Chapter 5
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Eighth grader Anissa enters her history classroom late. She hands her tardy slip to her teacher without saying anything. Anissa is usually talkative and friendly, and Mr. Garcia notices the change in demeanor.
Within a few moments, Anissa has joined her learning station group, one of four set up to provide active investigation of immigration from Northern Europe to the United States between 1800 and 1860. She is supposed to start in on her independent learning task, but instead, she just sits.
Mr. Garcia walks over to Anissa's desk and asks her if she wants to talk. When she looks up, her eyes are welling with tears. "Let's go sit at my desk for a few minutes," Mr. Garcia says quietly, gesturing to the "talking chair" next to his desk. All his students know that if they sit in this particular oversized chair, they can share whatever is on their minds. Sometimes they come to sit in this chair between periods, during lunch, or after school. They have learned that Mr. Garcia does not pry but will offer a sympathetic ear.
"It's no big deal, really," Anissa says, once she's settled. "It's just that a friend posted some mean things on Snap last night, and I told her it was not right. It's about someone else, but if someone did that to me, I would be mad. And I would be worried about what other people thought."
"It's really hard when people you care about do things that you don't agree with," Mr. Garcia responds. "It makes you question the relationship. What did she say when you told her it wasn't right?"
"She got mad at me and said that I was a traitor."
"That's really hard," Mr. Garcia says. "When you do the right thing and there are negative consequences, it can make you not want to do the right thing the next time. Like we've talked about before, it's not easy to keep doing the right thing when it's not the popular thing. Can I ask something else? Is the other person safe? Was the posting bad enough that we need to talk with Dr. Castillo [the principal]?"
Anissa shakes her head. "No, it was just rude. And she took it down anyway. I just don't know how to keep my friend and do the right thing at the same time. Can we talk more after school?"
"Of course," Mr. Garcia says. "You can always talk with me. I think this might be lesson in empathy for others, and it's allowing you to understand somebody else's perspective. There are ways to repair relationships when both parties want to. I look forward to our conversation."
The kind of struggle Anissa was having with her friend are not an uncommon occurrence in the lives of young people. Social media make navigating these waters terribly complex, as slights and hurt feelings are amplified in ways we adults never experienced when we were school aged. As students work through these choppy waters, our counsel is more important than ever. Of course, inserting yourself into an adolescent's personal troubles is always tricky, and it is just as likely that Anissa never would have opened up to Mr. Garcia in the first place. But a few things worked in his favor (and hers):
Human beings are hardwired to socialize—to affiliate with one another to achieve group goals. In fact, it was when our species gained the ability to cooperate and collaborate that human development skyrocketed (Pinker, 2012). Language, tools, and processes could be shared across generations and societies. Humans have developed prosocial skills that are found within all cultures. Most of the dispositions discussed in previous chapters are primarily internal to the individual but play a role in the expression of prosocial skills, which involve interactions with others.
Prosocial skills include helping behaviors (see Chapter 4) as well as sharing and teamwork, which are examined in more detail in this chapter. These prosocial skills are proactive (hence the name), meaning that they are foundational to, but not the same as, developing relationships with others. In other words, you can have good prosocial skills but not have strong relationships. Consider the number of times each day that you engage in the prosocial skills of helping, sharing, and teamwork behaviors with people with whom you have no relationship. Holding the door for someone, moving over on a subway seat so another passenger can sit down, and standing patiently in line at the supermarket are all prosocial skills that help us function as a group, even when we are strangers. Prosocial skills contribute to social competence.
Prosocial skills are prerequisite to, but not the same as, building and maintaining relationships, some of which blossom into friendships. Relationships require another set of skills—communication, empathy, and methods for repairing relationships when they are damaged. Empathy, which is the ability to understand and share the experiences and feelings of others, is a critical driver in relationships. A well-developed sense of empathy is necessary for altruistic decision making, where the good of others is taken into account. Relationship skills are more complex and require lots of adult guidance and brokering to help children and adolescents become more competent. We will begin with an examination of the prosocial skills of sharing and teamwork that transform classrooms into communities.
