Not That Kind of Doctor - Tackling Tough Talks in the University Classroom
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09/23/2024
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Description
In this episode of Not That Kind of Doctor, Guy and Nick tackle the delicate topic of having tough conversations with students. They discuss the emotional bandwidth these interactions require and emphasize the importance of building trust and rapport before issues arise. Sharing personal experiences, they offer strategies for approaching difficult discussions, such as being honest, direct, and focusing on observed behaviors rather than assumptions.
They delve into common classroom challenges like attendance issues, disengagement, and anxiety. Guy and Nick provide practical tips on how to create action plans with students, follow up effectively, and maintain a supportive learning environment. They also highlight the significance of recognizing cultural and neurodiversity in the classroom and adapting communication accordingly.
Key Takeaways:
Build Trust Early: Establish rapport to make tough conversations more productive.
Focus on Behaviors: Address specific actions without making assumptions about intent.
Be Honest and Direct: Clear communication fosters understanding and resolution.
Create Action Plans: Collaborate with students on concrete steps for improvement.
Follow Up Matters: Recognize progress and provide ongoing support.
Don't Avoid the Issue: Unaddressed problems can affect the entire class environment.
Join Nick and Guy as they explore how tough conversations, while challenging, are essential for student growth and a thriving classroom community.
---Timestamps---
00:00 - Introduction
01:07 - Building Trust and Rapport with students
03:03 - Identifying When Tough Conversations are Needed
05:02 - Collecting and Responding to Student Feedback
07:53 - Setting the Stage for Productive Conversations
10:34 - Strategies for Building Connections with Students
14:08 - Managing Anxiety and Resistance in Students
16:18 - Addressing Behavioral Issues and Engagement
19:11 - Starting and Framing Touch Conversations
23:96 - Creating Action Plans and Documentation
26:04 - Supporting Neurodivergent Students and Diverse Needs
29:01 - Partnership and Accountability in Tough Conversations
33:06 - Tracking Student Progress and Class Dynamics
36:06 - Preparation for Tough Conversations
38:01 - Handling Emotional Aftermath and Self-Care
40:04 - Guy and Nick Peace Out
#TeachingStrategies #DifficultConversations #StudentSupport #NotThatKindOfDoctor #highereducation #teaching #wellbeing
Not That Kind of Doctor with Nick Husbye and Guy Trainin
www.youtube.com/@tltenotthatkindofdoctor
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- [00:00:01.080](upbeat music)
- [00:00:10.537]All right, let's have a tough conversation.
- [00:00:12.840]I can't have another one this week, guy.
- [00:00:16.761]I just can't.
- [00:00:18.210]All right, why can't you have more than
- [00:00:20.580]one tough conversation
- [00:00:23.100]At a time?
- [00:00:24.330]Because they are emotionally exhausting.
- [00:00:26.130]They are.
- [00:00:27.371]There is a level of bandwidth to having these kind
- [00:00:30.180]of emotional conversations and tough conversations
- [00:00:32.910]and honest conversations where
- [00:00:36.210]it just takes a lot out of you.
- [00:00:39.334]And we're still in like
- [00:00:41.550]classroom honeymoon period, right?
- [00:00:44.646]Yes.
- [00:00:45.479]Like it's week three here at UNL
- [00:00:48.242]and you know,
- [00:00:49.075]we haven't had the first big assessments yet.
- [00:00:52.500]Yeah.
- [00:00:53.333]So everyone still kind of has an a in their heads.
- [00:00:57.300]They're learning,
- [00:00:59.478]but there isn't necessarily anything around like achievement
- [00:01:02.580]or behavior that has like raised flags yet.
- [00:01:06.420]So it's kinda this honeymoon period, which is lovely.
- [00:01:08.880]But I'm prepared.
- [00:01:10.890]You're prepared.
- [00:01:11.760]I'm already supposed
- [00:01:13.980]to have some tough conversations, so this would be great.
- [00:01:16.830]Maybe I'll get a few.
- [00:01:19.950]So I taught my first class
- [00:01:21.390]because I worked with graduate students.
- [00:01:22.860]I taught the first class this weekend.
- [00:01:25.440]It was fantastic.
- [00:01:27.881]But we're starting to anticipate some challenges
- [00:01:30.240]and have to have to have some conversations.
- [00:01:31.707]Oo, yeah.
- [00:01:32.540]There's some things that, like I've got,
- [00:01:33.600]I've got some bullet points for certain students
- [00:01:35.670]where I'm like, I might have to talk about that later
- [00:01:37.320]if that doesn't correct itself.
- [00:01:39.150]So I think that a big part of what we're saying.
- [00:01:42.540]And, hi, I'm Guy Trainin,
- [00:01:45.723]a professor in the department
- [00:01:46.620]of Teaching learning and teacher education here at UNL.
- [00:01:49.350]And he's not that kind of doctor.
- [00:01:50.820]Neither am I.
- [00:01:53.010]I'm Nick Husbye.
- [00:01:54.120]I am an associate professor
- [00:01:56.250]of elementary education, K6.
- [00:01:59.010]My Invisalign is killing me today,
- [00:02:00.630]so I apologize for what that,
- [00:02:02.190]what that makes my voice sound like.
- [00:02:04.170]Okay.
- [00:02:05.400]It sounds fine to me, but, okay.
- [00:02:07.590]It feels weird in my mouth.
- [00:02:08.910]This is the first try where I'm like, ugh,
- [00:02:11.850]it's gonna complicate difficult conversations.
- [00:02:13.997]'Cause I sound like I'm slurring everything.
- [00:02:18.270]Okay. So yeah.
- [00:02:19.379]Yeah.
- [00:02:20.740]So tough conversations
- [00:02:21.690]and we're talking especially with students,
- [00:02:23.640]although tough conversations are in no way
- [00:02:25.800]restricted to students.
- [00:02:26.850]We have colleagues.
- [00:02:30.408]We have other people in our sphere that we have
- [00:02:32.340]to have conversation about what's happening.
- [00:02:34.350]But today we're focusing on our students.
- [00:02:36.390]On particularly students, yeah.
- [00:02:39.987]And really the,
- [00:02:41.280]I think one of the most important things
- [00:02:42.810]to keep in mind about tough conversations
- [00:02:49.171]is you don't,
- [00:02:50.760]one does not just have
- [00:02:52.824]a difficult conversation, right?
- [00:02:54.840]Like, so much of this is about establishing trust
- [00:02:59.700]and rapport in those first few weeks.
- [00:03:02.580]So we're in week three, I'm still learning names.
- [00:03:06.750]I've got a larger class this semester
- [00:03:10.857]and I am starting to like figure out what's up
- [00:03:13.500]with certain students and connecting with them
- [00:03:16.815]and connecting around their interests.
