Yesterday I was leading the class through a class discussion when a student starts blasting music from his phone. I remind the student several times "Please put the phone away".... he ignores me. I speak with him individually and he starts to mock me- "Ok whatever you SAY Ms. Tsai blah blah blah BLAH" **makes a weird face
Both the student and I start to feel angry. I feel like I want to grab this kid and shake the immaturity out of him (don't worry I don't actually do that.....but if I could.....) Teaching is unique in that my emotional reaction to day to day situations has a real impact on the students that I serve. More generally, my mindset has a ripple effect through everything I do. In this situation, I have a few choices to make. Do I respond to the anger first? Or do I respond to the situation first? The choice may seem obvious, but I find that in practice making the right choice is easier said than done. In practice, I find that it's easier to default to a place of fear-- If I don't show this student how angry I am, the student won't understand he's in trouble, and I'll lose control of the class. Therefore, I need to assert my authority as the one in charge. But....what would it be like to practice separating myself from fear (fear of losing control of the class....fear of letting kids "get away with" cheating or breaking the rules.......) I was listening to a podcast by Angela Watson, an educator and author, and she introduced me to this idea of radical acceptance. Radical acceptance means dealing "realistically with the facts of the situation and sitting with the discomfort of the present moment instead of insisting it shouldn't be happening". Radical acceptance does not mean "suck it up and muscle your way through it". Radical acceptance is a way to conserve energy in order to actually focus and make change towards the situation at hand. Like mindfulness...but applied in a practical way. Going back to the scenario I wrote about in the beginning of this post, there are two ways I could have responded.
The way I see it, radical acceptance can help us to pause long enough in the present moment when upsetting things occur in school in order to 1) identify our fear and 2) react from a place of confidence. And I'm not saying I'm an expert in actually doing this....but it's something I want to practice going forward. In my student teaching, it was common for me to see teachers shame students, kick them out of class, lecture students harshly, or even call students names. What would happen if teachers were more sensitive to not just how our students are feeling...but how we're feeling? Maybe it could help us stay present, stay engaged, and meet students where they are. Maybe it could help us lead students in the right direction from a place of confidence rather than fear.
1 Comment
TeacherG
2/13/2020 08:40:25 pm
I really enjoyed this post. I agree that this radical acceptance, or slowing down and separating the student’s behavior from them as a person is hard to do in the moment. My knee jerk reaction is to tell them to leave the class, and that’s not a good way with dealing with things. I can’t just kick a kid out every time i feel challenged or threatened (I mean I could try but that would just damage our relationship and make it harder for that kid to want to be in my class and learn) Kudos to you for writing this. It’s nice to know there’s another option, we don’t have to be so punitive. I want to practice this as well.
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Katie TsaiHere to reflect, rant, and spread some love to my fellow beginning teachers! Archives
July 2020
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