Prosocial behaviors are influenced by the expectations of others. They are sometimes referred to as normative behaviors, meaning they reflect societal norms—agreements about the right or most the desirable way to behave (e.g., older children should grant more latitude to younger children).
Collective opinion carries weight, which is why it is so useful to create classroom norms that go beyond standard compliance measures (e.g., raise your hand before speaking, keep your feet flat on the floor). There is evidence that children and adults engage in more frequent prosocial behaviors when there is an audience and when the influence of the social norms of the setting are strong (House & Tomasello, 2018). The school where the three of us work operates on three norms that are prosocial in nature:
Of course, operationalizing these norms requires significant investment in the principles of social and emotional learning profiled in this book. Beginning with the first week of school, students and teachers list ways in which these principles are demonstrated in the classroom. From there, teachers and students co-construct classroom rules that align with these prosocial norms. Science classrooms usually have specific rules about lab equipment ("Take care of this place"), but many rules circle around the second norm ("Take care of each other"). Examples include "Listen respectfully even when you don't agree" and "Yield the floor so others can speak." In these rules lie the mechanisms of teamwork.
Prosocial behaviors cluster into three categories: sharing, helping, and teamwork. Because we discussed helping in Chapter 4's discussion of cognitive regulation, we won't return to it again. But we will dig into sharing, which is a precursor to altruism, and teamwork, which includes cooperation in the classroom.
Anyone who has been around very young children can confirm that early sharing behavior is often … reluctant. Often, it's a response to the prompting of adults or older siblings, accompanied by a reminder that sharing is the right or fair thing to do—thus identifying it as a societal norm. Primary and early-elementary teachers can (and often do) follow this same model, adding normative information to classroom rules to help establish expectations beyond the rule "Share." Compare: "It's time to share the ball with someone else now" and "It's time to share the ball now with someone else who's been waiting. That's one way we take care of each other."
Willingly sharing resources and materials can be a challenge for some children, but as a foundational skill for positive relationships, it's worth promoting and practicing. Consider that primary-aged children perceive partial resource sharing as a sign of friendship between the two (Liberman & Shaw, 2017). Kindergarten teacher Kiley Farmer plays turn-taking games with her students to build habits about the give-and-take nature of cooperation and sharing. "I start the year by reading It's Mine! (Lionni, 1996), which is about three frogs that squabble with each other until a storm comes along and they realize how much they need each other," she said. We hang a picture of the frogs to remind us not to be too ‘froggy’ with each other." Ms. Farmer makes sure to set up her learning environment so that her students get lots of practice sharing. "Art supplies, math manipulatives, tablets … I often stage it so that two students will need to work together with one set of materials. As they get better at sharing, I expand the group sizes to three or four. It's a good way to build their teamwork skills," she said.
The ability to productively collaborate with others is widely understood as an essential skill. This prosocial behavior is variously described as a 21st-century skill (Partnership for 21st Century Learning, 2015) or, in the world of work, a "soft skill" (SCANS, 1992). The ability to collaborate with others draws on a number of other social and emotional skills, including positive relationships, communication, self-regulation, goal setting, and taking responsibility. Teamwork is required in many childhood endeavors (e.g., sports, music, theater, play). In school, the importance of teamwork is usually expressed through a variety of group tasks that require mutual participation to complete the task. We define collaborative learning as a set of practices designed to foster peer-to-peer interactions through meaningful academic tasks (Fisher & Frey, 2014).
Simply pushing four desks together is no guarantee that collaboration will happen. Too often we have seen students divide and conquer a task, working together only for a short period of time to stitch together the parts they have developed separately. Eighth grade humanities teacher Clay Westerbrook had noticed this happening for several years when his students did group presentations. "The kids would get up there and each person would talk about the one presentation slide they produced. No one could ever answer a question about a partner's slide. Sometimes, they wouldn't even match visually," he said. However, he didn't really know what to do about it. Things changed for him when he looked at the experience through the lens of task complexity: "I was giving them an assignment where they didn't really need each other. All they were doing was cutting and pasting information from the internet."
