Build Nurturing Relationships

What Teachers Can Do

Identification

Work inhibition is rarely diagnosed as the reason for children's inability to do work; its symptoms are often confused with other educational disabilities. Parents can certainly recognize when their children have difficulty settling down and doing their work, but they rarely know what causes the problem. Even teachers who observe these children daily are often perplexed. At times both parents and teachers suspect that a child's failure to do work is caused by a subtle learning disability, attention-deficit disorder, or perhaps a fine-motor coordination weakness that impairs the ability to write and complete assignments. These questions must be answered if a child is to be helped.

A successful system for evaluating work-inhibited stu­dents must accomplish two major objectives. First, edu­cators must identify those students who do not engage in the work of school. Second, educators, working with parents and mental health professionals, must devise and implement a plan to ensure that each of these students is individually understood.

For work-inhibited students, sitting down and doing schoolwork is painful. It simply is the worst part of their life. They hate it. For many, this problem is of long stand­ing and simple quick fixes are not in the cards. Teachers can, however, make a difference.

Work-inhibited students may be helped in a number of general ways. They benefit from positive relationships with their teachers; they achieve more with supportive help to complete tasks; they benefit when they are actively helped to become independent; and they bene­fit from opportunities to develop their individual strengths.

In order to grow toward independence, work-inhibit-ed students need friendly, positive, and optimistic relationships with important adults, including teachers. It is reassuring and important to them to feel that their teach­er is in their corner.

Most people tend to do better work, or at least enjoy it more, when they work with someone who likes them Providing work-inhibited students with friendly hellos, greeting them each day with a smile, finding a way to extend unconditional positive regard nurtures a stu­dent's sense of well-being.

A teacher's friendliness may be positively disarming to these students. They usually have long histories of nega­tive self-perceptions and do not expect their teachers to be truly interested in them. In response to their teach­ers' friendly 'hello"—away from the classroom, where teachers are not obligated to take notice of them—the students feel a bit better about their teachers and about themselves. Such friendly, inviting greetings in them selves can improve attitudes toward school and pave the way for further positive dialogue.

There is probably no better way to convey interest and nurturance than through listening. Most teacher-student social exchanges are momentary—just a few words and a smile. But sometimes the opportunity presents itself to be with a student in a situation that has nothing to do with schoolwork. Exploit such opportunities to be attentive to remarks about the student's interests. The act of really listening is a tremendous compliment and a powerful tool in building a relationship.

Help Students Develop Stick-to-it-tiveness

Work-inhibited students need help in learning persistence—to stay on task, to withstand failure, and to forge ahead. They need to learn the skills of stick-to-it-tiveness more than academic skills.

Teachers may choose among a variety of strategies to assist the work-inhibited student to move slowly, incre­mentally, toward competence. Sometimes an entire class may have the same assignment—which a work-inhibited student may well be able to complete if it is broken down into small incremental steps. As the student completes each part, the teacher gives a pat on the back, a bit of encouragement—an emotional "pick-me-up"—to pro­ceed on to the next step. The teacher tries to extend the student just a little bit.

This method is much like training to run faster. Run­ners set intervals during which they run hard and fast for a brief period, and then recover. Then they repeat the pattern. The goal is to run faster for short distances and then gradually extend the distance.

Varying the approach helps. Students like novelty. Sur­prise the child by insisting that only three questions be completed. Set up a challenge to work quickly. Use a timer and ask the student to beat the clock. Highlight or underline certain items and ask the student to finish only those that are so marked.

Maintain a careful record of assignments completed and graph the results. Student and teacher alike may be surprised and positively reinforced by viewing a graph that shows progress.

Do not let the work pile up. At the end of each peri­od, go on to the next activity. If possible, collect any work, both complete and incomplete, and go on. Work-inhibited students easily feel overwhelmed and are unlikely to tackle a tableful of incomplete assignments. They do need to learn to tackle longer and longer assign­ments, but it is foolish to encourage work-inhibited stu­dents to climb a mountain when they are still unable to scale a hill.

Working incrementally means always taking it one day at a time. It means the teacher is pleased to see a work-inhibited student increase effort 100 percent when going from two minutes to four minutes, while most of the other students are able to work independently for half an hour. Bit by bit, focusing on successes, breaking assignments into smaller units, giving assignments that may be completed—this is the direction in which suc­cess lies. Offer Helping Hands

Through positive regard and problem-solving confer­ences, a work-inhibited student's readiness for accepting help may improve. But a teacher with twenty-five stu­dents in a classroom can spend only a fraction of the day being next to and assisting any one individual. Therefore, it may be useful to recruit helpers to assist work-inhibit­ed students. The classmates of work-inhibited students may be a rich resource. Pair classmates and encourage them to assist each other. Older work-inhibited students often welcome the opportunity to tutor younger chil­dren with similar weaknesses. It not only adds variety to their day but tutoring also helps them feel important. In high school, members of the National Honor Society, Key Club, or other service organizations may be ready and willing to give tutorial assistance. Each school is filled with helping hands.

Providing positive, effective feedback to students is a powerful tool but not necessarily easy to use. For praise to be effective, certain rules should be remembered.

Reward the action or product, not the person, with pos­itive attention. Comment specifically about what it is the student has accomplished. Comments should not be exaggerated or insincere, but rather true and to the point. "Nineteen out of twenty correct! You really understand!" "Your use of shading in this painting gives the scene per­spective and a sense of distance." "Your paragraph includ­ed three funny examples of what can happen on the first day of school." "Joe, your speech kept everyone's atten­tion."

Sometimes positive reinforcement does not require words. Just a smile or a pat on the back may keep a stu­dent working. What is important is to notice what the student is doing or has accomplished.

Teachers are not the only ones who may give positive reinforcement. Everyone in the class might do it! Encour­age classmates to support each other by modeling posi­tive communication. The goal is to create a climate of encouragement.

Дата добавления: 2014-12-29