Expecting Perfection Does Not Lead to Perfection

Imagine the following fictional parent-teacher conference. (I promise it is fictional.  It does not represent anyone I have recently met with.)

Teacher:  Hello, Jenny's mom.  Jenny is a delight to have in class.  I really enjoy teaching her.
Jenny's mom:  Thanks.  Let's talk about her grade.
Teacher:  She's doing well.  She asks great questions in class and has given some very insightful answers on her tests.
Jenny's mom:  That's good, but her grade is a B.
Teacher:  Yes, I'm really happy to see how much she improved between her first and second tests.  She's getting better at analytical thinking, which takes some time to develop at this age.  That B+ is great.
Jenny's mom:  In our house, a B is not acceptable.
Teacher:  If she keeps improving at the rate she is, it will be an A in no time.
Jenny's mom:  I think we'll hire a tutor and take her phone until it comes up.  On another note, she has anxiety.  What is the school doing to help her with that?

While this conversation is fictional, I know there are some of you who will recognize parts of it.  There is frequently a disconnect between the teacher's viewpoint of success and a parents.  It sometimes works the other way too, with a parent believing their child cannot do better and the teacher believing they can, but that's a topic for another post.

Sometimes, we see this start very young.  We've all been at a children's soccer game in which a parent is "coaching" from the sidelines, losing their mind over a missed goal and screaming at the ref or coach for a perceived injustice.  We all roll our eyes at that parent and inwardly tell them off in our minds.  "They're five-year-olds, lady.  Stop screaming or squeeze into a uniform and go show them how to do it."  That parent is only going to get more anxious when the stakes are raised, which might be how we ended up with the moms who felt comfortable photoshopping their kids into athletic photos and paying for SAT scores in order to get their kids into Stanford.  It's also what leads some kids to cheat in order to get the grade their parent expects from them.

As adults, we know that we are good at some things and just okay at others.  We even allow for the fact that we aren't good at a few things and are happy with ourselves (and our friends) when we improve a little at those things.  In our kids, however, we seem to think that they must perform at the same level of mastery on everything they do.  In my career, I've met only a handful of kids who don't seem to have a weakness, those who are good at science and math, eloquent writers, creative artists, and able to sing and play instruments.  They are exceptions.  The vast majority of my students have been particularly great at some things and pretty average in other things.  One of the most dyslexic students I ever taught struggled greatly with algebra because letters and numbers were hard enough separately.  She fought valiantly just to pass, but she was a gifted artist who now owns a graphic design business.  I have had students who struggle academically but are gifted with an extra dose of kindness and empathy.  I have met some incredible scientists who have trouble writing a coherent sentence.  They work to improve so that they can communicate clearly, but they aren't going to write the great American novel.

When we demand students get straight As, we are asking them to be equally good at everything they try, something we would never ask of ourselves or another adult.  We tell our students that they must be captain of an athletic team, leader of a service organization, perform well on the SAT (despite knowing that the research shows no correlation between SAT scores and college success), get 4s and 5s on AP tests . . .  It's no wonder we are experiencing anxiety at unprecedented levels (even more than during times of world wars).  We are telling students that anything less than perfection is unacceptable. 

Successful people are not perfect.  You know why?  No one is.  Most successful people did not make perfect grades.  If they did, they were not being properly challenged by their teachers.  Most are not equally gifted in a hundred different skills.  They tend to be specialists in one thing.

Successful people are learners.  They are people who grow.  If they encounter something they don't know how to do, they put in the work to learn how rather than complaining that they weren't taught it during high school.  If we recognized that our kids have strengths and weakness and celebrated their growth rather than expecting perfection, our kids would have less anxiety; and we would ultimately raise better adults.

Be The Adult

This week, my school had parent-teacher conferences.  Like everything else in teaching, there is a wide spectrum of experience, from "my daughter thinks you are just the best" to "my daughter thinks you are mean" and everything in between. 

There is one that has stuck with me this year.  As I spoke with the parents, I said, "I wish he realized we are on the same side."  They went home and spoke to him, resulting in my receiving an email apology.  I replied with forgiveness and told him the same thing.  "I hope you know that we are on the same side."  As I have thought about it, I'm pretty sure I've not been acting that way.  Tomorrow, I will apologize to him because we have both been acting like middle school students.  That's age appropriate for him, but it isn't for me.

As a middle and high school teacher, I spend most of my time around (surprise) middle and high school students. That can result in being a bit embarrassed around adults as I laugh at things middle schoolers would laugh at.  It can result in my knowing things I really wish I didn't know but have to - like some of the text abbreviations.  It sometimes results in becoming a little more snarky than is appropriate simply because I am surrounded by the masters of the art.  When that happens, it is important to recognize it and correct it.

I know you know this, but there is no such thing as a perfect teacher.  Even those teachers that I hold in such high esteem that it is just shy of idolatry are fallible human beings.  We are going to make mistakes, and we are going to sin.  What's important is to own up to those mistakes and sins, not sweep them under the rug and hope no one notices.  The students will notice them.  More importantly, they will notice how we respond to them.  We should admit our wrongs, apologize for them, and do whatever we can to make them right.

In an age where adults spout off their anger on social media, talk about their dependence on wine like it is normal and not a reason to attend a meeting, deal with their stress by coloring, and talk about "self-care" like it is a virtue, our kids don't see adult behavior modeled very often.  Teachers, we are there to teach more than math, history, and science.  We are also role-models, and we simply must act like it.