Mr. Westbrook made two important changes. The first change was to use peer evaluations. His students completed feedback forms about the content and the presentation style to share publicly with the group presenting. "This really improved their ability to remain engaged and to practice ways to give feedback that are useful." But the second change to the process—introducing iterative presentations-really fostered teamwork: He introduced iterative presentations. Instead of being assigned a topic, Mr. Westbrook's teams had to identify content based on a previous team's presentation. The teacher gives the first presentation, then draws the name of a team to create a second one. Based on the initial presentation, the team must identify the topic for their 5-minute presentation. "I give them the rest of the class period to put it together, so they have to stay in close communication with one another," he said. While that team is building the presentation, Mr. Westbrook works with the rest of the class. The team delivers their short presentation at the beginning of the next class, then draws the name of a second team. The second team's task is to put together a presentation that answers a question derived from the previous topic. "I call it Presentation Shark Tank," he said. For example, to get the ball rolling during the Creating America unit of study, "I started with a short presentation on manifest destiny. The first team wondered about the Oregon Trail, which I had mentioned, so they presented on that topic the following day." Over the next week, teams presented on the perils faced by mountain men and settlers, the Donner Party, displaced western Native American tribes, the Louisiana Purchase, the lives of Seminoles in the Everglades, and the fight for the Alamo. "It really prompts a new kind of listening, too, because a team doesn't know whether they will be selected until the end of the presentation."
Tracking the development of teamwork skills is possible using the Teamwork Scale for Youth (Lower, Newman, & Anderson-Butcher, 2017). This eight-item self-report instrument has been validated for use with students ages 9–15 and can be used multiple times in a school year to monitor progress. The students respond to the following statements using a Likert scale of 1 (not at all true) to 5 (really true):
As with other assessment tools of this type, students' answers can open the door for having future conversations, setting goals, and celebrating growth.
Relationships are critical in the learning lives of students. The relationship between teacher and student exerts a strong influence on achievement, reported by Hattie (2009) as having an effect size of .52. As well, when we strive to build relationships with students, we model how it is that they can do so with others, including peers. Therefore, before discussing ways to foster peer relationships, it is crucial that we attend to how we ourselves model by example the kinds of healthy relationships we want in our classrooms.
All relationships, regardless of the age of the people involved, are predicated on a foundation of respect and regard. We can't demand that students form healthy relationships with peers if we don't ourselves demonstrate the value of respect and regard we hold for our own students. Students look to us for guidance in how in-school relationships should be formed. To lay the foundation for healthy, growth-producing relationships with students, educators need to do the following:
There is an adage in education that students don't care how much you know until they know how much you care. Caring is an important part of a relationship. When we use people's names correctly, speak to them about their interests, and seek to make connections to their lives, we are drawing a blueprint for how relationships are built. We exhibit caring behaviors so that in turn students can use them with each other.
Effective student-teacher relationships are trusting and supportive, but they are also characterized by high expectations. In other words, "caring" is not just about "being nice." Students expect to be challenged and supported; what they need are teachers who are "warm demanders" (Vasquez, 1989). Delpit (2012) notes that warm demanders "expect a great deal of their students, convince them of their own brilliance, and help them to reach their potential in a disciplined and structured environment" (p. 77). That's the type of relationship that accelerates learning.
When it comes to practical things you can do to position yourself to be a warm demander, we direct you to the work of Mark Finnis (2018) of Independent Thinking (www.independentthinking.co.uk), who has developed a list of 33 ways to build better relationships with students (see Figure 5.1).
Source: Adapted with permission from "33 Ways to Build Better Relationships," by M. Finnis. Copyright 2018 by Independent Thinking.
When students experience healthy, growth-producing relationships with their teachers, they are more likely to mirror those actions and behaviors with their peers. By teaching students to engage with peers and develop respect for one another, we provide them with avenues for dealing more productively with problems. Students with healthy relationships tend to work through issues rather than express their anger on a social media platform or with their fists. Although peer relationships require more than modeling from adults, the examples adults provide students set the expectations for their interactions with others.