- [00:03:20.803]And, you know, they're starting to see that like,
- [00:03:22.920]I'm not just some crazy guy who's making them learn.
- [00:03:27.360]Yeah.
- [00:03:28.411]Insane things in this class.
- [00:03:29.244]That these things are actually useful, right?
- [00:03:31.410]So that trust and rapport of I'm gonna ask you
- [00:03:35.010]to do some things,
- [00:03:35.843]but I'm also gonna prepare you to do them.
- [00:03:37.830]Yes. Is really important.
- [00:03:39.030]And I'm also gonna try to get to know you as best as I can
- [00:03:42.450]within the state that we're in.
- [00:03:45.720]And I think you're making the point
- [00:03:48.180]besides establishing trust,
- [00:03:53.516]is that you need to establish trust.
- [00:03:54.690]But also if you're starting to sense
- [00:03:56.910]that there are problems,
- [00:03:58.200]you need to wait a little bit,
- [00:04:00.180]because they're getting to know you,
- [00:04:02.070]you're getting to know them.
- [00:04:03.840]So as part of instruction you are,
- [00:04:06.630]if even if there's
- [00:04:09.252]a problem that you've identified early on, like,
- [00:04:11.280]we've had our first meeting,
- [00:04:12.510]but I'm identifying some problems.
- [00:04:14.130]I'm not gonna have this conversation right now, as you said,
- [00:04:17.070]I'm gonna keep my eyes, if it comes back, we're going to,
- [00:04:20.250]we're going to have a conversation.
- [00:04:21.690]But right now it's everybody testing their boundaries
- [00:04:26.010]and finding out what
- [00:04:27.720]in this instructional moment works
- [00:04:31.020]for the instructor, works for me.
- [00:04:33.090]How much can I push?
- [00:04:35.970]Right, and when we're talking about
- [00:04:37.320]an instructional conversation
- [00:04:38.880]or a difficult conversation,
- [00:04:42.120]you wanna be able
- [00:04:43.721]to separate what's an anomaly and what's a behavior.
- [00:04:46.260]Yeah. Right?
- [00:04:50.972]And when it's an anomaly, it's a one-off.
- [00:04:54.508]When you see something happening in a pattern,
- [00:04:57.090]that's when you start to see a behavior
- [00:04:59.310]or a practice that you might need
- [00:05:01.200]to have a difficult conversation around.
- [00:05:03.570]Whether it's, you know,
- [00:05:05.820]I've noticed you're not coming to class.
- [00:05:07.920]Right, which is like the most basic in teaching,
- [00:05:10.860]I feel kind of difficult conversation.
- [00:05:14.310]Yeah.
- [00:05:15.522]And part of that is the, hey, I see you,
- [00:05:17.040]I see you not having come to class.
- [00:05:18.870]I've contacted you when you aren't in class just to say,
- [00:05:21.870]hey, I hope you're doing okay, etcetera, etcetera.
- [00:05:24.720]So even that's part of that, like, you're building rapport,
- [00:05:28.200]you're building trust, you're thinking about,
- [00:05:35.796]and that's one of the like really basic techniques
- [00:05:37.980]around building rapport is just like,
- [00:05:39.720]hey, I saw you weren't in class.
- [00:05:42.240]Yeah. You okay?
- [00:05:43.500]Yeah. We good?
- [00:05:45.150]You know?
- [00:05:46.620]And I would argue you talked about the anomalies,
- [00:05:49.230]so I do want to talk about that just briefly.
- [00:05:51.720]And that is, it's really hard
- [00:05:53.790]to know if anything is an anomaly
- [00:05:55.350]necessarily in the semester.
- [00:05:56.730]We haven't had enough to establish a baseline,
- [00:05:59.670]but I would argue that if you do see anomalies later on,
- [00:06:03.840]it's not something you necessarily want to ignore.
- [00:06:05.790]But you do want to approach
- [00:06:06.900]and say, hey, I noticed today
- [00:06:08.490]you were having a hard time with,
- [00:06:10.740]and because often these anomalies come
- [00:06:12.960]because something has happened in your life.
- [00:06:14.670]And that's the same thing.
- [00:06:15.900]It's there I see you, I know something has happened.
- [00:06:19.320]I'm here to help you at least instructionally
- [00:06:22.020]with things you need
- [00:06:23.370]or to send you towards resources
- [00:06:26.400]if you need other resources.
- [00:06:28.230]But I can see that something is different, right?
- [00:06:31.230]And that's an important way to, again,
- [00:06:33.420]communicate with students.
- [00:06:34.830]I see you, I care about you,
- [00:06:39.603]and we are on this journey together.
- [00:06:41.490]Great, and we've talked a little bit about,
- [00:06:44.231]like lots of these have been
- [00:06:45.715]like verbal contact with students,
- [00:06:47.040]but there's other channels that you can do and engage in,
- [00:06:49.970]in order to develop that trust and rapport.
- [00:06:53.940]So one of the things I do every class is exit tickets.
- [00:06:58.590]And I have students like rank where they are in terms
- [00:07:01.560]of certain learning objectives that I have for them.
- [00:07:04.020]And then there's space where, like I asked them that, yeah.
- [00:07:07.170]At yesterday's class to tell me how
- [00:07:10.380]reading changes the brain.
- [00:07:12.540]Talk about the lobes.
- [00:07:13.530]What happens in each of the lobes.
- [00:07:15.300]And then there's always a,
- [00:07:16.530]is there anything you want me to know?
- [00:07:17.790]Is there something that I could do better?
- [00:07:21.258]And part of like the rapport
- [00:07:23.130]and trust building is when I get those suggestions,
- [00:07:26.700]I really entertain them.
- [00:07:28.350]Like if it's something that I can do.
- [00:07:30.342]Yeah.
- [00:07:31.175]I do it.
- [00:07:32.008]So for instance, like all
- [00:07:33.030]of my readings in my class right now are assignments
- [00:07:36.210]because that came up in more than one exit ticket.
- [00:07:39.240]At first I was like, ugh, that's so much work.
- [00:07:42.171]So much work.
- [00:07:43.596]But if my goal is to provide them with access
- [00:07:47.370]to the materials and that makes it an easier way
- [00:07:49.560]for them to do it, sure, why not?
- [00:07:52.560]Why am I not doing this?
- [00:07:53.670]Let's just go.
- [00:07:55.360]Yeah. And being responsive
- [00:07:59.010]and showing them that I am responsive
- [00:08:01.440]to what their needs are is also building up that trust
- [00:08:04.500]and support and that idea that I am demanding.
- [00:08:07.710]I'm demanding as an instructor,
- [00:08:11.100]but I'm also supportive as an instructor.
- [00:08:13.410]I do not set bars that I don't think they can clear.
- [00:08:16.050]This is not an Olympic.
