you and your ideas, you need my undivided attention. How could I have been so blind?
From that point forward, I began giving my full attention to my kids. During class, I made
eye contact with every student speaking to me. If a student came into my room during my
conference period, and I was in the middle of a parent email, I would ask them to hold on
for a minute while I finished my thought. That way I could focus all my attention on that
kid. It made a difference.
I began changing the questions I asked and the questions I wrote on tests to include students and their interests. If my question was about vectors and I had a swimmer in my class, it was easy to make the question about "Stan". It was easy to make baseball questions about "Kendall". On numerous occasions I had senior boys stand up and/or yell out during a test, “Hey this question’s about me!” It made a difference.
There are few things more powerful than using a student’s name and interests in class. It lets them know you care. Students may call us “Miss” or “Mister”, but using their names (other than just calling on them to answer a question) is very powerful. Being SEEN is powerful.
And I can tell you--it makes a difference.
Students do better in classrooms where the learning is more personalized to them and their
interests. Sometimes we all wonder how to start making changes. We have to start somewhere so my suggestion is to start small. Give your undivided attention to kids when they're talking to you and personalize your problems. Trust me on this one. It makes a difference.
We all grow from each other’s experiences. Let me know what happens so we can share. It makes a difference.
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