Feeling a sense of belonging to a group is essential for our well-being as social animals. Adolescence is a particularly challenging time, and teenagers are especially vulnerable to feeling alienated and marginalized. At this developmental stage, relationships with peers grow in importance, and feeling disliked is associated with loss of learning, with a –.19 effect size (Hattie, 2009), equivalent to roughly a half a year of lost learning. A measure of relationships is the extent to which one feels a sense of relatedness to others—in other words, connected to others. Relatedness is defined as one's perception that peers care about you, respect you, and see you as a valued member of a group or team. A study of nearly 1,100 middle and high school students in 65 schools found that peer relatedness was stronger in classrooms where helping behaviors were valued, and where students had opportunities to interact academically with one another (Mikami, Ruzeck, Hafen, Gregory, & Allen, 2017). Although teachers are not able to make friendships materialize out of thin air, we can set the stage for relationships to strengthen among our students.
Ninth grade history teacher Aja Buchanan structures her classroom so that students get to know one another from the first day. They introduce themselves by writing a short biography, then convert the text into a word cloud graphic of their own design. "They love seeing their work displayed," she smiled. "Never too old for that." She makes a point of making sure that she and everyone else in the room learns each other's names by the end of the first week, reinforcing that a sign of respect is using one another's names correctly. She designs her instruction to emphasize collaborative learning ("I tell them my goal is that about half of the instructional minutes during the week are going to be in small groups, so they should get used to it"), then proceeds to teach the communication skills needed to function well as a member of a team. "These are life skills, not just history skills. I tell them, ‘If you're able to establish a relationship with other people quickly, it makes work and life just a little bit easier,’" said Ms. Buchanan.
Another reason relationships with others are important is they help us develop our identity and agency. Mike Holmes's 5th grade class hosts a short "gratitude circle" once a week, during which students share their appreciation for each other. "This brief activity provides students a healthy transition back to the learning environment and some practice with oral language skills, not to mention relationship building," he said. At the start of the year, it's often hard for students to accept the compliments, Mr. Holmes told us. "They get better at it, though," he added. "I love to watch their confidence and pride in themselves grow."
On one particular afternoon, the students shared the following compliments:
Finally, students who do not have a good relationship with their school and believe they are valued members of the school community will be likely to exhibit the desire to repair harm when it occurs.
Our goal is for students to develop the habit of thinking before they act, reflecting on the actions they do take, and learning from the experience. Relationships students have with adults in the school can be highly influential in this process. Students who respect these adults don't often engage in problematic behavior. When they do, they have to face the adults they care about and make amends for what they have done. We also hope that our students reach the point when they care about the school as a whole, and decide not to take certain actions because they don't want the school to be affected in a negative way. This is a long-term goal that requires a significant amount of investment, but when students reach that pinnacle in their thinking, great changes occur.
At the school where we work, students' relationships with the school are at the center of what we do. We describe the process in more detail in How to Create a Culture of Achievement in Your School and Classroom (Fisher et al., 2012), using five pillars intended to build affiliation between the organization and the students who learn there. Briefly:
We are reminded of Miguel, an 11th grader who was identified as credit deficient. He had been expelled at the end of the 9th grade and never attended 10th grade. He showed up at a school on the first day of what would have been his junior year only because his probation officer wanted evidence of his enrollment. He was defiant and disengaged (but at least he was in school). Miguel made several mistakes and had poor attendance. Yet there was an English teacher who made a connection with him. She would advocate for him every time something went wrong. She started brokering relationships between him and other teachers, and Miguel's behavior started to change. At one point he said his behavior changed because "these people here are trying and they really care. When I do something wrong it makes them all look bad. I don't want it to reflect on this school, so I keep my *$%# together now." Yes, one bad word but Miguel graduated and is working as a mechanic. That wouldn't have happened without a trusting relationship and the eventual development of respect for the school.
Relationships with peers, teachers, and the school are built, deepened, and repaired through effective communication. Communication is also an essential vehicle for learning. Students are expected to read, write, speak, and listen as part of their learning. And there are specific communication standards (often called language arts) that focus teachers' efforts to develop this aspect of learning. Yet many people, old and young alike, have difficulty communicating, especially when it comes to expressing ideas, feelings, and reactions to emotionally charged situations. It may be because some classrooms limit communication to specific, safe topics. Or it may be because we don't test speaking and listening, which means these skills receive less attention in the classroom. Or it may be because teachers assume students know how to communicate and thus do not focus on these skills.