- [00:08:17.760]Yes, and only two of you will make it out.
- [00:08:20.220]Right, right, like, it's all gonna be fine.
- [00:08:24.180]Like this is not a zero sum game.
- [00:08:25.920]Yeah, and I think that what you are talking about
- [00:08:30.300]with collecting data,
- [00:08:31.500]and I'm working with instructors across the department,
- [00:08:35.790]especially graduate students who are teaching maybe
- [00:08:37.770]for the first time,
- [00:08:39.240]we highly recommend collecting that data.
- [00:08:41.430]Like exit ticket, keep it simple.
- [00:08:43.590]Whether use technology, I tend to use technology,
- [00:08:46.380]but sometimes I just want it on a piece of paper.
- [00:08:48.215]What I'll post.
- [00:08:49.710]Use something that works for you.
- [00:08:51.717]And that is simple.
- [00:08:52.650]This needs to not add complication to your life.
- [00:08:56.010]If it's hard for you to read people's handwriting,
- [00:08:58.680]switch to electronic.
- [00:09:00.810]That's the easiest way to prevent
- [00:09:01.643]that from becoming a problem.
- [00:09:03.270]But then you have to be responsive.
- [00:09:06.060]That is, if you are going to collect this information
- [00:09:08.370]and not refer to it
- [00:09:09.450]or respond to it in any way, they will stop doing it.
- [00:09:13.200]Or they will start seeing it as a burden instead
- [00:09:15.990]of an opportunity to communicate.
- [00:09:17.730]Right. So if you wanna build trust,
- [00:09:19.140]you've gotta be responsive.
- [00:09:20.640]Even if it is to say, I've heard this was difficult for you
- [00:09:24.926]and I'm not giving up on this.
- [00:09:26.580]No.
- [00:09:27.413]But I'm going to go back to it and reinforce it.
- [00:09:29.670]It's also a really nice opportunity with the objectives.
- [00:09:35.494]If they don't understand it, I need help.
- [00:09:37.110]I can then send them additional resources.
- [00:09:39.570]Yes.
- [00:09:41.083]And that doesn't necessarily mean I need
- [00:09:41.916]to reteach it in class,
- [00:09:43.170]but if I have a video that I've made
- [00:09:44.910]or there's a website that I know of,
- [00:09:47.100]I'll send that along and say,
- [00:09:48.120]hey, I know notice this on your exit ticket.
- [00:09:50.100]Yeah.
- [00:09:50.933]I just wanna follow up.
- [00:09:52.560]And so there's a lot of different ways
- [00:09:55.290]that you can build up that trust
- [00:09:58.230]and rapport that sets the stage
- [00:10:03.906]for creating an environment where you can have
- [00:10:07.170]a difficult conversation
- [00:10:09.210]without it feeling
- [00:10:12.210]particularly
- [00:10:15.960]Right?
- [00:10:17.222]Our brain is wired to always self preserve.
- [00:10:19.110]And so if you have,
- [00:10:20.700]if you are invited into a difficult conversation,
- [00:10:23.280]that fight or flight mode is activated.
- [00:10:26.850]You always want to, you as the instructor,
- [00:10:30.240]you always wanna couch it in.
- [00:10:32.430]I'm doing this because I care about you.
- [00:10:33.473]This is an act of love.
- [00:10:35.190]This is an act of me being invested in your development.
- [00:10:38.970]I don't want you to feel as though you are,
- [00:10:43.410]this is a gotcha moment.
- [00:10:45.480]We don't want a gotcha moment.
- [00:10:47.760]No, not at all.
- [00:10:49.140]Because that's not productive.
- [00:10:50.640]Right.
- [00:10:51.660]And if you don't have a relationship,
- [00:10:53.310]it often feels like a gotcha moment.
- [00:10:56.370]So we've gone over a couple
- [00:10:58.320]of different kinds of strategies, right?
- [00:11:01.230]The basic one of like learning names.
- [00:11:04.045]Yeah.
- [00:11:05.400]Even if you have, like, I have a class of 38 right now.
- [00:11:08.820]It's a lot of names.
- [00:11:09.930]Yes.
- [00:11:10.763]I've got a week and a half left
- [00:11:11.596]to finish learning them all.
- [00:11:15.060]It's gonna be close.
- [00:11:15.930]Yeah. It's gonna be close.
- [00:11:17.790]'Cause after four weeks I stop doing name tags
- [00:11:20.580]and I need to know who they are.
- [00:11:23.160]And that's kind of my personal challenge, right?
- [00:11:27.245]And it's also a way I, like, I try to model for them.
- [00:11:29.400]Like, look at me, I'm interleaving practice,
- [00:11:32.370]'cause you all are moving around and you've changed clothes.
- [00:11:35.010]And I'm getting to know all your names
- [00:11:36.420]and I'm trying not to look at your name tags.
- [00:11:38.220]But that kind of investment in knowing students' names
- [00:11:43.020]and not being reliant on name tags.
- [00:11:46.470]Although just to say,
- [00:11:50.123]that around the 38, 40, is where the max,
- [00:11:53.580]it's close to the maximum,
- [00:11:55.050]unless you've got the phenomenal memory
- [00:11:57.090]and then all power to you.
- [00:11:58.650]If you can remember 250 students on site, this is fantastic.
- [00:12:03.570]Oh yeah.
- [00:12:04.667]At the university,
- [00:12:05.561]at the high school setting it might happen,
- [00:12:06.450]at the university setting, it'll not happen.
- [00:12:08.220]We don't see each other often enough.
- [00:12:09.810]Right, and the trick,
- [00:12:11.190]the trick for me is I see them twice a week.
- [00:12:13.490]Yes.
- [00:12:14.323]And I see them for three hours each.
- [00:12:16.380]But also.
- [00:12:17.490]I'm just setting expectations.
- [00:12:18.900]Right, because if you're an lecture class.
- [00:12:21.060]That's probably not going to happen.
- [00:12:23.520]I would say lower than 50.
- [00:12:26.610]You can do it.
- [00:12:27.540]You might need a couple of weeks.
- [00:12:28.950]You might need, like this week I, this semester,
- [00:12:31.170]because I have so many more, I gave myself four weeks.
- [00:12:33.180]I normally just give myself three.
- [00:12:36.951]But it demonstrates to students
- [00:12:39.959]that I am actively committed to getting
- [00:12:43.080]to know their names.
- [00:12:44.910]Yes.
- [00:12:46.643]And that has been so powerful.
- [00:12:49.830]It is.
- [00:12:51.189]It's simple, yet powerful.
- [00:12:52.563]And there's no way around it.
- [00:12:53.396]Right, there's no way around it.
- [00:12:55.320]So we've talked about exit tickets.
