In late February, EdWeek’s Susan Sandler wrote about Personalization 3.0, or “a hybrid approach of humanity and technology…that uses technology to enhance teacher-student relationships, not replace them.”
Sandler references Theodore R. Sizer’s work (late founder of the Coalition of Essential Schools) who emphasized that, for students to succeed, they must be personally known at school and have strong relationships with the people there. But Sizer is not the only one who’s talked about the importance of quality learning relationships. In fact, learning theorists and pedagogists from Piaget to Vygotsky, Briggs-Myers to Lawrence, Dewey to Comer, Sousa, Willis, and Cushman. The list literally goes on and on.
Just like the product of a child’s IQ and EQ (IQ*EQ) has a significant impact on SAT scores and career trajectory, the product of a teacher’s EQ has a significant impact on his ability to positively impact two critical dimensions of educating our children: (1) whetting students’ appetites for learning and (2) learning how to effectively work together in teams.
Read the rest of the article that Jen Lilienstein, Kidzmet Founder wrote for EdTechDigest here.
It seems like very few days go by when I don’t hear one story or another about the positive impact a teacher that “got” them made on someone’s life. I also hear lots of stories about unbearable school years where a teacher just didn’t connect with someone and this lack of connection made a negative impact on the individual’s perception of school in general, the subject matter being taught, and (most importantly) their own self esteem.
These examples are backed up by numerous recent research studies which conclude that positive teacher-student relationships have been shown to support students’ adjustment to school, contribute to their social skills, promote academic performance, and foster students’ resiliency in academic performance. (Battistich, Schaps, & Wilson, 2004; Birch & Ladd, 1997; Hamre & Pianta, 2001)
In fact, ASCD’s email newsletter just yesterday stated, “students as learners are also students as people, with hopes, fears, and needs. That’s why it’s so important to build adult-student relationships that support and encourage each student’s academic and personal growth. The frequency and perceived worth of interaction (PDF) with faculty, staff, and other students is one of the strongest predictors not only of student persistence but also of student learning.”
This belief is the foundation upon which Kidzmet is built. And it shouldn’t be something that we expect just from interpersonally gifted instructors that have an innate talent for connecting with people. We should expect a fervent attempt at true connection from EVERY teacher a child has in school. It doesn’t just benefit the students, it gives the teacher the experience of having a room full of students that are not only more engaged throughout the school year, but who wrap up the school year thinking, “s/he was the best teacher I’ve ever had.”
Throughout May, we’ll be looking for blog comments that tell stories of their most POSITIVE and most NEGATIVE teacher relationship experiences. (It can be yours or your child’s.) It can be a story of a teacher that made you love science because he presented it in a way that “clicked” for you. Or a teacher that used the *wrong* approach to motivate you and you spent the year dreaming up excuses about why you couldn’t make it to her class. Or even the story of a teacher that came highly recommended by another parent, but that just didn’t “get” your child.
Everyone who posts a story will get a Kidzmet Classroom Account gift card to pass along to a teacher, so that she can understand how each individual student in her class ticks and hit the ground running with new student relationships. Save it until you know who your child’s next teacher is in the Fall; pass it along to a sports coach, tutor or summer activities leader; or even gift it to this year’s teacher so that he is better prepared to welcome his new batch of students this Fall. It’s entirely up to you.
We’re looking forward to hearing everyone’s stories!!
To our kids’ collective success, Jen Lilienstein Founder Kidzmet
One of my former colleagues recently posted this in our Facebook group. We used to use this technique to get our creative juices flowing vis-à-vis product development and corporate strategy in the educational software world.
I’m still a believer that the seeds of great ideas often come from places you wouldn’t expect. And, even though many of the recommendations were recycled time and again, there were nuggets that shone brightly with a little bit of polish.
Re-reading it, I couldn’t help but think…what if teachers used this technique with students in the classroom one or two times per quarter? What kinds of insights would school leaders get as to what’s working—and what’s not with regard to how we’re educating our kids? What if we took it a step further and discussed student insights and recommendations in our weekly grade level team meetings?
I stumbled across our Monsters, Inc DVD last night and one of the key themes replayed in my mind…the realization at the end of the movie that joy/laughter creates significantly more power than fear.
I think we need to revisit this theme with respect to learning and school. So many of our policy decisions right now are based on fear of falling behind and trying to teach kids the “right” ways to do things as quickly as possible, eliminating true discovery and joyful novelty from school day learning. But we’re not just eliminating opportunities for inventive, creative self-expression during the school day by slashing recess, arts and extracurricular budgets. As parents, we’re replacing “go play outside/have a dance party/fiddle around on the piano” with soccer practice/music lessons/tutoring.