As noted in Chapter 3, the willingness to listen is a marker of emotional regulation. It is also a skill needed in effective communication, as well as for relationship building. Unfortunately, for a lot of students, the opposite of speaking is waiting to speak again, rather than listening. There are a number of models for active listening, but the common aspects of these models can be summed up like this:
The students in Alexis Calvio's 4th grade class have developed their listening skills because their teacher regularly asks them what they heard another student say and if they agree or disagree with that person. For example, while discussing the characteristics of inventors after reading several articles about different inventors, she asked her students to discuss their ideas with their team. Ms. Calvio used Numbered Heads Together to encourage students to support each other. Here's what it looked like.
Students sat at numbered tables in the classroom and counted off, 1 through 5, so that every person had a number. Following their initial conversation, Ms. Calvio rolled a die and told the class that Person 4 from each table should be ready to answer. The students talked again, this time making sure that Person 4 at their table was prepared to answer. Ms. Calvio brought the class back together, rolled the die again, and called out, "Table 6!"
Kanella from Table 6 stood up and spoke confidently: "One of the characteristics that inventors need to have is creativity, because you have to be able to think of new ideas that the world needs. If you invent something that no one needs, then you won't be able to sell it."
Ms. Calvio rolled the die again, and it was Table 1's turn. In this technique, Round 2 of the discussion requires students to agree or disagree with the previous round's speaker and offer a reason why. Maya stood up and said, "I agree with Kanella that inventors need to be creative, but I don't think it is just because they need to sell the invention. Even if some of the new things won't sell, they're still an inventor."
There is evidence that students learn through collaborative conversations like these (Frey, Fisher, & Nelson, 2013). For too many students, learning is stifled because they have not yet developed the skills required to interact productively with their peers. Relationships are important, but so are all of the other aspects of SEL that we discuss in this book. Communication cannot be limited to academic conversations; students need to talk through social situations as well.
Another way that teachers can build listening and communications skills is through the use of circles. Communication circles allow students to learn about their own perspectives and those of others. Circles are part of "restorative practices" work (e.g., Smith, Fisher, & Frey, 2015) and can serve as a foundation for repairing harm when it is done. Without experience communicating one's feelings in the low-stakes environment of communication circles, for example, a student may not be willing to engage in higher-stakes conferences when damage or harm has been done.
Communication circles show students that their experiences are valid, that they are allowed to share their feelings, and that peers listen to their thinking. Regardless of the type of circle, there are responsibilities and expectations:
Our experiences suggest that the topics need to be safe when introducing circle processes. These low-stakes circles use questions for which there is no "right" answer, making them less emotionally charged. Here are some examples:
When students understand the process and know that the experience is psychologically safe, circles can be used to discuss more complex issues such as classroom operations, bullying on the playground, fears about an upcoming test, or struggles with relationships. The opening question is really important. A teacher who begins with the question, "What can I do to make this class run more smoothly?" sets the stage for a discussion or a critique centered around the teacher. Contrast this with the opening question, "What can we do to make this classroom run more smoothly?" This phrasing indicates shared responsibility for the construction of the learning environment. The focus of the circle, regardless of the topic, is everyone's growth and reflection.
Sequential circles allow each member of the group an opportunity to participate in the conversation. We recommend forming the circle out of chairs alone (not desks) or even having the students stand or sit on the floor. The goal is communication; you want everyone to make eye contact. Typically there is an object, such as a stuffed animal or tennis ball, that students pass around the circle. Only the person with the object can talk. Sequential circles are suitable for situations when you want full participation by members. However, we don't want to force students to speak when they don't want to. Those who are not ready to speak can pass.
Sixth grade teacher Dahlia Colangelo was preparing her students for an annual tradition—the districtwide five-day camping experience for 6th graders held in the mountains a few miles outside the city. Ms. Colangelo does this prep every year. For most students in her urban district, it's their first camping experience, and for many, it's the first night they'll spend away from home in an unfamiliar place. Her students are always excited about the trip, but there is also anxiety and insecurity just below the surface.