- [00:12:58.675]We've talked about thinking through
- [00:12:59.580]and about
- [00:13:02.610]ensuring that, you know,
- [00:13:03.750]like we are responsive to students.
- [00:13:07.500]All the different ways that we can do that.
- [00:13:09.450]The ways that we can build up trust.
- [00:13:11.670]Are there any strategies that we haven't covered yet
- [00:13:14.730]that you find are particularly helpful?
- [00:13:17.880]I use the time,
- [00:13:21.150]the dead times in class
- [00:13:22.380]to get to know students.
- [00:13:25.464]So if you have a class where there's significant amount
- [00:13:27.900]of group work,
- [00:13:29.730]spending some time
- [00:13:31.565]with groups does help you understand who students are.
- [00:13:33.210]There are always students who come early.
- [00:13:35.130]That's an opportunity for conversations.
- [00:13:38.040]I structure some extra time
- [00:13:40.830]because I have enough, again,
- [00:13:43.346]going back to it depends
- [00:13:44.179]on really how your class is structured.
- [00:13:45.870]But I let my students off about 15 minutes early
- [00:13:49.500]once a week.
- [00:13:51.822]And then I stay with a small group every time.
- [00:13:53.640]And that's an opportunity to discuss some of the issues.
- [00:13:56.160]They give me feedback on teaching and some things.
- [00:13:59.040]So it goes, it's another version of the exit ticket,
- [00:14:01.980]but I get to do it with three or four
- [00:14:03.510]and I get to know them a little bit better
- [00:14:05.340]and they get to have a conversation with me
- [00:14:07.200]and not just this anonymous feedback.
- [00:14:10.920]So that's another way to respond.
- [00:14:15.024]And I actually use art in my classroom.
- [00:14:16.650]And that seems to be another way to start conversations
- [00:14:19.440]and have these, creating those moments.
- [00:14:24.870]And I have three times a semester I actually work
- [00:14:27.600]with students only in small groups
- [00:14:30.971]as a way to create rapport.
- [00:14:33.707]And so I have a multitude of strategies around that
- [00:14:37.382]just to make sure that there's an opportunity to connect,
- [00:14:39.240]create trust, and listen to students.
- [00:14:41.430]And I think listening is where it's, where the next step.
- [00:14:44.910]So if we are identifying something that
- [00:14:49.710]is a problem, and the listening is a,
- [00:14:53.730]an important first step.
- [00:14:55.320]So let's talk about what issues do you see coming up
- [00:15:00.360]at the higher education
- [00:15:01.470]level we need to attend to.
- [00:15:04.816]So I think one of,
- [00:15:07.500]one of the issues
- [00:15:10.546]that comes up a lot is
- [00:15:13.292]around anxiety and how anxiety begins to manifest.
- [00:15:17.146]Right.
- [00:15:18.620]And how that creates behaviors,
- [00:15:21.000]particularly for us training teachers.
- [00:15:23.338]Yeah.
- [00:15:24.180]That are not beneficial to teaching, right?
- [00:15:28.320]Yeah.
- [00:15:30.469]So we've talked about perfectionism before.
- [00:15:32.130]Yeah.
- [00:15:33.586]We'll link that episode in a card somewhere.
- [00:15:36.660]We're trying to get better.
- [00:15:40.655]So dealing with that perfectionism is tricky.
- [00:15:43.980]But there's also,
- [00:15:46.290]the,
- [00:15:50.820]for us in reading and writing,
- [00:15:53.160]our students are already skilled
- [00:15:55.470]readers and writers.
- [00:15:57.090]Yeah.
- [00:15:59.036]And so they come to class saying, oh,
- [00:16:02.070]I already know how to do this so I can teach it.
- [00:16:08.750]And so there's this
- [00:16:10.620]disconnect between what they think they can do
- [00:16:15.210]and what is happening in class.
- [00:16:17.790]Yeah.
- [00:16:19.580]And oftentimes, there's almost like
- [00:16:23.280]a defiance to that.
- [00:16:24.930]Like, why are we learning this?
- [00:16:26.490]Yes.
- [00:16:27.528]Why are you talk literally,
- [00:16:28.361]why are you telling me how to explain a word?
- [00:16:31.320]Yeah.
- [00:16:33.150]So there's a challenge with,
- [00:16:35.490]I think I know this
- [00:16:39.376]and that sometimes can turn to an opposite challenge,
- [00:16:42.939]I would argue, where if you're talking about anxiety,
- [00:16:46.230]how are we dealing with, I'm never gonna get this.
- [00:16:51.450]Which is a problem as well, right?
- [00:16:53.430]The giving up that,
- [00:16:55.535]that idea of I'm never,
- [00:16:56.880]I'm never gonna be able to do this arises.
- [00:17:00.540]We talked about attendance or being late
- [00:17:04.835]or being on devices instead
- [00:17:06.000]of being in engaged with the lesson.
- [00:17:10.022]I've had a student who shopped for shoes online
- [00:17:15.085]for a while before I realized that what was happening.
- [00:17:20.097]So there are multiple challenges
- [00:17:23.040]to seeing what's happening in the classroom.
- [00:17:25.770]And I think one of the challenges, especially for us,
- [00:17:28.230]we've taught school, right?
- [00:17:29.430]We've taught K12.
- [00:17:30.680]And in K12, you take a lot more care with students
- [00:17:34.050]and you define a lot more things.
- [00:17:36.524]Eventually, here we deal with quote unquote adults, right?
- [00:17:41.224]They make decisions and they can decide
- [00:17:42.360]not to come to class.
- [00:17:43.380]It has consequences, but they can make some decisions.
- [00:17:46.650]Oh yeah, totally.
- [00:17:48.094]And we're not saying you can't make decisions.
- [00:17:49.800]All we're saying is.
- [00:17:51.030]There are consequences.
- [00:17:51.863]Unfortunately, yeah.
- [00:17:53.070]The consequences are going to come
- [00:17:54.780]and mommy's not gonna wake you up
- [00:17:56.700]in the morning to force you to go to school.
- [00:17:59.490]Right, like there's some self-regulation there.
- [00:18:01.383]Yes.
- [00:18:02.216]That needs to be in place, right?
- [00:18:05.040]And so I think when we're,
- [00:18:06.540]when we're thinking about the behaviors
- [00:18:09.420]that sometimes require difficult conversations,
- [00:18:11.370]like attendance is an easy one, right?
- [00:18:13.650]Yes.
- [00:18:14.490]Like that one I can, hey, this is your third absence.
- [00:18:18.870]You know what the policy is.
- [00:18:21.450]This is where you're at.
- [00:18:23.712]Like according to the policy, at this point in time,
- [00:18:25.170]you could fail this class.
- [00:18:26.522]Yes.
- [00:18:28.257]So what is our plan moving forward?
