We all want to feel cared for and valued by the significant people in our world. Students are no different. This knowledge is a powerful tool in the arsenal available to you as you form your classroom discipline plan. As a classroom teacher, you wield a great deal of power over your students simply due to the fact that you control their destiny for up to six and a half hours each day, five days a week. When students feel that you value and care for them as individuals, they are more willing to comply with your wishes.
Think about it for just a minute. Aren’t you more apt to go out of your way to please a boss who you feel values you as an individual and treats you with dignity and respect, rather than a boss who communicates a lack of respect for you? When your boss asks about your family, gives you “slack” when there is a personal emergency, or praises you for work well done, don’t you develop feelings of regard for this boss and want to do your best to please him or her? Students have the same feelings. So it makes sense that developing positive teacher-student relations is one of the most effective steps you can take to establish a positive discipline climate in the classroom. It’s critical to remember that when you treat students with respect, they tend to appreciate and like you. When they appreciate and like you, they are more willing to want to please you—which causes them to be more likely to behave appropriately. This is why it is so important to remember that, when it comes to student behavior, it’s far more often the relationship students have with you than it is the rules themselves that encourages students to follow those rules.
A review of the research shows that authors have a lot to say about positive relationships with students. Thompson (1998) says, “The most powerful weapon available to secondary teachers who want to foster a favorable learning climate is a positive relationship with our students” (p. 6). Canter and Canter (1997) make the statement that we all can recall classes in which we did not try very hard because we didn’t like our teachers. This should remind us how important it is to have strong, positive relationships with our students. Kohn (1996) goes a step further, saying, “Children are more likely to be respectful when important adults in their lives respect them. They are more likely to care about others if they know they are cared about” (p. 111).Marzano (2003) states that students will resist rules and procedures along with the consequent disciplinary actions if the foundation of a good relationship is lacking. He goes on to assert that relationships are perhaps more important at the elementary and junior high levels than at the high school level. And according to Zehm and Kottler (1993), students will never trust us or open themselves up to hear what we have to say unless they sense that we value and respect them.
What are some strategies that you can implement to develop strong and powerful relationships with your students? Let’s look at some techniques that are easy to integrate into your everyday interactions with students: communicating positive expectations, correcting students in a constructive way, developing positive classroom pride, demonstrating caring, and preventing and reducing your own frustration and stress.
Communicating Positive Expectations
Research on teacher expectations and student achievement has shown that expectations have a dramatic impact on student academic performance (Kerman, Kimball, & Martin, 1980). Student behavioral performance is also dependent to a large degree on the expectations of significant adults in students’ lives. Numerous studies indicate that the expectations teachers have for students tend to become self-fulfilling prophesies. It is therefore critically important for educators to monitor their interactions with the goal of communicating appropriately high behavioral and academic expectations to all students, not just to high achievers.
There are several techniques that can be used to achieve this goal. Monitor the way you call on students. Make sure that you give all students chances to participate in class. Try to increase the amount of time you wait between asking a student a question and moving on by either answering the question yourself or calling on another student. Give students hints and clues to help them succeed in class. Tell students directly that you believe that they have the ability to do well. Your belief in them will inspire their success.
Let’s look at some of these techniques for communicating high expectations in more detail and discuss ways to implement these techniques in your classroom.
Call on All Students Equitably
When you call on students, there are several things to keep in mind. First of all, you must monitor the equitability of response opportunities. Often, teachers who keep track discover that they call on a small number of students frequently and allow few, if any, chances for students for whom they have low expectations to answer. When you fail to recognize particular students, you can communicate a low level of confidence in their abilities. Individual students may “tune out” and believe that you don’t expect they will be able to answer your questions. This message is compounded when these students see others being called on regularly.
Think about what it would communicate to you if your boss always asked other teachers to participate in committee work or special projects instead of you. And how would you feel if the boss continually came to you for help on curriculum projects or input on difficult students? Just as we do, students develop feelings of self-confidence in their abilities when their teacher goes to them for the right answer. In addition, calling on all the students in your class—rather than a select few—will help keep students on task and decrease the number of behavior problems.
It is important that you monitor yourself to be certain that you are providing all of your students with response opportunities. Putting a check by the name of each student you call on during class discussions is an excellent way to quickly determine whether you are being equitable. Also, you should monitor yourself to make certain you are not calling exclusively on your high-achieving students but also on students who have a pattern of not performing well.
There are many ways you can develop positive relationships with students in your daily interactions with them. Not only does this contribute to a positive classroom environment, but it also improves the quality of school life for both you and your students.
While building positive relationships is the foundation to a strong discipline system, relationships alone are not enough. It is also critical to clearly define parameters of expected behaviors, to monitor those behaviors, and to implement consequences when necessary.
By: Melanie T. Tacaca | St. Francis II Elementary School
