The proudest moment I had this week was when a new student came into class. The student was complaining that he did not want to be in the class. He wanted to go back to his home school, did not want to participate in class activities. The student was generally agitated. Last year, I would have insisted the student tow the line, improve his attitude, do his assignments, etc. and the kid probably would have acted out in a negative manner. I left him alone. After awhile he got on track and had a good day. When he calmed down I told him I knew it was a difficult transition to come to a new school and if he still wanted to go back to his home school I would help him do that but I thought he should give our school a chance before he made the decision.
The student has done a good job the rest of the week and tells me he wants to stay in the class. Sometimes the best action to take is no action at all. It took some time for me to understand that in teaching more is not always better and in taking disciplinary action I've learned to ask myself is the action I'm taking about me or about what is best for the student. It's not always easy to be honest with oneself about the reasons we take disciplinary action. Anyway, I was proud of the fact that, in my mind, I had matured in a small way as a teacher.
You said "It took some time for me to understand that in teaching more is not always better and in taking disciplinary action I've learned to ask myself is the action I'm taking about me or about what is best for the student."
ReplyDeleteThats great Johnny. I see many teachers everyday who have this backwards. It is living proof that its not just my judgement when our ISS is holding 20 a day and is backed up for 1 1/2 months at the moment. Teaching isnt just a job of standards based learning, it every bit as much about life lessons. Cant get those lessons in ISS.