“Here’s the deal. You’ve got to give kids credit at a younger age for
feeling stuff more acutely. When you say something to a kid, you’ve
got to know what you’re saying to them. The stuff you say to a kid
just starting out - you’ve got to be supercareful…. What skill building
really is, is confidence building.”
Skip Engblom from The Talent Code (Coyle, 2009)
I tutor a young man who struggles in middle school a few different ways. At the end of a recent session, he looked up from his notebook and said, “Thanks J. You make me feel smart.” On the one hand, his sentiment felt good at the end of a long day. On the other hand, it bummed me out that his experiences in schools stripped him of his confidence and sense of self. Unfortunately, this happens way too often.
Schools can empower students or they can dismantle them. No student should leave school feeling less confident or with a finished identity than when they started school. Struggle is part of learning, but academic trauma should not be. For too many students schools provide a subtractive experience. Good grades don’t protect students from mental health issues, but for right now let’s focus on the students who struggle in school as a result of their experiences with a small number of educators.
I still grapple with the times teachers made me feel stupid in school. To make matters worse, they did so in public and many of my peers soon shared the teacher’s sentiment. Reputations (both social and academic) stay with students. Fortunately I found it easier to dissuade my friends of this “J = Stupid” notion than teachers.
My academic trauma shaped how I interact with students and how I teach. Let me take you down memory lane.
Fourth Grade - Long division still haunts me. I don’t know why but my brain shut down when Mrs. Khan began teaching us that madness. My brain could not process the steps. Somehow those numbers and operations caused my mind to flatline. She offered to work with me after school 1:1 away from the judgment of my classmates. Despite her patience and best efforts, I just couldn’t make sense of the process. As I stood staring at the board, chalk in hand, I looked over to see such a look of disappointment and disbelief on my teacher’s face. I gave up immediately. Now I still love Mrs Khan and don’t think she meant to cause me math trauma. Whatever her intent, the impact began a long road of math anxiety.
Junior High School - I struggled in seventh, eighth, and ninth grades many different ways. The math anxiety from fourth grade morphed into math despair during my years at RJHS. In seventh grade Mr. Lipman tried, but gave up. At one point during the year he asked us what we wanted to be as adults so he could share the role math would have in our chosen careers. When I told him I wanted to pursue marine biology he laughed and told me to choose another career. Confused, I asked why. He replied with, “you’d never succeed with your math skills.” Ok journalism it is. I don’t remember his name but my eighth grade teacher was a giant of a man who told the other students that their work was “TREMENDOUS” when he handed back our Friday quizzes every Monday. He marked them with thick red pencil, and pinned them to the board across the back of the room after he commented on our work. After months of scores in the 20s and 30 (out of 100) he remarked that the 42 I worked so hard for represented futility and a waste of both his time and mine. After that I scored in single digits for a full month. I don’t really remember my ninth grade teacher but I do remember my new math tutor who was more of a math therapist. He coached me up and helped heal my math trauma before high school started.
High School - Somehow I found myself in tenth grade honors English with Ms Goller. This was a year of transition and transformation, but Ms Goller didn’t care. Things were not great. I just didn’t measure up to her ever shifting demands. At some point we read Tess of the d'Urbervilles. I thought the book sucked but knew that it was considered a classic. I tried, I really tried but just didn’t see what the big deal was about this book. So my literary analysis (40%of my grade) did not impress her. We then had to choose an author to study and analyze their work (10-15 page paper). I chose Rudyard Kipling. To this day I don't know what happened, but it wasn’t an awesome paper. As Ms Goller walked around handing back our papers, she commented on each person’s paper. When she got to mine, she rolled her eyes and announced to the class that I was incapable of cohesive thought and said, “Mr. Juelis, are you in fact stupid?” Stunned, I walked out. Later on in high school (thanks to my 10th grade experience) the head of the English Department would not allow me to submit writing to the school literary magazine “because I couldn’t possibly have anything meaningful to contribute.” Evidently my reputation preceded me.
Teachers have power and as my Mom used to say, “a sacred obligation” to their students. They can’t just throw out flippant comments. Most of us learn this the hard way early in our careers and quickly pivot and amend our interaction style. Unfortunately a few educators don’t make the connection between what they say and how they say it with how their words impact students. Intent doesn’t really matter. It’s the impact on students that matters. Mistakes happen and the teachers who acknowledge their error and the damage done can undo and heal that damage through acknowledgement and corrective action most of the time.
The words teachers use when they talk to students matters. As an educator what you say and how you say it has a tremendous impact on the trajectory of student learning. Throw out the big speeches aimed at inspiring and motivating students. Instead, pay attention to the little things. Know your students. Those brief comments or few words have the biggest impact.
At DTL our goal is for students to say, “Yeah I got this.” We want them to leave us with more self confidence and self efficacy than when they arrived. It’s not that we make students feel smart, they were smart when they got here. We just remind them how smart they are.