The Importance of Managing Emotions and Success at School

 This week’s article summary is Students Who Can Manage Their Emotions Do Better in School.

As Trinity focuses on children from age 3 through 6^th grade, most of us know from experience that Emotional Intelligence is just as important—if not more so--in student success at school as IQ.

Think of how critical student self-regulation is in our classrooms: learning how to wait your turn, learning how to share, learning to follow directions, learning that you don’t always get what you want when you want it.

The reality for many schools and in our society at large is that Emotional Intelligence and Academic Achievement too often are put into separate categories. The truth, though, is Emotional Intelligence (intra and interpersonal skills) supports Academic Achievement. Being able to listen in class, to work cooperatively and collaboratively with others, to organize oneself, to do work at home (including homework in older grades) all obviously lead to better academic performance.

This is why at Trinity we talk so much about teaching the whole child and helping form his/her academic and character foundation.

More and more research illustrates the interrelation and interdependence of IQ and EQ: here’s another article on EQ traits and how to teach them at school and at home.

Joe

 

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Emotional intelligence is an important part of academic success—from kindergarten into college—according to a new study. In particular, students who understand and can manage their emotions earn higher grades and do better on standardized tests.

 

The findings help bolster the growing consensus among researchers that skills such as emotional intelligence are not just important for future workplace success, but also students' academic success in the here and now.

 

While raw intelligence, or IQ, is still the biggest predictor of academic performance, the study's findings put understanding and managing emotions right up there with it.

 

The study also examines different types of emotional intelligence and methods of measuring it to see how these variations impact tests, grades, and success in different academic subjects.

 

The goal is to determine exactly what parts of emotional intelligence move the needle on academics. For example, the study found that students' ability to read others' emotions was not as important as the ability to regulate their own emotions.

 

Emotionally intelligent students may also be better at handling negative emotions that come from, say, test anxiety.

 

Students with high emotional intelligence may also be better at managing their social world—from navigating peer pressure to forming positive relationships with teachers—which puts them in a better position to focus on learning

 

The biggest takeaway from the study is teaching emotional intelligence skills doesn't detract from students' academics—it boosts them.

 

What Makes a Great Teacher?

 This week’s article summary is What Makes a Great Teacher: Pedagogy or Personality?

 

We’ve probably all heard the expression “He/she was born to teach” or “Teaching is more art than science.”

 

Yes, there’s art to teaching (improvisation, creativity, and imagination are vital for any classroom) but there’s much more learning needed to become a great teacher. Whether it’s content knowledge, differentiation strategies, assessment tools, etc., teaching is much more than having an engaging, entertaining personality.

 

The article below explains that teaching is indeed a ‘scientific’ profession that requires ongoing learning, experience, and nuance.

 

To me, one of the most important attributes of master teachers is regardless of how much experience and expertise they amass, they never forget what it was like to be a student, including anticipating the questions students will ask. Ted Williams was arguably the greatest hitter in professional baseball but when he coached younger players about hitting all he would tell them is “see the ball, hit the ball.” That’s good advice when you have as much natural ability as Williams, but not for most as hitting in baseball is considered one of the most difficult athletic feats.

 

Williams was not a good teacher: he couldn’t relate to players who couldn’t hit like him, nor could he communicate to them how to hit.

 

Being able to perform at a high level (and knowing the steps and skills needed to get there), being able to communicate how to in simple-to-understand ways, and providing supportive scaffolding as needed to novices is to me the essence of teaching.

 

No matter how much we educators further learn and understand about teaching, we always need to be able to relate to our students. And we all need to champion teaching as a profession requiring much ongoing learning and practice. It’s why we proudly say at Trinity that we are a community of learners, meaning not just our students, but adults (parents and faculty/staff)!

 

Thank you for all you did during our first full week of school. We made a lot of adjustments this week and will continue to yet I hope you and your students (those at school and those at home) are beginning to settle into the routine and predictability of school.

 

Enjoy your weekend!

 

Joe

 

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"She’s one of those people who just has a way with kids."

 

"I think it’s his personality that makes students love his class."

 

You’ve probably heard comments like these. Though they affirm the powerful and unique personalities that many teachers bring to their work, these comments also bug me. They diminish the role of pedagogy and all of the decision-making that informs teaching, and this reinforces a view of teaching as less than the professional work it is.

 

Of course, a teacher’s passion, charisma, warmth, and humor influence the way students experience a class. But teachers aren’t really “born” knowing how to connect and inspire children in a classroom setting. Instead, they must grow these capacities by continually developing pedagogical and social-emotional skills.

 

The idea that a great personality makes a great teacher is fantasy. Most of us have seen brand-new teachers or guest speakers who come in with what seems like the right energy: They’re confident, caring, and creative. But without relevant teaching skills, most aren’t effective with students.

