When you listen first, you show the student you really care ,you motivate the individual to bring out the core of the issue in play and that will impact positively reaching out for a proper solution to the problem.
Besides staying mentally "blank" I also still appreciate the first college teacher that cared to show me how to redo a paper I failed and it ment the end of my college career. I had lived up to my image that college papers were tough and I could not write them.
This teacher waited to reply and if fact I had stood up and was preparing to leave the lecture hall.
He showed me how to rework the paragraphs, collect my thoughts and write directly.
I agree I am not a counsler, but I did badly in high school English and likewise in college. After that one day I wrote better and improved my grades and achevied a BA in Education.
I do well with at risk students because I was one. I find that being approachable and non judgemental helps them open up and allows me to view their issure from a perspecitive tha will aid me in assisiting them