Because Ms. Colangelo understands that modeling can be an effective way for showing others how to communicate and how to express their feelings (e.g., Miller, 1989), she began by saying this:
We've covered a lot of information about our camping trip next week, and I'm excited. But I'm also a little bit nervous. I get butterflies before these trips. I wonder if you do, too. Let's go around the circle and start by naming one thing we're excited about. I'll start. I'm excited about the hike we'll do on Tuesday morning. I can't wait for you to see my favorite spot on the trail. I want to share it with you.
Ms. Colangelo passed the "talking stick" (a small souvenir vinyl football from the local university team) to Ariyana, the student to her left. "What are you excited about?" the teacher asked. In short order, the talking stick was passed around the circle, and each student named an event he or she was looking forward to. When it was Ms. Colangelo's turn again, she moved the conversation forward:
I get nervous, too, when I'm getting ready for this trip. Sometimes it's something I'm worried about. I'm worried that because I won't see my own kids for the whole week, that something might go wrong without me there. Ariyana, what is something about the trip that you are nervous or worried about?
The pace was a little slower as students revealed their trepidations. Being away from home was a big one. Then several students in a row talked about insects and snakes before the talking stick reached Eliana, who voiced this fear: "I'm nervous about sharing a cabin with three other people. Like changing clothes. Will people make fun of me?" This worry was echoed by some other students. When it was Ms. Colangelo's turn again, she complimented them on their courage, then said, "I heard some people saying that a worry they have is about privacy. What are some ways we can help each other feel a little less worried about this?" This third round elicited ideas, and when it was Ms. Colangelo's turn once again, she summarized their thoughts and invited discussion about agreements. The class even adopted a slogan ("What happens at camp stays at camp") as a reminder that unexpected things would happen. Some might be funny or embarrassing, but they agreed that they would not tease one another. Ms. Colangelo said, "It might not help us with mosquito bites, but it's good to know that we're all going to protect each other this way."
Non-sequential circles operate much the same as sequential circles, except that students do not speak in order of their position. In a non-sequential circle, the current speaker recognizes the next person to speak. The facilitator rarely interrupts the flow of the conversation unless it is necessary to get the discussion back on track.
One morning, during Rebecca Phillip's 10th grade English class, Angel raised his hand and asked if they could have a circle. The class was engaged in a unit that included reading the short story "All the Years of Her Life" (Callaghan, 1936), which focuses on a mother's devotion to her son, forgiveness, moral choices, and the consequences of one's actions.
Once seated in a circle, Angel confessed that he was having a hard time paying attention to the text because it was hitting really close to home: "It reminded me of when my mother said to me, ‘You have shamed me enough.’ It was because of my grades and how I'm acting at home. I'm not sure how to fix that relationship."
The students responded with advice, compassion, and empathy. Some wanted to know more about Angel's situation at home. Others offered to help him catch up on grades before the next reporting period. Still others shared experiences about conflict with their families and how they resolved it. For example, Liam had this advice for Angel:
Own it. And then do something about it. Your attitude is your choice. Go home tonight and tell her you're sorry. And then show her respect. She's your momma … the only one you got. Yeah, she'll get on your nerves, but practice what we learned. Take a breath. Think before you speak. Talk it through. It's worth it. You don't know what I would do to have one more convo with my moms.
Angel ended the circle by saying, "Can we have this circle again next week? This was good for me. I think I can get back to the reading now."
Ms. Phillip later reflected that emotional work is part of teaching literature. "The characters we read about help my students think about the world writ large. So sometimes we need to allow for some group processing." She told us her students' writing is now stronger "because they understand that literature is a reflection of the world and can shape how we think about the world and our place in it."
The fishbowl strategy takes place in a circle within a circle. Those in the outer circle witness and listen to the discussion held by those in the inner circle. There is an empty chair or two in the inner circle to allow people from the outer circle to participate temporarily in the inner circle.
The students in Charles Lee's 2nd grade class needed a fishbowl circle discussion following some hurt feelings on the playground during recess. Mr. Lee started the circle by saying, "I heard that we didn't live up to one of our goals today. Does anyone remember the goals we set? Who would like to join the inner circle to talk about it?" Several children moved to the inner circle.
Jamal volunteered, saying, "We made a goal that we would take care of each other. But today, we had problems at recess."
Kevin added, "We stopped taking care of each other because we all wanted to play kickball and there wasn't enough spaces."
