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Post by brittanysinitch on Apr 12, 2016 12:23:15 GMT -5
Brittany, I'm glad you brought this up as it is an important issue that we will all face at some point in our teaching careers. I feel like there are many reasons for why a student would refuse help; they may have been belittled by someone who had tried to "help" them before, they may have been instilled with the belief that receiving help is a sign of weakness, and so on. Regardless of the reason, I think it is important to build trust between you and your students and to maintain appropriate relationships with them. At my high school, a lot of teachers would let students come into their classrooms during lunch, just to sit down and chat or anything really. Those teachers always had great relationships and trust between them and their students, and from the teachers I had who did that, even students who wouldn't try in class or accept help would eventually make some improvement. It can be hard to remember that your students (or anyone for that matter) are people with their own thoughts, feelings, and lives. However, we need to remember that and build that trust in order to get anywhere with our students. Also, a referral to the guidance counselor may also help, as sometimes students may just need to talk to someone who doesn't have that authority over them. Hi, Savanna! I agree. I think building trust amongst our students is important. I love the idea of opening up our classrooms and really making ourselves available to talk and just be present for our students. I think guidance counselors can be helpful too, but at the end of the day it is so nice for students to just feel comfortable coming to us as their educator for advice or any questions/concerns that they might have. |
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Post by brittanysinitch on Apr 12, 2016 12:24:50 GMT -5
You guys have really helpful responses! I think the biggest points we have been making is developing that trust as well as gathering their interest and diving in from there. I also like what Daniel said about turning it all around. We can find ways to engage our students and that is the magic of teaching!
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Post by sarahaubreyr on Apr 17, 2016 16:29:05 GMT -5
Helping a student who does not want to be helped is probably one of the hardest parts about our job. I think all students want to achieve great things, but sometimes they feel as though they cant, so they don't try. The important thing is that you do not pressure the student. If he or she wants to come around they will. It is also important that we do not take this personally, it is not necessarily that they do not want our help, but that they do not want anybody's help.
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Post by seanwillis on Apr 20, 2016 13:01:10 GMT -5
Savanna,
I just saw your reply! I really like your thoughts here and I think a lot of the way that we can get through to these students is by being relatable.
By being relatable I mean talking to students like they're people too, I feel like as educators it will be easy for us to stand in front of the class and give mundane presentations in monotone voices and write it off like "the students were given the information." We have to present material in a way that interests students and try to make our presentations at least a back-and-forth dialogue where students are somehow engaging with the lesson. This can be difficult when we find students who have personalities that clash with our own, so I suppose the question is, how do we adapt our education practices in order to suit defiant students with whom we find it difficult to relate either ourselves or our education with?
The answer to which I think can really only be solved by knowing the individual student.
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