- [00:18:29.910]How are you going to ensure that you are in class
- [00:18:34.117]and not just physically, but mentally present.
- [00:18:37.845]Yeah. Right?
- [00:18:38.850]Like, how is that going to play out?
- [00:18:47.562]And being sure that there is some kind of like action plan
- [00:18:51.480]to come out of that conversation
- [00:18:53.040]that addresses that behavior, is really important.
- [00:18:57.420]'Cause it does impact the learning environment.
- [00:18:59.640]When you're not here as a student, we miss you.
- [00:19:03.030]Yes.
- [00:19:04.620]And I think that's a really important point.
- [00:19:06.120]And that is, depending on how classes, if it's a lecture,
- [00:19:10.500]it's much easier if you miss it's you.
- [00:19:13.800]But if it's a more active classroom community,
- [00:19:16.380]somebody not being there changes the dynamic
- [00:19:19.500]and changes the learning in ways that we miss you,
- [00:19:22.740]you miss some materials,
- [00:19:23.880]but everybody else missed on something as well.
- [00:19:26.250]To a degree.
- [00:19:27.083]And I think we wanna like,
- [00:19:28.710]if it's a presentation, right?
- [00:19:32.130]If it's a lecture, there's going
- [00:19:33.480]to be hopefully some kind of interactive bits
- [00:19:36.000]and bobs there.
- [00:19:37.200]Yeah. Right?
- [00:19:38.100]Like lectures get a bad rap.
- [00:19:41.670]Yes.
- [00:19:43.020]Because oftentimes they get
- [00:19:44.040]confused at the presentation.
- [00:19:45.480]Yeah.
- [00:19:46.557]And students think about them as, oh,
- [00:19:47.580]information that I'm being filled with versus like,
- [00:19:53.040]a lecture, which should bring in.
- [00:19:55.961]Yes.
- [00:19:56.794]Your audience, right?
- [00:19:57.627]Yes.
- [00:19:58.460]And so there is this mismatch
- [00:19:59.986]between sometimes students thinking they know
- [00:20:03.630]how learning works.
- [00:20:04.770]Yeah.
- [00:20:05.603]And not knowing how their learning works.
- [00:20:08.580]And so being clear about,
- [00:20:12.120]one of the most powerful things I have found in,
- [00:20:14.010]and we talked about this in the,
- [00:20:16.410]what did we do with our summer last year,
- [00:20:19.426]was being clear
- [00:20:20.609]and explicit with my students about the kinds
- [00:20:21.660]of pedagogical choices I'm making.
- [00:20:22.867]Yeah. And why.
- [00:20:24.150]Absolutely.
- [00:20:25.050]Kind of bringing it to a meta level.
- [00:20:26.760]Right.
- [00:20:28.275]On a regular basis.
- [00:20:29.670]One of one of my students on the way out was like,
- [00:20:31.830]I've been thinking about you telling us that we have
- [00:20:34.410]to forget something in order
- [00:20:35.640]to begin moving something from short term
- [00:20:37.560]into long term memory.
- [00:20:40.770]And it's totally shifted the way I study.
- [00:20:42.570]Yeah.
- [00:20:43.608]And I feel more effective.
- [00:20:45.060]That's good.
- [00:20:46.200]And so it's that like I know what I'm doing.
- [00:20:50.100]Yes.
- [00:20:50.989]Right?
- [00:20:51.822]And then that also gives me some meta language
- [00:20:53.490]for when I have a student
- [00:20:56.970]not do well on their first exam.
- [00:20:58.560]And we're talking through what that,
- [00:21:00.360]what's happening there.
- [00:21:01.560]Yeah.
- [00:21:02.698]We can draw upon that meta language within that,
- [00:21:06.450]within that dialogue.
- [00:21:07.283]'cause you're also gonna deal with, you know,
- [00:21:09.090]disappointment in themselves if something happens,
- [00:21:11.220]if they don't get a particular assignment grade
- [00:21:17.423]and they think they should.
- [00:21:19.296]So how do you start the conversation?
- [00:21:20.400]So you have a student, we have a challenge.
- [00:21:23.730]How do you start the conversation?
- [00:21:26.627]So I typically start the conversation by
- [00:21:30.540]talking about,
- [00:21:33.930]just checking in first off, hey, how are you?
- [00:21:38.070]What's going on?
- [00:21:41.100]How's life?
- [00:21:43.110]Here's what I've noticed.
- [00:21:45.733]And I start with behaviors.
- [00:21:47.370]I've noticed this, I've noticed this, I've noticed this.
- [00:21:51.600]This is why they could potentially be problematic.
- [00:21:55.157]What's a possible solution to what's happening here?
- [00:22:00.360]Talk to me about where that is.
- [00:22:03.270]So I try to be both very clear
- [00:22:09.824]and not judgmental.
- [00:22:10.980]Yes.
- [00:22:12.933]And the other piece, I think ,
- [00:22:14.220]in that moment of,
- [00:22:16.489]here's what I noticed is it's not judgmental,
- [00:22:19.260]but also you, we talk about the behaviors we see,
- [00:22:23.700]not the assumptions we make,
- [00:22:25.440]because we can make a lot of assumptions
- [00:22:27.750]and we have an emotional response when somebody gets out
- [00:22:30.390]and leaves class early.
- [00:22:32.280]Right?
- [00:22:33.113]And at the moment we're in the middle
- [00:22:35.100]of teaching and they just disappear.
- [00:22:36.540]And sometimes you don't know what to do with this.
- [00:22:38.280]And sometimes you're like,
- [00:22:40.368]I'm not going to disrupt everybody's focus in progress
- [00:22:42.660]because somebody's making the move,
- [00:22:44.670]but I do need to check in later.
- [00:22:45.761]There's an emotional response
- [00:22:47.880]and there's an assumption about what has happened.
- [00:22:50.390]What does that say?
- [00:22:52.800]A lot of people are,
- [00:22:55.980]really care about respect
- [00:22:58.470]and consideration for everybody else.
- [00:23:01.020]And so you can come into that conversation with some emotion
- [00:23:04.290]and you need to check that.
- [00:23:06.879]And for me it's talk about the behavior
- [00:23:09.570]and then I kind of flip that.
- [00:23:11.910]I talk about the behavior.
- [00:23:13.050]This is what I've been noticing.
- [00:23:14.340]I do ask how they are,
- [00:23:15.510]but this is what I,
- [00:23:17.820]this is what I'm noticing.
- [00:23:19.350]Tell me a little bit about it.
- [00:23:20.640]So I ask them to first talk
- [00:23:22.380]about the behavior and just listen
- [00:23:25.530]and then come in with what are we going, okay,
- [00:23:28.860]this is going to be.
- [00:23:29.970]These are the reasons it might be a problem.
