Teaching With Heart Part III
If you want to model how to be a good, functioning member of society to your students then owning up to your mistakes is a great place to focus. So many of the most difficult students we encounter are accustomed to being blamed for everything. They’re also asked to meet expectations the entire time they’re at school, and it can be exhausting for them. It can also be disheartening because every time they don’t meet an expectation they either get in trouble or feel like they’ve failed. If we want our students to own up to mistakes, then they need to see us doing the same. It’s not weak to admit fault, if anything it bolsters your credibility with the students. It’s also important to remind them not we don’t expect perfection, just want progress and consistent effort.
Let’s take another student from my first year at Middle School X. “Alisa” (named obviously changed) was a BI student, with her own unique set of issues. She scored so low on the assessment for struggling readers she couldn’t be accurately assessed , and she had a borderline IQ score in the low 70s. She’d also been sexually abused by multiple adults during her time in the foster care system. Despite all of this, she showed up to class every day and legitimately wanted to learn. She hated not being able to read or write and it was important to her to improve. But she also had an extremely short fuse and many, many different triggers. Once something set her off, she would typically yell some expletives, storm out of the room, slam the door, and open it again to yell some more expletives. She was the poster child for a kid who wanted to do well but had just about every card in the deck stacked against her. She lacked the support systems, the academic skills, the loving parents, the stable home, and the social skills to do well in school. As a teacher it can be easy to take some things for granted.
You probably[1] got into teaching because you had good experiences in school. That was the case for me because school was a refuge from a chaotic home life. But I was also very strong academically, so I enjoyed playing the game of school. Many of our most challenging students just do not have the same background. For them being in school might be a nice respite from their home lives, but it can also be extremely demoralizing when they can’t engage with the content in their classes. Even the most resilient of students can give up when they’re asked to do the undoable every day.
Despite all, this Alisa did her best just about every day even when it didn’t look like it. Every time Alisa had a blow up in class, she would express sincere remorse upon returning. She didn’t want to be so volatile, but she didn’t know what else to do. Students who’ve experienced or are experiencing significant trauma develop their own coping and defense mechanisms. Some students shut down to avoid attention, others explode with anger so they can escape the situation. It doesn’t always make sense but try to see it from the kid’s perspectives. Whatever coping mechanism they’ve developed has gotten them this far so it must be working. Furthermore, they’ve never had a compelling reason to learn any other coping mechanisms because if they had… well, they would be using them. So for Alisa a big show of anger was her way of meeting an emotional need. After getting to know her, my best hypothesis was that her behavior was a mix of a cry for help and a desperate attempt to avoid feeling dumb. And she knew that this wasn’t a good method to get what she wanted, but she didn’t know what else to do.
It can be so frustrating when students act out or behave in ways that we don’t understand. But every behavior meets a need and if we don’t provide alternatives for the kids, then they’re never going to learn to do something else. Intuitively, most teachers understand academic deficits and the various ways to ameliorate them. I mean that’s what teaching is, right? For the most part we don’t get angry when students are lacking academic skills and we should apply the same logic to social-emotional or behavioral deficits. Most kids don’t want to get in trouble, but they also don’t have the tools to succeed in school. Through my conversations with other teachers, I get the impression that this is a point of contention. It’s not our jobs to be counselors, parents, social workers, or behavioral specialists. And that’s a fair point, it would be awesome if society could get its shit together and meet the needs of our students. But the choice between waiting for that to happen and addressing the needs as best I can is an easy one for me. Don’t forget that doing so will make your life easier too. The way that some of my colleagues talk about their students honestly disgusts me. Yeah, the kids can be shitty but being shitty back to them isn’t going to change it, it’s just going to make it worse. Yes, their parents have failed them but that doesn’t give us license to do the same. You don’t have to tolerate misbehavior or disrespect but you shouldn’t respond in a mean or derogatory way. In addition to being unprofessional, it’s ultimately counterproductive.
So back to Alisa. Every time she had a blow up, we would process and try to work on identifying what had set her off. We worked on calming techniques like mindful breathing. We talked about how every day was a fresh start and if she made a mistake all that mattered was learning from it. Every day, Alisa made a bit of progress whether academically or socially. And I made sure that she knew I noticed. The day she stormed out of the room and slammed the door but didn’t reopen the door to swear at everyone was a great success. She’d changed her behavior in a positive way. Soon after that she was simply storming out of class without any door slamming at all. By the end of the year she would just raise her hand to ask for a break. We have to acknowledge these baby steps because we’re not going to change years and years of learned negative behaviors. What if I had gotten mad at her for slamming the door that one day she didn’t come back in and swear at everyone? She would have received the message that her progress didn’t matter. That she wasn’t good enough. Yeah, it would have been great if she didn’t slam the door at all but you have to teach the kids that incremental progress is okay. One of my favorite moments in teaching was the day I saw Alisa writing her own flash cards so she could study vocabulary on her own. It didn’t happen overnight, but it happened.
I can’t remember what offhand comment I made, but I distinctly remember the incident. Class was going well but Alisa was off her game. She was clearly agitated about something and was taking it out on her classmates by making obnoxious comments. After a few of them, I snapped at her. I don’t remember exactly what I said, and I don’t think it was terribly rude on my part or anything but to Alisa, it was clearly hurtful. She immediately shut down and put her head on the table. After a moment of reflection I stopped class and apologized.
“I’m sorry,” I told the room. “It’s not an excuse but it’s been a tough day for me and I didn’t mean to be rude to you all.”
I asked Alisa to stay after class so we could talk. The apology was as much for Alisa as it was for the rest of the class. We have to be willing to own up to our own mistakes to show students the kind of behavior we expect of them.
“Kiddo,” I began softly. “I’m sorry that I took out my frustration on you. It wasn’t fair and it wasn’t right.”
She grunted a noncommittal response.
“Are you doing okay today?” I asked. “You seemed like you were really upset during class.”
“I just found out that we’re moving,” she finally said. “I don’t want to move. I like it here.”
“I’m sorry kiddo and I’m sorry I made your day worse by being rude. You’re going to be okay. You’ve made so much progress this year and I know you’ll keep growing.”
On her last day, Alisa wrote me a note saying thanks for sticking with her.
[1] Results may vary