Mood before matter: Building student-teacher relationships

Building Teacher-Student Relationships
Trust - Engagement - Belonging - Success
Sam Cutri
Lecturer SAE Qantm
Mood Before Matter

This strategy session will explore
– How we get to know our students,
– How, inadvertently they get to know themselves,
– The practice of ‘Building Teacher Student Relationships’ (BTSR),
– Relating to yourself and others,
– Mood before Matter - Rebalancing teacher student power dynamics, and
– Negotiating risk - Ethics - Marginalisation - Assumptions
("Interrelationships", 2018)

Benefits of a positive teacher student relationship
▪ Leads to effective transfer of learning and improved academic performance
(Rumnarayan and Rao, 2004).
▪ Students ability to nurture and sustain positive rapports with teachers leading to
higher productivity (Farounbi, 2002; Carroll, 2005 and Ilesanmi, 2005)
▪ Open and friendly communication between students and teachers can reflect on
students self-concept, improved self-perception (Fatona, 2001).
▪ Student voice and participation in leadership groups, shared responsibility in
decisions (Akinpelu et al, 2003; Beardwell and Holden, 2000).

A Critically Reflective Teacher
Knowing yourself - Understanding your students
▪ Critical reflection is the process by which adults identify the assumptions governing their actions
▪ Question the meaning of assumptions, and
▪ Develop alternative ways of acting
(Cranton, 1996)
▪ Critical friends and colleagues are at the heart of the critically reflective process
▪ Talking to colleagues unravels the shroud of silence in which our work is wrapped
▪ Helps check, verify and reframe personal and professional assumptions (Angelika, 2015)
(Brookfield, 2015)
.

Student Feedback Today
▪ We gather information about the effects of our teaching on students at the end of the
teaching period
▪ It’s summative, after the fact.
(Brookfield, 2015)

BTSR - Through a student’s eyes
BTSR Activities can help us design teaching informed by what we find
out about;
▪ Student experiences,
▪ Ability levels,
▪ Personal and Cultural beliefs, and
▪ Aspirations
Receiving formative feedback that allows us to;
▪ Constantly research their responses to learning, and
▪ Make continuous adjustments based on what we find out.
("The Worlds...Students Eyes", 2014)

Mood before matter - Rebalancing the power
▪ Tripping into class - ‘An Abrupt Beginning’
▪ Teacher as the class clown
("Is it good to have a class clown?", 2018)
▪ Resetting any assumptions about the teacher student power dynamics (Brookfield, 2015).
▪ Leveling the playing field
(VOLPICELLI, 2016)

BTSR Activity - The Introduction Activity
▪ Introduce yourself to the class
▪ Tell me about yourself
▪ Your personal educational experience
▪ What you are studying
▪ Why you are here
▪ What you hope to achieve in work, life… ("How to...Self Introduction", 2017)
▪ Your likes and dislikes
▪ Reflections and Aspirations

▪ Who am I at university
▪ What's important in my studies
▪ What do I expect from university, after university
▪ What do I need to be successful
▪ What if I fail
▪ How do I express my creative ideas, and
▪ Who do I want to be, what do I want to be and are they the same thing.
BTSR Activity - Exploring a students
learning journey
(Law, 2016)

BTSR Activity - Weekly Story
– Tell me something that happened this week - a life or learning experience
– Relate that back to an emotional growth story, experience, positive reinforcement, a
joke, deeper learning, content delivery.

BTSR Activities
● The One‐Minute Paper
● The Muddiest Point
● The Learning Audit
● The Learning Audit
● Clickers (Bruff, 2009)
● Social Media - Messenger
● Todays Meet
● The Critical Incident Questionnaire (CIQ)
● Teacher-Student Relationship Questionnaire (TSRQ)
● Letter to Successors
Stephen Brookfields (2015), Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher
(Seymour, 2018)

BTSR Activities Outcomes
▪ You introduce yourself to the class, expertise what you have achieved…..
▪ Gives students a sense that you know what you are talking about, and
begin to earn their respect as a practitioner.
▪ Gives students an insight into your life experience, opening the door to a
deeper connection
▪ Developing a connection to self and others
▪ Developing an emotional connection to learning (Thompson, 2018).

BTSR Activities Outcomes
▪ You get to know your students, their talents, their experiences and
aspirations
▪ Improved Transferable Skills
▪ Achieve early student success - Presenting yourself to a room of peers
can be one of the most intimidating experiences for a young student.
▪ Contextualise L&T
▪ Personalising student centred L&T
▪ Improved retention

Preparing to contextualise learning
▪ Take notes
▪ What and where they studied
▪ Discipline specific information
▪ Likes and dislikes
▪ Why they are at university, and
▪ Reflections and Aspirations.
(Wanless, 2018)

Negotiating Risk
▪ Student motivation, students shaping their own learning from their perceptions of a teacher, this can be problematic with misinterpretations
of expectations (Muller, Katz, & Dance, 1999.; Hyland, 2015)
▪ Professional relationships between teachers and students versus close non academic relationships may lead to faculty playing favourites, or
deemed inappropriate (Cahn, 2011).in
▪ a
▪ Students are still easily influenced and must be approached with awareness and neutral influence (Speight, 2016).
▪ Faculty can influence both positively and negatively the scholarship choices made by students, Speight (2016) states that “faculty… can alienate
students from entire bodies of knowledge”
▪ Creating and maintaining supportive and safe learning environments by empathising with the level of knowledge, beliefs and understandings of
young people and their behaviours (Egeberg, McConney & Price, 2016)
▪ Napora (2011), writes of the practice of mindfulness of which the BTSR workshop draws inspiration, “It is problematic the practice is often left
to individual educators to implement without oversight” (Napora, 2011).
▪ The BTSR practice should be informed by and inline with the national professional standards for educators ("Teacher Standards", 2017).

