It has become a cliché to say that teachers should be life-long learners. That does not make it less true. In this post I am not going to talk about your learning in your subject area or pedagogy or classroom management. Those are self-evident, I would propose.
The more challenging area of growth and learning, I think, is that of Emotional Intelligence. But this is also the one that most of us would like to avoid. We shrug and say: "This is who I am", or "I am not here to be liked" (see Rita Pierson debunk that notion brilliantly).
Which is the worst kind of cop-out if you are a teacher, and even more so if you would presume to be a leader.
Two events conspired serendipitously (as it often does) to make me think of this. The first was an unfortunate conflict between myself and a student in our last week of term, followed a day later by a colleague posting a link to this article by Rosalind Wiseman: https://bigthink.com/future-of-learning/dignity-student-engagement. Do read it, it is not long.
Back to the first event - me ending up in a skirmish with a student. Picture the scene: It is the last week of term. At the best of times, teachers are frayed and volatile in the last week of term. But it was also the term of COVID. I am even more overwhelmed than usual. The Grade 9s have been off campus and being taught remotely for the entire term. For the last week, we have sent the Seniors home to be taught online again and have arranged a series of on-campus workshops for the Grade 9s so that they can do their subject choices for Grade 10. A lot of preparation has gone into this, complicated by all the hoops we have to jump through to manage students coming onto campus for the first time under COVID regulations. Forms had to be completed, etc.
All goes well until one boy arrives on campus late. He has not completed any of the necessary prework or paperwork, even though he clearly got the message because here he is! I confront him. He shrugs me off with "I was very busy last week". I explode. In front of the whole class I launch into a speech/tirade about lack of respect and responsibility, etc. You know the drill. With lots of grumbling I eventually get him settled and register him for the online aptitude test and off we go.
And then it hits me: This boy's grandmother, who had been looking after him for the past several years, passed away two weeks before. I remember his name now - the Dean of Students informed me at the time. He is in the midst of a custody battle. When he said that he had been busy, it was not disrespect, it was a statement of fact. I watch him while he works through the 90-minute long online assessment. His shoulders are drooping. He is completely uninterested in what he is doing. At the break after the assessment I go to him on the playground and apologise. I hope I have saved the rest of the day and subject choice process to some extent.
But the point is not his specific context - although we must never forget that each student arrives on campus every morning with a lot of extra weight in their backpacks that we are not aware of. The point is that I, through my sense of righteous indignation, impinged on his dignity. Any student, even one who might have been guilty of real "disrespect", would lose interest in the task if their dignity is trampled on. This is the point of Wiseman's article above.
I am now 53 years old. I have been in education for 21 years. And still I have to consciously learn how to manage my personal behavioural triggers. I am still growing up and gaining maturity and skills in this very difficult aspect of working with children. And we need to also be aware that students' perception of dignity differs from one place to another. It is our responsibility as educators to be ultra vigilant and humble while we learn about the culture around us.
Read the article again. Watch Rita Pierson's TED talk again. And never forget that how you treat the students at the worst of times is the most important interaction you will have with them. That is where you both grow as human beings. That is our biggest challenge and responsibility.
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