 

Likewise, when a teacher is successful, we can’t just attribute it to personality. Teaching methods are critical to educational outcomes for students, and not all methods or curricula are equally effective. Even in the above example, what the teacher did well on the first day wasn’t simply about her personality. She made some sound pedagogical decisions: to spend time building connections with her students, giving them a structured way to speak about themselves, and listening to them with interest.

 

So, personality isn’t important in teaching at all … case closed? Not really.

 

Personality is important, but the traits that matter most aren’t fixed.

 

A teacher can be soft-spoken, not someone we’d describe as extroverted or funny, but still create an excellent learning environment. What really matters is the ability to demonstrate compassion and emotional constancy, the cultural competency needed to develop trust and understanding with students, and the courage to take risks and be vulnerable.

 

It's important to remember that teaching is a developmental process, just like learning is. But teaching is unique because it’s dependent on interaction: You can learn on your own, but you need a learner in order to teach. Awareness of all that goes into those interactions is at the center of successful teaching.

 

Awareness includes five dimensions:

• Awareness of the self as a teacher
• Awareness of the teaching process
• Awareness of the learner
• Awareness of interaction
• Awareness of context.

 

Each is a continuum, and teachers develop them at varying rates.

 

Great teaching requires an awareness of all of the factors at play in a particular moment, to take advantage of opportunities and anticipate and address challenges.

 

What jumps out at me is that awareness of self is as important in the framework as the awareness of learner or the awareness of teaching process. Generally in teacher preparation and professional development, the focus is on teaching practices and how we can understand our students as learners. But we are rarely called to look at our own identities. 

 

Perhaps the element of personality that most contributes to excellent teaching—as essential as our pedagogy, knowledge of our students, and of course, knowledge and passion for our subjects—really boils down to our ability to develop a strong sense of ourselves in our teaching role. The vibrancy we notice in an excellent teacher may really be a combination of skilled pedagogy, a highly developed awareness of the teacher’s presence, emotions, and needs, and the conscientiousness to attend to them as well as we all want to do for our students.

 

What is Privilege?

This week’s article summary, Different Types of Privilege Explained, is a follow-up to our preplanning DEI session.

 

What initially caught my attention in the article was this quote: “Privilege isn’t about what you’ve gone through; it’s about what you haven’t gone through.”

 

Privilege is a tough topic because all of us worked hard to get where are, and, as a result, we view the world as a meritocracy where success comes from toil and effort.

 

But as Jackie and others shared during preplanning, we need to move beyond our individual story/experience and try to see the larger historic, institutional structures embedded in our society. And from that view, many of us are privileged.

 

As a white, heterosexual, Baby Boomer male who whose parents were able to afford a private school education for me, I clearly had it easier than many others and had many available safety when I erred. And to this day I benefit from societal privileges I often don’t see and take for granted:

• When I’m on an early-morning run and a police car passes me, I never worry that I will be stopped and asked what I’m doing and why I am in this neighborhood
• While my preference is not to hold hands with my wife in public (PDAs are just not my thing), I would get no stares or glares from strangers if I did
• When my wife and go out to dinner, I am given the check at the end of the meal, not her
• As we kept receiving paychecks during the pandemic home quarantine, I never had to worry about paying my mortgage or utility and food bills
• My skin color and gender are commonly reflected in the movies, television shows, and books I read
• When I visit another country, most people I encounter have familiarity with the English language
• …And the list goes on

 

Again, these privileges don’t mean I haven’t worked hard to get where I am.  Yet I do need to take stock that others haven’t had the same opportunities as I. To me, recognizing institutional privilege doesn’t mean I need to feel bad about the benefits I may have; it’s about seeing that others aren’t afforded those same benefits and then supporting equity of opportunity for all.

 

The article lists a number of privileges. Spend a few minutes reflecting on which areas you are privileged in and more importantly those who aren’t.

 

What does this mean for us as educators?

• As we’ve discussed before, our classrooms need to provide our students with both ‘mirrors and windows’—they need to see themselves in what we teach (mirrors) but they also need to explore difference (windows).
• Help them see that their experiences and perspectives are not the experiences and perspectives of everyone. Encourage them to think with multiple perspectives, looking for both similarities and differences.
• And in age-appropriate ways guide them to see that the world is not fair to all and resources and opportunities are not equally available and distributed. Kids have an innate sense of fairness: help them see that they can indeed help level the playing field and help the world get better.

 

FYI, the acronym BIPOC in the article stands for ‘Black, Indigenous, People of Color.’

 

Thank you for the wonderful start of the school year (with two first days of school)! There was so much positive energy, excitement, and smiles (even if hidden behind masks). Enjoy a well-deserved weekend!

