Dealing With Challenging Students
When dealing with challeging students we must remember that at some point in time, we were all students. Showing compassion and understanding will prove more equitable to our students rather than negatively reinforcing their actions.
I agree that extending compassion and understanding can go a long way in promoting our students learning experience. However, there are students that look for areas in their learing process to "slide" past a well defined expectation or to change the borders of requirement for them to accomodate their low performance ( and it is usually because they have been afforded this before in previous classes). How do you draw the line between appropiately appling understanding and compassion vs being too lenient?
I feel that most challenging students come with a history of being unaccepted or labeled in previous classroom situations. When a challenging student can see that he/she is being treated with the same respect as others, they will often live up to the expectation. I taught biology in high school where I often had ED and SpEd students. I always discussed their situation early on with the SpEd instructions responsible for their modifications. I would teach the first grading period with no modifications or limited ones. When the students realized they were having the same expectations as everyone else, they often strived to achieve these goals, often going through the entire year with no modifications needed for their situation.
It must be kept in mind at the same time that I taught classes that were primarly hands-on with learner centered activities for almost every lab and activity done.
I found long ago that the saying;" people don't care how much you know' until they know how much you care, is so very true. making a connection with the student allows them to know that you genuinelly care about them, andthere progress. I have found in many casses this improves there output a well as there own self worth.