Be the adult in the room.  They need it.

Teaching - Be Ready for All the Feelings

This weekend, I had a teacher high moment.  I got the privilege of attending the wedding of a former student.  It's not the first I've had the pleasure of attending, and I know it won't be the last.  I smiled, cried, laughed, and got to feel pride for her and her sister and bridesmaids (also mine).  I got to talk with several former students about what they are up to now, and it was lovely.

There are definitely teacher high moments like these, but there are also others, some good, some bad, some truly horrible, and some that defy description.  Some days bring the highest highs, like those that come from a student making you enormously proud.  Some push you into a deep hole, which you were not trained for handling.  I have experienced a range that includes the funerals of students and a shooting threat along with the joy of teaching alongside one of my students and supporting their ministries.  Every day brings with it a range of emotions, from hope to disappointment, amusement to irritation, joy to sadness.

If you are considering education as a career, here's the thing you need to know.  Be ready.  Be ready to have all of the feelings.  There are days you will love your kids like crazy.  There are days you will wish "that one" was absent.  You will be proud of the kid who fights hard to squeak by with a D and disappointed by the A student you catch cheating on a test.  No day is either purely good or purely bad.  You may hear, "I hate you" and "I love you" on the same day (and sometimes in response to the same event).  No year is either purely good or purely bad.  The events of last year were terrible, but the students were amazing.  You will laugh so hard that tears run down your face, and you will cry so hard that you finally start laughing with hysteria.  You will get angry, and you will feel pride - sometimes with the same child.  You will go home exhausted and wake up energized.  People will not understand what you do or how you feel, and that will both bother you and make you a little bit proud.

If you choose this career, I can guarantee one thing.  You will not ever be bored, so get ready.

The Joy of Recommendation Letters

When I was in college, there were a lot of things I pictured about my future career.  I imagined teaching students.  I imagined being the lab.  I even imagined parent-teacher conferences.  I guess that is because those are the parts of teaching students actually see teachers doing.   I never had a mental picture of sitting down to write recommendation letters, but over the years, I have written at least a hundred.  It is one of my favorite job responsibilities.

When a student asks a teacher to write them a letter, they aren't just marking an item off of their to-do list.  They are putting themselves in a vulnerable position.  What if the teacher says no?  What if it turns out that the teacher doesn't view the student the way the student thinks they do?  We should make sure that we respond in a way that honors their courage.  We should handle this request for what it is, an honor.

If you are blessed enough to have students who want your recommendation, take the time to think back over your relationship with that student.  Think about who they were when you first met them.  For some, that may be the beginning of this year; but for others, it goes back to middle school.  Think about how they have changed and grown.  The college is going to see their transcript, so the letter shouldn't be about what they do or what grades they get.  It should be about who that student is and their potential for growth.  It should help the admissions counselor get a picture of who that student is as a human being.

When you write letters that list resumé items, it's kind of a chore.  When you write letters that reflect the character of a student, it is a joy.  Imagine if you took the time to think back over your relationship history with a friend.  You would think about good and bad times and the depth of your friendship.  It's the same way when you view recommendation letters as stories of growth.  It adds depth to your view of the student.  Then, they are no longer a chore.  They are a privilege. 

Pull Back the Curtain - The Magic of Teaching

First, a confession - I love stage magicians.  I grew up in the days when David Copperfield made the Statue of Liberty disappear and was in high school when he went over Niagra Falls.  I am rooting for Eric Chen to make it far in this season of America's Got Talent.  I loved Harry Anderson but am not a fan of David Blaine.

Among my favorites are Penn and Teller.  I enjoy them, and not only because Penn Gillette is incredibly smart and Teller's facial expressions remind me of Red Skelton.  (He does talk, by the way.  I heard him interviewed on NPR.)  I love that they are willing to reveal a bit about how their tricks work.  They don't violate magician rules because they don't tell you everything, but they reveal just enough to keep you intrigued and raise your respect for the craft.  On Fool Us, other magicians perform for them in the hopes of doing something Penn and Teller won't know.  In order to tell them whether or not they were fooled, Penn speaks in allusions and code, just enough so the contestant will know that they got it (and they are super supportive of these young magicians whether they have fooled them or not).  As a viewer, I don't understand much of what they are saying, but it is fun seeing them recognize each other's skills.

I think it is important to sometimes take a Penn and Teller approach to teaching.  When appropriate, we should tell students why we write questions the way that we do or what certain techniques are doing for their brains.  When you are using priming, it helps them to know how that makes the rest of what you are going to do that day stick better.  When asking them to put words in categories, they are likely to think it is busy work if you don't reveal that their brains love to categorize in order to compare and contrast.  My 8th-grade students sometimes think any question that makes them think is a "trick" question, but when I show them Bloom's taxonomy, there are less likely to believe i am doing something to them rather than for them.

You can't tell them everything because some things only work if they aren't conscious of the effect.  However, sharing a little of our craft will let students know that we make choices out of professional judgment, not by accident.  They will appreciate good teaching when they see it again and will find out things about their own brain that they can apply to other learning.  Unlike a magician, whose goal is to entertain, our goal is life-long learning.  We have to pull back the curtain enough that they can teach themselves when we aren't around.