Teacher’s Corner

What could help your students be better students and help them follow rules better is caring about them with “no strings attached.” No strings attached means that your caring about your students not because they are doing so well with their schoolwork or are staying out of trouble, but instead because they are who they are and deserve to be cared about.  This type of caring about students is essential to their learning and discipline.

When students really believe that they are cared about even when they don’t get A’s on their report card and even if they mess up and get in trouble, that is what gives them the resilience to keep trying to get that “A” and to keep trying to stay out of trouble.

On the other hand, when students think their teachers don’t care about them, that is when they give up and just accept that they are “dumb” or are “mess-ups.”

Writing Prompts and Discussion Topics on the subject of teachers caring about their students.

1. What do you think love with “no strings attached” means?
2. Do you think students do better when they think their teachers care about them? Why or why not?
3. How can students tell whether teachers care about them? Give examples.

Read more about caring about your students at  Kids and Pets: The Basics; Kids and Pets: More about Responsibility, Love, Independence, and Loss; and Love Your Kids No Matter What, Part 2.

Teachers, you can use this blog in classrooms. Here are two ideas about how.

1. For middle or high school parenting or child development courses:

• Use the blog for discussion topics
• Require students to research the topics and agree or disagree with what the blog is suggesting.

2.  For all courses, especially English Language Arts:

• Use the blog for writing prompts for paragraphs, theme papers, journal entries, class starters, etc. Have students read the blog and respond to:
  • Do you agree with what is being said about kids? Do kids really act, think or feel that way?
  • Do you agree with what is being said about parents, grandparents, teachers and child caregivers? Do or should they act, think or feel that way?
  • What would be your advice on this topic?
  • What was left out of this article?
  • If you were a parent, would you use any of this information? How?

Why can this blog be a useful teaching tool?

• Students that see connections between their coursework and their lives do better in school.
• Most students will either be parents one day or have children in their lives that they care about, so the topical information can help them build their knowledge about children and parenting and develop a positive image of the type of parenting they want to do.
• The new core literacy standards adopted by most states call for frequent writing in all courses.
• Newly developed end-of-course assessments to be used by many states will require that students demonstrate that they can think critically. These prompts help students practice critical thinking.
• Newly developed end-of-course assessments to be used by many states will require that students demonstrate that they can analyze what they read. These prompts help students practice analysis.