Slow down, listen, and trust your students

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This article is by Carrie Thomas. Carrie is a high school reading specialist, chair of the Keystone State Literacy Association DEIB Committee, and is happiest when she’s in the woods.

I’ll spare you the details…after accepting a new position as an instructional coach, I am working as a high school reading specialist teaching six classes.

This proverbial lemonade needed a lot of sugar. So I turned to what I know: how to collaborate and communicate effectively.

I credit much of my professional success with collaboration and communication to this blog and the summer book study that Matt has been running the last few years. I get to connect with other professionals and learn so much from their expertise. 

So what do I know about communication?

I know that there needs to be a lot of listening and building trust. This is how you collaborate with peers, so I thought well, why not try this with six classes of high school students? My students mirrored the different types of teachers I’ve worked with as a literacy coach.

• The veterans - I had a few 11th and 12th graders in my classes.

• The new, excited ones eager to learn - my (sometimes) wide-eyed 9th graders.

• The ones who ask “why do we need to do this?” - transcending all grades.

I had to trust that what I’ve learned about working with teachers could be transferred to the high school classroom. Despite the rush around me to squeeze as much content as possible into “instructional time” plus the pressure to fill up my class periods with exit tickets and group work, I slowed down.

I talked with my students. I got to know them. 

And it’s paid off! Students who have been written off as “bad readers” or “they can’t write” wrote persuasive papers about the conditions in the school, saying what should be fixed. They independently wrote poems and sent me Remind messages at 1:30 in the morning to let me know that they were up all night and couldn’t wait for me to read what they had written. I’ve been promised ringside seats to all the fights when they become professional boxers. And they share in their writing prompts that if it wasn’t for me, they would hate school. Trusting me with parts of their lives they don’t share with their parents.

This connects to the classroom, I promise. Because they trust me, they also trust themselves to ask questions when they don’t understand something. They feel safe enough to say “Miss, can you explain this again?”. More often than not, I learn how to better clarify my directions for the next time. We are learning from each other.

In this mutual learning, I’ve learned to be a better communicator. When I ask the right questions and choose my words intentionally, students understand the content and know how to transfer the skills they’re learning. My students trust me enough to let me know when something is ambiguous and needs clarification. And when I choose different words or a more clear way to explain, it’s like the students knew it all along.

One of my favorite quotes to keep in my mind as I’m teaching comes from Brené Brown:

“Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind.”  

As this wildly unpredictable school year draws to a close, I find myself reflecting on the positive experiences. I never thought in a million years I’d find myself in this position. Much of the positive has come from slowing down and trusting what I know. May you all have the chance to slow down, reflect, and celebrate the moments of joy that you’ve had this school year.