- [00:23:32.190]Let's talk about it.
- [00:23:33.810]I had to have a lot of these conversations like
- [00:23:36.270]after the pandemic when we were back in person.
- [00:23:38.550]But some students were choosing to come in digitally
- [00:23:42.750]and inadvertently I created a situation
- [00:23:46.560]that I needed to rectify.
- [00:23:47.730]This was on me.
- [00:23:49.080]I was honest with them about that.
- [00:23:50.670]I made that possible.
- [00:23:52.200]You took advantage of that.
- [00:23:53.880]Not took advantage, but you took that opportunity
- [00:23:56.880]and you thought this was a good choice.
- [00:23:58.560]Here's why I think it's really not working for you
- [00:24:01.260]or for me.
- [00:24:02.580]Conversation.
- [00:24:03.413]So that's the addition for me.
- [00:24:05.640]And I find the important thing there
- [00:24:11.111]is to be excruciatingly honest
- [00:24:16.427]and not sugarcoat things.
- [00:24:17.490]Yes.
- [00:24:21.531]To save someone's feelings.
- [00:24:24.191]Yes. Right?
- [00:24:25.024]So like we we want to check our feelings,
- [00:24:27.690]but we also want to be sure that we're being as honest
- [00:24:31.710]as we possibly can in terms
- [00:24:34.876]of when we're seeing those behaviors,
- [00:24:36.660]what impacts those could have on those behaviors.
- [00:24:39.750]Connecting
- [00:24:42.240]why those behaviors are
- [00:24:44.130]impacting their current education at the moment.
- [00:24:46.620]Which is we have the added bonus of like, look,
- [00:24:49.380]we're doing things so that you can support students.
- [00:24:51.360]Yes. Later.
- [00:24:52.620]Yes.
- [00:24:54.885]And I try to always be very clear about
- [00:24:58.920]everything in my syllabus.
- [00:25:00.720]Everything that we talk about serves a particular function.
- [00:25:04.860]You're missing out if you're missing class,
- [00:25:07.830]you're skipping out on these functions.
- [00:25:11.432]If you come to this knowledge base thinking you know it all,
- [00:25:15.000]but you can't tell me why you clap at a syllable,
- [00:25:18.900]that tells me that you can't explain that to a child.
- [00:25:21.130]Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [00:25:23.580]And so,
- [00:25:25.200]so we have the hard conversation
- [00:25:27.210]and you talked about one of the outcomes
- [00:25:30.321]has to be a very concrete plan.
- [00:25:31.380]Here's what we're going to do.
- [00:25:33.060]One, two, three.
- [00:25:34.620]I like backing it up with an email
- [00:25:37.770]after, that says, we had a conversation.
- [00:25:40.830]Either I ask the student to do it,
- [00:25:43.020]what is your understanding?
- [00:25:44.460]What are we going to do?
- [00:25:45.330]Send it to me.
- [00:25:46.942]Or depending on the situation, I say,
- [00:25:48.720]I'm going to summarize this and I'm sending it to you.
- [00:25:51.000]Because now we've got quote unquote a paper trail.
- [00:25:54.570]Right.
- [00:25:55.582]That says, this is what we agreed on
- [00:25:56.730]and I'm sending it so the other person can respond
- [00:26:00.240]and say, yes, this is what we agreed on.
- [00:26:03.869]Or no, this is not what we agreed on.
- [00:26:06.300]I thought we were having a different conversation.
- [00:26:08.550]This is an opportunity.
- [00:26:09.600]But that's another layer of clarity
- [00:26:13.665]and protection for you as an instructor.
- [00:26:14.790]Especially if you're a graduate student
- [00:26:16.470]or a young assistant professor
- [00:26:18.090]and you have a student that is pushing back
- [00:26:20.940]or potentially even gaslighting once in a while.
- [00:26:23.400]We have those as well.
- [00:26:25.050]We love the gaslighting.
- [00:26:26.220]Yes. Love it.
- [00:26:27.878]So have documentation.
- [00:26:29.562]Yes.
- [00:26:30.395]Have documentation.
- [00:26:31.320]This is what we talked about when we met.
- [00:26:33.780]This was the decision.
- [00:26:35.130]This is how we're going to resolve this.
- [00:26:37.320]And then what do we need to do?
- [00:26:40.290]Follow up. Follow up.
- [00:26:42.030]And before we talk about follow up.
- [00:26:43.530]Yes.
- [00:26:44.363]Do you think it's important to remind ourselves
- [00:26:48.986]to,
- [00:26:49.819]this is not a reprimand, right?
- [00:26:52.230]This is not, as we talked about earlier, a gotcha moment.
- [00:26:56.370]Like, we are not naughty.
- [00:27:00.030]This is an instructional moment.
- [00:27:02.400]Yes.
- [00:27:03.455]It is a potential, possibly it's a potential moment
- [00:27:06.600]to help that student elevate their current practices
- [00:27:11.130]or replace ineffective practices
- [00:27:13.470]with more effective practices.
- [00:27:19.215]And it's a partnership really with that student
- [00:27:21.480]and making that clear that I am investing in you.
- [00:27:24.960]Yes. This is an act of love.
- [00:27:28.680]And sometimes, and you talked a little bit about this,
- [00:27:31.200]sometimes it's through that conversation,
- [00:27:35.400]they realize you help them see
- [00:27:37.950]what is it in their studying practices,
- [00:27:40.800]learning practices, the way they manage their life.
- [00:27:43.290]What is it that is derailing them
- [00:27:46.440]and maybe they need to reconsider
- [00:27:48.210]whether it's bad study habits,
- [00:27:50.070]maybe it's taking on way too much
- [00:27:52.620]and not being able to sort to,
- [00:27:54.270]what is the most important thing
- [00:27:55.650]for my goals right now I'm in school.
- [00:27:58.110]Yes, I have all these social obligations
- [00:28:00.240]and work and all of these things.
- [00:28:02.100]If it's too much, what am I giving up?
- [00:28:05.670]What can you cut back on? Yes.
- [00:28:06.780]There are 24 hours in a day.
- [00:28:08.130]Because if not, your default is you're cutting on
- [00:28:10.890]your university,
- [00:28:12.763]which is probably in the long term if you want, in our case,
- [00:28:15.150]if you want to be a teacher, that's not working for you.
- [00:28:17.520]But if you want to become a lawyer
- [00:28:19.020]and you need good grades,
- [00:28:19.980]that's not gonna work for you either.
- [00:28:21.690]A whole host of things.
- [00:28:23.100]And just helping them think
- [00:28:24.720]through the problem is really the moment.
- [00:28:27.060]Because we can always, I mean, as instructors,
- [00:28:29.940]we can always the ultimate reprimand
- [00:28:32.280]as we can give an f, right?