Which brings to mind this study, which found that instruction actually limits spontaneous exploration and discovery. Kids who were shown how to use a novel toy played with it for significantly less time AND found fewer different kinds of actions on the toy than kids who were just given the toy with no further instruction.
This revelation, in addition to recent self-regulation studies that have shown that kids’ executive function—or the ability to control their own emotions and behavior—has diminished since the 1940s, should set off alarm bells in our minds. Why? Because the more structured the play, the more children’s private speech declines. This means that kids aren’t getting a chance to practice the all-important skill of self-regulation/executive function. And executive function is used by adults to surmount the obstacles that we encounter countless times as we work to innovate and invent as adults. (Among a host of other incredibly important skills.) More on these studies can be found here.
If we’re going to help the next generation of kids continue to invent and innovate–not just regurgitate–we need to make sure that as parents and educators we allow opportunities for our kids to experience both structured AND unstructured learning.
Let’s change our collective mantras and our own self-talk from a fearful “what haven’t they learned yet?” to a joyful “what will they think of next?”
As I speak with principals, assistant superintendents and curriculum directors each day, one of the first questions I always ask is “what is it that separates your superstar teachers from the rest of the pack?” The answer that comes back is always the same: “They are able to connect with each of their students,” “they tailor their lesson strategies to each class,” or “their classes are consistently engaged.”
Sounds a lot like another profession I was in for a couple of decades…marketing. A marketer’s job is to take a product and make it look/sound as appealing as possible to the target audience so that they’ll listen long enough to eventually be convinced to buy it based on the messages in their packaging, advertising and brochures. The selected message and advertising vehicle for products is not the same—it needs to be tweaked, tailored and massaged based on the target demographic. Focus groups are run in which all KINDS of perspectives are heard. A/B test splits are executed. Even if the message is perfected for a certain group, it will need to be modified if it’s to effectively reach a different target.
A teacher’s job is to take a concept and make it look/sound as appealing as possible to students so that they’ll engage long enough to eventually learn it based on the messages in lesson plans, homework and breakout groups. And, just as with marketing, the selected lessons and breakout groups need to be tweaked, tailored and massaged for the class based on who’s sitting in the classroom. Even if a unit is a hit with one class, the teacher will most likely need to modify it to most effectively reach their class mix either the next year…or next period.
In fact, the teacher’s job is INFINITELY harder than the marketer’s job because, while marketers can get a pat on the back for getting just a percentage of their target audience to purchase the product…the teacher is expected to get every kid in class to “buy” the concept.
Master teachers are able to do this because they often have an innate interpersonal gift. They intuitively know how to reach very different students. They are able to convince a raucous group of teenagers why geometry is and will be important to them. They are able to contextualize history in ways that students will be able to remember so that we’re not all doomed to repeat past horrors. They work magic with student breakout groups so that students are empowered to learn from each other and admire the unique strengths of their peers. They’re able to detect when a student “learns different” and help both the student and their parent modify the ways in which homework is approached so that the child has a greater chance of success with learning.
Why’s this important? Harvard & Columbia recently released the findings of a longitudinal study of 2.5 million students over 20 years that show the dramatic impact that quality teachers can have on their students. They are more likely to attend college, earn higher salaries, live in better neighborhoods and save more for retirement. They are also less likely to become pregnant as a teenager.
But earning your stripes as a quality teacher is more meaningful than just for the students. It’s a much more enjoyable profession for the teacher when she feels she’s reaching or, better yet, inspiring her students. At long last, the education and EdTech sectors are beginning to take notice and calling this new ground swell Personalization 3.0. But, at Kidzmet, we feel that what EdWeek has dubbed Personalization 3.0 isn’t using a wide enough angle lens. While the teacher-student relationship is important, so is engaging the parents as a critical member of a child’s learning team…as is beginning to harness the power of compatible student groups. In short, we believe that ALL learning relationships matter in a student’s education. Parent-student, teacher-student, parent-teacher, and student-student.
What about you? Do you feel that content positioning is as important as content pacing in educating our youth?
It seems like very few days go by when I don’t hear one story or another about the positive impact a teacher that “got” them made on someone’s life. I also hear lots of stories about unbearable school years where a teacher just didn’t connect with someone and this lack of connection made a negative impact on the individual’s perception of school in general, the subject matter being taught, and (most importantly) their own self esteem.
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