Risk mitigation options
● The BTSR activities should be voluntary, making it clear that students can freely opt out of participating,
● Offer students alternatives to the BTSR activities, such as a private face to face meetings...
● Clearly defining the activities, the benefits, risks and intended outcomes,
● Making students aware that counselling services are available,
● Confidentiality,
● Being respectful of colleagues beliefs when challenging assumptions,
● Avoiding marginalisation by not pushing new ideas to hard, supporting new ideas with research,
● Delivering an open and transparent process,
● Management approval of activities,
● BTSR activities are aligned with the well-being, ethical and academic policies and procedures of the institute.
● If you are unsure, discuss your practice with the academic coordinators, psychologists, student services or management.

References
Akinpelu, J., Ayodele, S., Bamisaye, O., Nwazuoke, I., & Okediran, A. (2003). Ethics and the Teaching Profession in Education this millennium: Innovations in theory and Practice. Ibadan: Macmillan.
Angelika. (2015). Post #2: Critical Reflection. Retrieved from https://angelikasocialwork.weebly.com/blog/post-2-critical-reflection
Beardwell, R., & Holden, C. (2000). Human Resource Management: A Contemporary Perspective. London: John Hopkins.
Brookfield, S. (2017). Becoming a Critically Reflective Teacher. John Wiley & Sons.
Bruff, D. (2009). Teaching with Classroom Response Systems: Creative Active Learning Environments. Jossey-Bass.
Cahn, S. (2011). Saints and scamps. Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.
Carroll, J. (2005). A Model of School Learning (66th ed.). Teaching Record.
Cranton, P. (1996). Professional development as transformative learning. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Egeberg, H., McConney, A., & Price, A. (2016). Classroom Management and National Professional Standards for Teachers: A Review of the Literature on Theory and Practice. Australian Journal Of Teacher Education, 1-18. doi:
10.14221/ajte.2016v41n7.1
Farounbi, M. (2002). Formative and Summative Evaluation of Students’ Learning. Monograph.
Fatona, M. (2001). Principles and Practice of Education. Ibadan: Oduns Prints.
How to Create a Great Self Introduction. (2017). Retrieved from https://helloalissa.wordpress.com/2017/03/15/self-introductions/
Hyland, T. (2015). On the Contemporary Applications of Mindfulness: Some Implications for Education. Journal Of Philosophy Of Education, 49(2), 170-186. doi: 10.1111/1467-9752.12135
Ilesanmi, J. (2005). Introduction to Educational Administration. Ibadan: Odusote Bookstores Ltd.
Interrelationships. (2018). Retrieved from http://traveltourismcomponents.weebly.com/interrelationships.html
Is it good to have a class clown?. (2018). Retrieved from https://www.debate.org/opinions/is-it-good-to-have-a-class-clown
Law, D. (2016). Creating a great learning journey. Training Journal. Retrieved from https://www.trainingjournal.com/articles/feature/creating-great-learning-journey
Muller, C., Katz, S., & Dance, L. (1999). Investing in Teaching and Learning. Urban Education, 34(3), 292-337. doi: 10.1177/0042085999343003
Napora, L. (2011). Meditation in Higher Education: The Question of Change, a Current Problem, and Evidence Toward a Solution, 66. Retrieved from http://www.contemplativemind.org/enewsletter/2011_Summer/Association for Applied
Psychophysiology & Biofeedback
Rumnanayan, S., & Rao, M. (2004). The Reality of School Management. San Francisco, California: Joss-Bass Publishers.
Seymour, T. (2018). How your dealerships can build trust in the local community. Retrieved from https://www.am-online.com/dealer-management/retailing/how-your-dealerships-can-build-trust-in-the-local-community
Speight, J. (2016). Ethics in the university. John Wiley & Sons.
The Worlds Top 50 Universities; Through a Students Eyes. (2014). Retrieved from https://www.britishcouncil.org/sites/default/files/through-student-eyes.pdf
Thompson, M. (2018). Emotional Engagement in Learning [Video]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QfXNn51OoxM
VOLPICELLI, G. (2016). Humans are surprisingly bad at walking, even when fit and healthy. Retrieved from https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3487458/Do-struggle-stay-two-feet-Study-finds-humans-surprisingly-bad-
WALKING-trip-slip-over.html
Wanless, M. (2018). Contextualising with consent. Retrieved from https://www.cmo.com.au/article/648490/contextualising-consent/

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