 

Joe

 

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Conversations around privilege can be tricky, as Black Lives Matter Toronto co-founder Janaya Khan discovered in the course of her anti-racism activism. What white people often hear when confronted with the idea of their privilege, she found, was not that they enjoyed advantages over BIPOC, but rather that they had never experienced hardship in their lives. This, she has said, would shut them down to dialogue.

So, she reframed the idea of white privilege to better enable discourse, in a quote that’s been widely circulated in recent weeks: “Privilege isn’t about what you’ve gone through; it’s about what you haven’t had to go through.”

This is critical to understanding that you can lack privilege in some areas while still retaining it in others. As Nicole Cardoza, an anti-racism activist, noted holding privilege in one area—e.g. race, gender, socioeconomic—doesn’t mean you don’t lack privilege in other areas; however, it also doesn’t exempt you from the benefits of the privilege you do hold. Cardoza says she’s experienced white women, for example, counter confrontation around their white privilege with evidence of their gender disadvantage. This is a fundamental misunderstanding of the way privilege works, and many of us are guilty of it. Understanding the various privileges you hold can help you to become more self-aware, commit fewer microaggressions, and practice more effective social justice activism.

Below, an exploration of different types of privilege—by no means an exhaustive list—so we can all better understand ourselves and our role in equality.

White privilege: Having white skin is a global privilege due to colonialism, but it is especially privileged in the United States. America was founded around systemic racism, and everything from policy to pop culture reinforces white privilege. Longtime anti-racism activist Peggy McIntosh once described this privilege as, “an invisible package of unearned assets.” If you possess this privilege, it’s typical for you to exist in spaces where the majority of people look like you, to turn on the TV and see the same, to be treated more generously and less violently by authorities, to know that if you aren’t offered a job or approved for a home, it’s not because of your race, and on and on the advantages go.

Male privilege (or gender privilege): Being cis male is also a global privilege, and America was specifically designed as a patriarchy, aka a system of government in which men hold the power and women are excluded it from it, to institutionalize this advantage. If you are a cis man, you benefit from this setup in many invisible ways. Holding male privilege means you aren’t greatly disadvantaged by not fitting into ideals of conventional beauty, that your “masculinity” is not connected to your childbearing or rearing decisions and capabilities, that you will likely do less of your household’s labor, that you may be able to walk alone at night without fear, that you can be sexually empowered without it being positioned as a negative, that you earn more money than women who do the same work as you, and more. Male passing privilege also exists. If you are a trans man who passes as a cis man, you may be entitled to the same privileges.

Heterosexual privilege: Globally, heterosexuality is a privilege. It means that you benefit from identifying as straight and will not face the same discrimination or threats to your safety as a result of your sexuality. It can also mean that you have more rights. More specifically, heterosexual privilege can mean you don’t have to fear others finding out about your sexual orientation, that you can hold hands with your romantic partner without being scorned, mocked, or threatened, and that you are not identified as deviant or damaged because of who you are attracted to, among many other things.

Cisgender privilege: Cisgender privilege is when you identify with the gender to which you were assigned at birth. If you have this privilege, you are not likely to be harassed in public restrooms or locker room spaces, face questions about your genitals from strangers, be clinically considered mentally unwell, be regularly assigned the wrong pronoun, and more.

Socioeconomic privilege: Socioeconomic, or class, privilege relates to financial security. It’s navigated and shown when you don’t have to worry about affording necessities (e.g. food and shelter), you don’t have the burden of debt, you have control over your time, you’re able to only be exposed to others with the same privileges, you’re more likely to be perceived as innocent by the criminal justice system, you can afford good physical and mental health care, and much more. Most societies, including America, are designed in a way that reinforces and upholds class privilege.

Religious privilege: Religious privilege is when your religion is the dominant religion, or the one considered to be the default “norm” where you live. In the U.S., that privilege falls to Christians. You can easily spot this bias in our country’s holiday calendar, which makes Christmas a bank holiday, or in the fact that we routinely swear oaths on the Bible. (These are just two of many examples.) Religious privilege also means you are not likely to be persecuted based on your religious affiliation—you can worship freely and safely.

Passport privilege: Passport privilege has to do with how easy it is for you to travel around the world based on the passport you hold. Those who carry American passports have historically been privileged in this manner.

Location-based privilege: Where you live has other implications with respect to privilege, too. If you live near a big city, for example, you will have access to a greater number and variety of job prospects than someone who does not, including those which promise higher wages and greater prestige.

Beauty privilege: If you are attractive in a way that aligns with the dominant beauty ideals of your culture, you are likely to benefit from that attractiveness. You may also benefit from being perceived as attractive even if your appearance does not fit those dominant ideals. In any case, possessing the privilege of beauty means you’re likely to experience greater career success and make more money, be less persecuted within the criminal justice system, and have more positive social interactions, among other things. Don’t believe it? Consider how hard you work to achieve beauty ideals, and then ask yourself why you would bother so much if there were no inherent benefits.