- [00:28:34.980]We are justified in doing that
- [00:28:36.540]and not actually support students.
- [00:28:38.520]What we're saying is,
- [00:28:40.522]the hard conversation is actually a support for students.
- [00:28:42.840]Well, and I think there's other,
- [00:28:46.470]I think the grades, conversations,
- [00:28:48.060]the attendance conversations are really easy.
- [00:28:50.430]But when we're.
- [00:28:51.263]Yes.
- [00:28:52.523]I also want to think about the increasing diversity
- [00:28:55.770]within our classroom spaces.
- [00:28:57.240]Absolutely.
- [00:28:58.073]And so you could have students in your classroom space
- [00:29:01.530]who are neurodivergent,
- [00:29:05.481]and that requires a different kind of skillset
- [00:29:07.560]where you're really thinking through what's the behavior
- [00:29:11.400]that I'm seeing right now?
- [00:29:13.440]What's the process by which I can help you replace
- [00:29:17.370]that behavior that's not productive for you?
- [00:29:19.950]That's not.
- [00:29:22.527]So if they're,
- [00:29:23.892]if a student is constantly interrupting class, for instance.
- [00:29:26.940]Yeah.
- [00:29:28.260]And for us, it might not just be class,
- [00:29:30.330]it might be practicum, it might be things
- [00:29:32.190]that are happening in their classroom.
- [00:29:34.830]And it's happened more than once
- [00:29:35.727]and more than twice, which is kind of my,
- [00:29:40.860]within brain in terms of frequency,
- [00:29:45.030]will then figure out what's an alternative strategy.
- [00:29:48.420]Like what can I ask them to do
- [00:29:51.788]when they want to
- [00:29:54.390]interrupt class,
- [00:29:56.280]that they can start implementing themselves.
- [00:29:59.040]And that strategy eventually becomes a skill
- [00:30:01.950]and how to communicate that.
- [00:30:04.971]Because oftentimes, again, that like excruciatingly honest
- [00:30:08.160]and direct conversation,
- [00:30:12.017]like sometimes bashes up against this Midwest nice.
- [00:30:14.491]Yes, very much so.
- [00:30:17.487]And one of the tricks potentially
- [00:30:20.160]if you're working with students who are neurodivergent,
- [00:30:23.190]is they're not going to get the nuance in Midwest nice.
- [00:30:27.840]Yes.
- [00:30:29.082]And so you have to be clear, you have to be direct
- [00:30:31.020]and you have to have a plan
- [00:30:32.610]Yes.
- [00:30:33.859]That you can clearly explain.
- [00:30:35.910]Yes.
- [00:30:38.047]And I think the thing that you're hinting toward
- [00:30:42.450]is it's important to follow through.
- [00:30:44.340]Yes, absolutely.
- [00:30:45.953]And recognize.
- [00:30:46.786]For both sides,
- [00:30:47.960]For all of it to recognize when
- [00:30:51.210]students are following up
- [00:30:54.810]on the strategies
- [00:30:56.847]or the plans that, you know, we've co-constructed
- [00:31:00.540]with them to think stuff through.
- [00:31:04.710]It's really important, right?
- [00:31:09.079]It's a little behaviorist,
- [00:31:09.912]a little Pavlovian maybe,
- [00:31:12.449]but like there's something about,
- [00:31:14.070]hey, I see what you're doing.
- [00:31:16.230]You're doing a great job.
- [00:31:18.600]I appreciate you.
- [00:31:19.740]I don't know if it's Pavlovian,
- [00:31:22.914]but what we are working,
- [00:31:27.210]especially in higher education, when you teach,
- [00:31:30.960]one of the things that is always in the back
- [00:31:32.820]of my mind is these students have had
- [00:31:36.360]many years in education.
- [00:31:38.490]Many, many years
- [00:31:39.570]where they've developed habits
- [00:31:42.096]and they are deeply ingrained.
- [00:31:43.800]And so,
- [00:31:45.990]and they've coped obviously in one way or another.
- [00:31:48.750]Or they wouldn't have come,
- [00:31:50.190]they wouldn't have gotten to this point.
- [00:31:51.780]And this is fantastic,
- [00:31:53.952]but they may need to reshape the way
- [00:31:56.711]they are learning
- [00:31:57.775]because was might have been effective
- [00:31:58.860]before is not effective anymore for a variety of reasons.
- [00:32:04.140]And the expectations are different.
- [00:32:06.908]So helping them think through that problem
- [00:32:08.730]and that feedback, both from us,
- [00:32:11.340]but also from them, if they need to report in,
- [00:32:13.620]and say, here's what I've done so far,
- [00:32:15.540]this is the progress I've made, and all of that,
- [00:32:18.545]helps support them in changing something
- [00:32:20.730]that may be fairly deeply ingrained.
- [00:32:22.890]Or when we talking about neurodivergent students,
- [00:32:25.920]we're talking about things that they can't help
- [00:32:29.937]from a physical perspective,
- [00:32:30.770]they can just find strategies around that.
- [00:32:34.861]And so that requires a lot of effort.
- [00:32:36.870]There's effort in there.
- [00:32:38.580]The easiest is to slide into existing patterns.
- [00:32:41.040]The hardest thing is to create new patterns.
- [00:32:43.080]So we have to find ways to support,
- [00:32:45.330]to help define those patterns
- [00:32:48.028]and to help students find how they can cope
- [00:32:49.860]and then give them feedback,
- [00:32:51.780]but also have them report back to us.
- [00:32:54.000]Right, 'cause I think the important part with any kind
- [00:32:56.160]of difficult conversation,
- [00:32:58.470]if there's not a pathway forward
- [00:33:00.180]and there's not an accountability to that pathway forward,
- [00:33:03.270]that's when it becomes simply a reprimand.
- [00:33:05.550]Yes.
- [00:33:07.293]That's when it's a gotcha moment.
- [00:33:08.987]That's when it's a bad guy bad.
- [00:33:12.816]And you just move on with your life.
- [00:33:13.890]But that doesn't do anything to,
- [00:33:18.330]I remember Elizabeth Howman,
- [00:33:19.770]who was one of my professors at Michigan State
- [00:33:21.480]when I was an undergrad,
- [00:33:22.980]would always say in her class,
- [00:33:25.440]my teaching objective is to have you leave my class
- [00:33:28.380]a better person than you were
- [00:33:29.610]when you came in,
- [00:33:32.368]at the start.
- [00:33:35.930]And that's essentially like
- [00:33:36.900]what we're doing in these conversations.
- [00:33:38.940]Like how are we elevating that student work
- [00:33:42.300]and that follow up,
- [00:33:45.944]that show of
- [00:33:47.100]investment,
- [00:33:48.992]the extension of that initial investment is important.
