In "Walking Trees" Ralph mentions that he learns about the students' personal lives through his writing conferences. This helps him to build personal relationships with the students and gives meaning to his job. We, as teachers, can learn that children experience some of the same drama, hurt, pain, and disappointment that adults experience.
For the past two weeks, my quietest student has been frantically crying when she gets dropped off in the mornings and at random times during the day. Finally on Friday, the mother told me that the girl had not seen her father in two weeks. She does not eat at home or sleep. Unfortunately, mom and dad are no longer together, but this is just an example of how everyday marital issues can affect the children.
Children will love you without bias and they will follow you without reason. Keeping this in mind we, as teachers, can also learn how develop a genuine respect and interest for all people. Looking past their physical appearances, pet peeves, and so on. I am not saying that this is an easy skill, but any lesson learned is a lesson worth teaching.
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5 comments:
Thanks for sharing your story with us! It is a good story to help remind us, that even young children, could carry a great deal of weight on thier tiny shoulders. We, as educators, need to learn that no matter how small a child is, they all have their own problems to worry about and not evey child is carefree.
I think the story you shared about your student is a great example that shows that all children do not lead carefee lives. They may not have to necessarily worry about adult responsibilities, but not all children live in a "perfect home". My uncle works in a public school and has shared endless heartbreaking stories with me about the children in his school. As teachers, we must keep an open mind and realize that all children come from different backgrounds along with a different set of circumstances.
The story you shared with us is a good one. It is important for us as future teachers to realize that some children face many pressures outside of home such as the example you provided about parents not being together any longer. Teacher's face many pressures but I think its important for teachers to support student's and take at least 5 minutes of your time to talk, listen and acknowledge thier home problems. Both the teacher and the student will gain from this. Children from problematic homes will feel a lot better about coming to school knowing there is someone else to talk to.
As a teacher, spending nine months a year with students, it is natural to form personal connections and become deeply invested in the lives of students. However, the balance between caring about students and adhering to professional boundaries is quite delicate. I have taught children who clearly did not have easy home lives, and while it is natural to give these students extra attention and support, it is important to treat all students as equals. Additionally, parents can become very sensitive (to the point of angry and argumentative) if they feel a teacher is probing too much into their personal family issues. It is a tremendous challenge to decipher whether or not a child is having a "normal" rough time (as with a divorce or adjusting to a new baby) or experiencing something of greater concern (as with abuse or a parent's alcoholism). Should we as educators choose to take action, we must be certain that we can both support our claims and not waver in our efforts to help the child in need. On the other hand, there are teachers who choose not to become involved in student's personal lives at all, and who maintain a strict teacher-student relationship. Figuring out what type of teacher we will become, and how entrenched in student's lives we wish to be, is an important step in our professional development, and one that has the potential to reach far beyond the parameters of our own lives.
Great story, it is so nice to hear it from a person who is actually teaching. I am not in the classroom and hope to remember your story when I get there. We do need to remember that our students have many things going on in their lives and we as teachers should be there to listen and support them, not to make snap judgments.
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