Diego responded, "We told them that they couldn't play and then they took the ball away so we couldn't play."
"We should've taken turns with a timer," Ruben said. "But nobody got to play because we didn't take care of each other."
Jamal left the inner circle and was replaced by Carly, who said, "Oh, it was about kickball? I thought it was because I didn't take care of Aimee on the jungle gym when she needed me to. I'm sorry, Aimee. I just got mad and didn't do my strategy."
The conversation continued with students taking responsibility for their actions at recess and making commitments to one another to work harder to reach their goal.
Some people worry about the amount of time spent in circles and the potential loss of learning time. In this case, if students were still focused on their conflicts from recess and didn't have a chance to process and deal with them, they likely would have had difficulty attending to Mr. Lee's planned math lesson. The few minutes they spent in the circle accomplished several things. First, it allowed students to recognize and express their feelings. Second, it provided a way to move on from the problems at recess. Third, it allowed them to practice communication skills, including listening and turn taking (which are included in the grade-level standards). Finally, it gave the class the ability to focus on the math lesson once the conflict had been addressed.
Empathy, being able to understand the feelings of others, is an important component of relationship development. Although there is limited evidence that empathy can be directly taught, it can be developed by giving students opportunities to engage in empathetic responses. Some guidelines for fostering empathy advise educators to be aware of their own actions, integrate literature that allows students to explore empathy for historical and contemporary characters, and mirror empathetic responses to their students (e.g., Gerdes, Segal, Jackson, & Mullins, 2011; Gordon, 2009).
There are also specific actions that teachers can take that are likely to result in students' empathy development. Here are some to try:
There is evidence that empathy develops as students explore literature and discuss the actions of characters. For example, the students in Jose Herrera's 5th grade class were reading The One and Only Ivan (Applegate, 2015), the story of a gorilla who lives in a cage in a shopping mall. Told from Ivan the gorilla's point of view, readers learn that he seems satisfied until he reevaluates his life from the perspective of a baby elephant taken from her family. The students in Mr. Herrera's class discussed the story, acknowledging not only the anthropomorphism but also the feelings that the author assigned to the gorilla. One of the students said, "It's not just about Ivan. This is how people would feel if they lost a family member." Another student noted, "You can't always fix things, but you can be a friend."
We'd like to share an additional strategy drawn from restorative practices that can foster empathy with students and equip them with another communication technique. Affective statements allow teachers (and eventually students) to express their feelings and emotions by using "I" statements. This shifts the dynamic of the conversation away from accusatory "you" statements that can leave the other person feeling defensive. This simple change can develop empathy because the technique shifts the discussion from talking to students to talking with them. Adding an "I" statement, then, is a way for you to voice your feelings and allow students an opportunity to respond.
When teachers use "I" statements and provide background, students are better able to grasp what the teacher wants. These interactions are private and do not rely on public humiliation to control behavior. For example, placing your hand on a shoulder and quietly stating, "Taylor, it's hard for me to give good directions when you're talking at the same time," is likely going to be enough to redirect the behavior as an empathetic response, rather than temporary compliance. When the goal is behavioral compliance, demanding attention may work, at least temporarily. But students do not develop empathy when they are just told to obey. Conversations like this can change the narrative as student and teacher consider the other person's perspective.
It is inevitable that relationships with teachers and peers will sometimes be strained, and students have to learn how to repair relationships when that happens. Not only does this create a more conducive learning environment, it is also a healthy habit to develop for life outside the classroom. Of course, there have to be growth-producing relationships in the first place for students to learn to repair. When students have positive, healthy relationships with adults, they are much more willing to work to repair those relationships when damaged.
