Variety is the Spice of Life

Reflecting upon my writing programme I noticed that the spark and the creativity had gone from the students in their work. For some of them, personal voice had become less prevalent. During conferencing, we are predominantly talking about learning goals and rubric targets, next steps. Descriptive language was being used and praised, but more in the tone of including some for 'my audience' rather than exploring words and being creative and imaginative. In short, writing isn't as fun as it used to be. 

A solution I'll introduce is to include a variety of literacy activities as part of a class writing tumble. The intention is to keep the writing aspect fresh and use oral and visual independent activities to develop an audience and foster creativity in the students.

A Bit of Wiggle Room Helps

Ever been spoken to in an angry manner by someone higher than yourself? When someone has sternly laid out how things are going to be and that you have no say in the matter, have you sat there thinking, "Why are they speaking like that? Why won't they listen to my perspective?"
Often when someone starts growling at us, as adults, we can become defensive and respond in similar fashion to how we perceived we are being spoken to.


With the pace of teaching and learning, and all eyes being on achieving next learning steps, meeting learning goals, reaching national standards. The treadmill can sometimes be cranked up to full speed. In these moments, it can be easy, at times, for teachers to subconsciously transfer our sense of pressure onto the students in terms of putting pressure on them to perform. The learning needs to be demonstrated in the work, in order, in a way that meets success criteria, before testing and moderating to prove that progress is happening.

A lesson I have re-learned is that these are kids. They have good days and bad days, just like us. They have things that they are subjected to that motivate or upset them, just like us. Sometimes they wake up in the morning and feel like today is just too hard, just like us. When they feel that the pressure is too much and they are struggling to think of everything they need to do, and cope in doing it all, they can snap. Just like us.
Often, in our students lives, they have little or no say on what happens to them, what they can do or when they do it. If they feel frustrated or confused, what are their options?


Expectations can be explained just as easily in a reasoned tone, even implicitly. By giving students the wiggle room to allow the message to be absorbed in a clam manner, we give our them the opportunity to allow themselves to make good choices without having to 'save face', and we give ourselves some room to escalate action if bad choices continue to be deliberately made.


Authority isn't always about being the boss. If you go straight to angry, you get angry back. By giving my student the wiggle room required to control their decision making. I am empowering them to be a more effective self manager and an independent learner.

Self Belief is Important.

Interactions with some of my students recently made me aware of the importance of consistently sharing the good that you see in them, and the belief that they can be achieve.

These students want to be good. They want to achieve. They can identify the areas they want to achieve and the steps to achieving their goals. There was one vital ingredient missing. The belief that they could achieve. Their lack of belief manifested itself as poor behaviour, copied work, incomplete tasks, avoidance, tasks that hadn't even been started. After trying every carrot and stick trick in the book, an impromptu (individual) talk with some of them accidentally unlocked the door to progress.

One student told me that he thought I was his best teacher, ever. (Despite me being 'on his case' about achieving his learning goals) I know a lot of students say that to their teachers every year so I didn't suddenly feel like 'Super-teacher'. I just politely thanked him and asked him why. His answer surprised me. "Because sometimes school is hard and you make me feel like I can do this stuff." After all of the planning and preparation, which is a vital part of being and effective teacher, it was the peripheral encouragement and positive feedback that fueled his self belief that success was possible. 

When talking with another, he broke down when I told him that he was capable and that I believed he could meet his learning goals, and even extend them. "No. I'm stupid." he sobbed as he thumped the desk. The problem was crystal clear and the solution was simple. We have now adopted a mantra of pointing out the positives and referring to successes already achieved to reinforce student self-belief that they can succeed. The results are pleasing in both academic progress, and in classroom behaviour.

I realise that simply telling a student that you believe in them and constantly repeating that is not a magic bullet that fixes all behaviour and learning problems. It's not always the solution. Those words on their own are hollow, empty rhetoric. But a heavy dose of affirming language has been a vital ingredient in getting some students to make progress. So for now, we'll keep dishing more of it up.