on tuesdays, i give teaching tips

I want to start something new on Tuesdays.

My profession as a teacher isn’t just a job for me; it is one of my passions. I think of myself as extremely lucky. When I get to work in the morning, I am so happy. Yes, there are mornings where I need some caffeine before I want one of my students to talk to me, in fear of saying something sarcastic and snotty for no reason, (I am not a morning person). But, overall, I get excited to go to work every single morning. I love what I do.

I want my blog to also reflect my life passions. I am on a journey of finding a new path. I want more out of life at the present time; I don’t want to have my sight sets on the next scan or pout when I don’t get answers about becoming a mother, I want to be happy with where I am. Teaching and enjoying moments in my classroom is definitely a step towards the right direction.

So, on Tuesdays, I will give teaching tips 🙂

Today’s Tip: look beyond the student at the desk in your classroom. 

Recently, I was frustrated with a student in my Reading class. He treated school as his social event for the day, didn’t care about homework, test scores, or succeeding. He is a bright student, who has a lot of potential of growing academically and doing big things in his future, but he didn’t seem to care about any of that.

I found myself replying with short answers to his questions in class, even if they were about what I did over the weekend, because in my mind, why should I take the time to help him with a homework assignment when he won’t finish it or care how he does on it? I had labeled him as a ‘problem student’ and no matter my efforts, I wasn’t going to change who he was or make him understand how capable he really is.

One afternoon we had finished our lesson and activity in class early, and we had five extra minutes at the end of the hour to visit. I was asking the class if they had any plans for the weekend, and this young man’s hand went up right away, and he was wildly waving it around so I would notice and call on him, (“I will call on students who are sitting with their hands nicely in the air”). Eventually I made my way around the room and called on him to share. He informed the class that he was going to Chicago for a funeral because his favorite grandpa had died.

Why did he so badly want to share such a sad story? 

I replied that my grandmother had passed away last spring and that I knew how he felt. I also shared that it helps me to write and think about her sometimes, to remind myself how lucky I was to have a grandma like her. He nodded his head in response and looked like he got teary eyed.

He was gone the next couple days, but when he returned, before class started, I asked him how he was feeling and how the weekend went. He told me it was really sad and that he didn’t know how things were ever going to go back to the way they were. I explained things will be different, that they won’t be exactly the same, but if he ever needed to talk, I would be here to listen, because I have been very sad & in his position.

The next day, he came with his homework done (!!!) and informed me that him and his dad started talking about his grandpa the night before and while they were talking, he had gotten out his homework and his dad had helped him with it because his grandpa used to do the same thing for his dad. I praised him and told him how proud I was that he was able to get his homework done while going through such a tough time.

As began the small chats daily we would have that continued, and led to conversation after conversation between this student and myself. He started coming to class with his homework complete, (“Great job! You are doing so well in here! It is so great for me to see you working so hard”), and participating in class discussions – not just raising his hand to say a snide remark about the discussion topic, and continued to engage in conversation with me daily, (his desk is right next to mine).

One day, while walking around the room during work time, I stuck a post-it note on his desk that said – “I’m so proud of the way you have worked in Reading class. You are such a smart young man, & your grade is finally showing it! Keep making me proud! Keep up your hard work!”

The smile that spread across face made me teary eyed. I could still get emotional thinking about it. He taped it on the inside of his planner & I often catch him looking at it, smiling.

Again, my teaching tip for today – look beyond the student at the desk in your classroom. 

I did not think I would ever be a teacher that ‘gave up,’ but it is a lot easier said than done at times. I was able to build a relationship and connect with a student that had F’s in almost every class. Now, in Reading class, he is earning a B-, (the rest of his classes still need some work).

I was asked by my team what I am doing with this student that’s working, and all I could respond with was, “I started talking with him about some real life problems. We connected and related by going through something similar; everything else fell into place.” 

xo