Age privilege: In America youth is highly valued, especially in women. So, if you’re young, you have a privilege that older people don’t, and that privilege incrementally decreases with age. The younger you are (as an adult), the more likely you are to see yourself represented in pop culture and advertising, be valued for your ideas/art, be considered attractive (which is its own privilege), and more.

Couple privilege: In our society, being traditionally coupled, 1:1, is an advantage because it’s considered to be a norm versus remaining single or opting for a less traditional relationship structure, e.g. polyamory. You may enjoy a greater number of rights, benefit financially, and be less likely to be stigmatized.

 

 

How Teachers Can Help Students Transition Back to School

Thank you all for an uplifting first week of preplanning (and some good coffee this morning)! I’m sure a number of us approached our first week back at Trinity with some trepidation. While our responsibility of welcoming back our students awaits us next week, I hope all of you felt some normalcy this week as we settled back into the routine of school even as we wore face coverings, social distanced, met virtually, and operated under our PRP guidelines. For me, it just felt good to be back at school!

 

For those of you new to Trinity, every Friday during the school year, I like to send out an educational article that recently caught my attention and that I hope provokes thought in you. 

 

As we live in fast-paced times, we’ve grown accustomed to the character limit of Twitter and the short videos on YouTube. Hence, I edit down the article to its most salient points so it’s a quick read. (If available, I link the full article.)

 

I try to find articles applicable to early childhood/elementary education.

 

I don’t agree with every article. I know we live in polarized political times where there is little tolerance for the opposing position. I, however, don’t confine myself to only one side in politics or in education. In fact, I especially like articles that make me think, ask me to reflect on my educational beliefs, and even confront my educational biases. As we discussed in our DEI session this week, a little cognitive dissonance is good for us!

 

The first article summary of the year is How Teachers Can Help Students Transition Back to School.

 

Just as many of us were anxious to return to school this week, many of our students will be next week as well. This article is a reminder that in the first weeks of school—especially necessary this year—we need to attend to our students’ social-emotional, affective needs. Academic development, achievement, and application are buoyed from our students’ emotional and physical safety, comfort, and trust we establish with them. One of the reasons I am so happy that we can begin the year with in-person school is we get the opportunity to see, interact, and connect, and get to know our students as we create a caring, responsible, and respectful community in our classrooms and throughout the school. As I heard in a number of meetings this week, we need to devote the first  weeks of school to building relationships and routines. No matter our age, we all need routines, consistency, and emotional security in our lives.

 

Thanks again for such a great first week of energy, conviction, and community!

 

Enjoy the last weekend of summer!

 

Joe

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The return to full-time, face-to-face learning in schools is an exciting time for students and teachers and, no doubt, a blessed relief for many parents. It is also a critical time regarding maximizing learning opportunities, both during and after this transition.

We are changed and different now, and we can move forward together, being kind and supportive to all.

Here are some tips and suggestions to support school communities in managing this transition back to school for all students, and particularly those with additional needs.

Routine and Structure: A return to regular school and learning routines will be like a comfy warm winter blanket for all students. Kids thrive off known boundaries and predictable daily routines.

Harness Self-Isolation Experiences to Build Student Confidence: The unprecedented level of responsibility that school students of all ages have had to embrace, is worth both celebrating and harnessing. Discussing this early in the year with your students can instill confidence in their self-direction capabilities. Moreover, building on these new levels of confidence and autonomy is another way for teachers to show they genuinely care for their students, creating a safe and supportive learning environment where students are challenged to strive for success.

Planning for Inclusion And Reducing Anxiety: Clear communication and planning are ways to reduce anxiety around the transition process for everyone. All teachers are taking the time to think and plan for the integration of COVID-19 restrictions within previously established classroom routines. At an instructional level, planning for inclusion by designing teaching and learning activities to cater for the needs all students has never been more important than now. The need to differentiate classroom learning will be greater now than before. By showing empathy to our students (as in ‘we’re all in this together’) and acknowledging the difficulties faced during self-isolation, we can support them.

Share and Explore Home Learning Experiences: Making time to explore and learn about our students’ experiences, particularly home-learning experiences, will be an important part of this initial transition. Our students will need time and space to readjust to school-based learning. We all learn by thinking about, and reflecting on, things we have experienced and done in our lives. Simply talking with children about their understandings and what they know about COVID is important. This is not a ‘one-off’ chat, children learn with repeated chats over time.

A New School-Family Relationship: COVID-19 has created so many complexities, insecurities, and anxieties. We have all been trying to balance and deal with the impacts on our own work from home lives. Happily, this has created more parent understanding and empathy for the work of teachers, and vice versa. Greater parent understanding of content could facilitate establishment of more meaningful student learning goals and better support systems at home..