The most powerful tool we can recommend for teachers who want to integrate a focus on relationship repair into their day-to-day practice is the impromptu conversation. It is a major shift in thinking for educators to consider that problematic student behavior is less about the rules being broken and more about the relationships that have been violated. Impromptu conversations allow teachers to mobilize their skills, using "I" statements in a more extended way. This process is useful when a teacher wants to address minor infractions within the classroom that are not significant enough to require administrative support. When teachers lack tools to address such concerns and must instead ask administrators to deal with even minor problems, students do not develop empathy for their teachers or anyone else in the classroom. When administrators "steal the conflict," swooping in to solve the problem for the teacher, they rob teachers of a chance to invest in the relationship with the student. When it is the administrator doing the quick fix, it is often a quick assignment of blame, a correction, and a generic promise to try to behave better. Even more problematic is that the student never had an opportunity to understand how his or her actions affected others—and the teacher could have used the conflict to teach students how to go about repairing relationships. Of course, there are times when the actions are serious enough to warrant administrative intervention. But we're talking about low-level problematic behavior that can be changed when students see that their teachers take control of the situation and address it proactively.
At the school where we work, administrators and teachers work together to make these impromptu conversations possible. Teachers can request coverage in the classroom by an administrator so that they can step out into the hallway with the student. Once there, the teacher uses "I" statements to explain the concern and solicits dialogue from the student, as in the following example:
Teacher: What was happening just now? I noticed that you've got your head down on the table.
Student: I'm just not feeling it today.
Teacher: Hmm, that's a problem. I've got some good stuff planned, but I can see you're not with me. What needs to happen to get you back to where you need to be? I can usually count on you.
Student: It's just I'm falling behind in my classes. I don't know how I can catch up.
Teacher: I'm glad you told me. You're up-to-date in here, but I didn't know about your other classes. We can't solve this right now, but can you meet me at lunch? We can make a plan.
Student: Sure. Thanks.
Teacher: Let's get back in there so we can get back to talking about the Progressive Era. I'll ask Rico to share his notes from class this morning so you get up to speed.
Impromptu conversations like this can head off conflicts before they damage the relationship between student and teacher.
Conflicts of a more serious nature require more than an impromptu conversation and usually involve an administrator or counselor, as well as the student's family. But current approaches can leave something to be desired. When children misbehave, adults are notorious for asking, "Why did you do that?" It practically begs the student to say, "I don't know." Sometimes, especially with younger students, they really don't know. There are better questions to ask. For example, starting with "What happened?" makes it harder for a student to answer that they don't know what happened. When we ask what happened, we are opening the door for them to share their perspective. Following the "what happened" question, we often use a scripted conversation with the offender (adapted from Costello, Wachtel, & Wachtel, 2009) that includes the following questions:
Having this type of conversation can help determine if the student is ready to make amends and restore the relationship. We aren't suggesting that a single conversation will address the harm done; it really depends on the severity of the violation. There may be a series of actions required to restore the relationship. In addition, there may be further consequences, such as loss of privileges, detention, or suspension. But it is vital to include restoration and making amends as part of the disciplinary process.
We follow a similar script to talk with the victim, whether student or adult. In traditional school disciplinary actions, the victim is an afterthought, simply told, "I'll take care of this. You can go back to class now." That sends a powerful and damaging message to victims—namely that they will need to deal with the hurt by themselves. The script we use to discuss the harm caused to a victim is also from Costello and colleagues (2009):
These conversations are separate and private, and are not conducted simultaneously. At some point, when the victim and offender are both ready, they need to make amends. If you have ever been in trouble, you know the hardest thing to do is to apologize and take responsibility for your actions. Dominique remembers growing up hearing his parents say that a conflict with his sister wasn't over until he took responsibility and apologized. He never wanted to say he was sorry, but it wasn't because he never regretted his behavior; he just didn't want to go through the difficult and awkward process of owning up to the fact that he wasn't his best self for a period of time. But apologizing and making it right is the reason that Dominique and his sister are still close today. Similar processes need to happen in school systems so that, when infractions occur, educators can help individuals take responsibility, apologize, and develop a plan to move forward with the repair. This process should be in place for student-to-student, teacher-to-student, teacher-to-teacher, and teacher-to-leader relationships. Remember, restorative practices are used so that
Teaching students social skills, communication skills, and empathy facilitates their ability to form and maintain relationships with others. These skills also are instrumental to developing the altruistic and responsible young people we need to foster a public spirit (see Chapter 6). Relationships are important for many reasons, including the fact that they result in productive interactions between people and make life more enjoyable. In fact, most people say that the relationships they have with others are among the most valuable things in their lives. But we invariably strain relationships and need to know how to repair those relationships.