- [00:33:51.810]And I also don't wanna freak viewers out around like,
- [00:33:55.200]oh my gosh, there's all these difficult conversations.
- [00:33:57.570]Like they're really.
- [00:33:58.650]There aren't that many.
- [00:33:59.670]It's a handful, right? Yes.
- [00:34:01.410]Most I find I do find that, like pattern wise,
- [00:34:05.910]if you do that work of establishing
- [00:34:08.010]rapport, trust, structure, a lot of stuff just lines up.
- [00:34:13.800]Yes.
- [00:34:15.267]But sometimes some things don't line up
- [00:34:16.470]and that's when you have to have these kind
- [00:34:18.990]of difficult conversations.
- [00:34:20.790]Yeah.
- [00:34:22.500]So I don't wanna.
- [00:34:23.760]Yeah.
- [00:34:24.973]It's not that you have five of them a week
- [00:34:27.630]during the semester,
- [00:34:28.620]you have one or two a semester in most cases.
- [00:34:31.860]Right, maybe.
- [00:34:34.010]And they tend to happen, you know, mid-semester.
- [00:34:36.930]Yes.
- [00:34:38.427]As things as students kind of relax into the semester,
- [00:34:41.070]like stuff starts to slip
- [00:34:42.630]or stuff starts to happen,
- [00:34:44.220]the newness of the semester wears off.
- [00:34:47.670]And then there's some feedback on behavior
- [00:34:49.890]and things get a little more complicated.
- [00:34:52.458]Dicey.
- [00:34:53.550]Yeah, but also,
- [00:34:56.314]also we start seeing the patterns,
- [00:34:57.540]because the pattern may have been there at the beginning,
- [00:35:00.000]but it's not a pattern at the,
- [00:35:01.397]in the first two weeks of the semester.
- [00:35:03.386]Right, you sometimes don't have,
- [00:35:04.219]you don't have data around a pattern
- [00:35:08.220]until
- [00:35:09.870]right around now you're three weeks in, right?
- [00:35:12.120]For me,
- [00:35:13.260]tomorrow will be the sixth time
- [00:35:14.490]I've seen my students.
- [00:35:15.960]Yeah, that starts establishing,
- [00:35:17.340]I'm noticing some patterns.
- [00:35:21.333]And one of the things that that is helpful
- [00:35:23.280]to me is I have a contact form that I fill out
- [00:35:27.180]after every class where I kind of lay out, oh,
- [00:35:31.350]I noticed this about this student,
- [00:35:32.719]this about this student, this about this student.
- [00:35:34.320]And that does a couple of things that helps me think
- [00:35:37.500]through which students I'm not connecting with,
- [00:35:40.920]which students I'm not building rapport with.
- [00:35:43.263]Yeah.
- [00:35:44.427]Which students I'm not creating a sense
- [00:35:46.440]of belonging potentially for.
- [00:35:48.480]And then it also provides me an audit trail
- [00:35:52.920]when I go back and I'm looking at behaviors.
- [00:35:56.400]If there are difficult conversations
- [00:35:58.963]that I think I need to have.
- [00:36:00.579]It provides me with data
- [00:36:01.920]to move into that conversation.
- [00:36:06.250]And I want to say two more things
- [00:36:08.340]that I think are connected.
- [00:36:10.080]One is part of that prep ground
- [00:36:12.270]in creating a community is establishing policies,
- [00:36:15.450]but also establishing the connections between students.
- [00:36:19.740]Students often resist, for example, working with,
- [00:36:25.140]they form groups
- [00:36:27.030]and then they kind of get stuck in those groups.
- [00:36:30.602]And I think it is very good practice to avoid that.
- [00:36:33.630]And you have to do that fairly early.
- [00:36:35.370]If you let them form these groups
- [00:36:37.260]and stay in them for the first half of the semester,
- [00:36:39.480]they will not go there the second half of the semester.
- [00:36:41.790]So it's gotta be very explicit.
- [00:36:43.770]You've gotta talk.
- [00:36:44.603]And we talk a lot about why do we do this.
- [00:36:47.190]In helping them understand what happens.
- [00:36:51.300]The second thing that I think that I constantly
- [00:36:54.990]think about as I think about,
- [00:36:58.380]especially being a young assistant professor
- [00:37:00.600]or a graduate student teaching,
- [00:37:02.849]is go and talk to a faculty mentor
- [00:37:05.010]about these conversations.
- [00:37:06.630]Play them out.
- [00:37:08.460]Design what questions you are gonna ask.
- [00:37:11.430]Don't just go into that conversation without preparation.
- [00:37:14.940]Prepare, have some, if you have a hard time,
- [00:37:18.210]I have a hard time sometimes doing that.
- [00:37:21.060]After 20 something years it gets easier.
- [00:37:23.310]But I would write down the questions I want to ask,
- [00:37:26.640]what are the points,
- [00:37:27.540]I would write down the things I observed.
- [00:37:29.340]I'm not reading from paper,
- [00:37:31.260]but I have an anchor where if I get lost
- [00:37:34.560]or if the student is asking a question,
- [00:37:37.170]I have something to go back to and say,
- [00:37:39.060]here's what I saw and here are the questions that I have.
- [00:37:42.870]So I'm not in the discussion
- [00:37:45.780]and in a conversation suddenly losing it.
- [00:37:48.210]And again, ask for advice.
- [00:37:50.430]Don't go in without having
- [00:37:54.060]a practice conversation of some one kind or another.
- [00:37:57.450]One last build on. Yeah.
- [00:37:59.730]A list like that.
- [00:38:01.050]When you're having these difficult conversations,
- [00:38:05.060]that intense focus on addressing the behavior
- [00:38:08.160]then is not the time to like bring in something else.
- [00:38:10.680]Yeah, focus on the one thing you want to address, yes.
- [00:38:14.748]What is the primary function of that conversation?
- [00:38:19.500]What is the action plan moving forward?
- [00:38:21.750]How do they understand the action plan?
- [00:38:23.670]How do you understand the action plan?
- [00:38:25.227]Yeah.
- [00:38:26.130]That's what you need from that conversation.
- [00:38:27.780]Don't conflate it with,
- [00:38:31.458]with other gibberish.
- [00:38:33.150]Yeah.
- [00:38:33.983]And don't let students do that,
- [00:38:35.670]because students might also try to go around the problem
- [00:38:39.180]by saying, here's something I
- [00:38:40.650]didn't understand in class.
- [00:38:41.940]And this is like, that's fine, we can do that another time.
- [00:38:44.250]That's fine.
- [00:38:45.083]We're focusing on this.
- [00:38:45.916]Not the place for this conversation.
- [00:38:47.310]Right, again, that like excruciating honesty.
- [00:38:50.700]Yes.
- [00:38:53.497]Is is really important.
- [00:38:58.091]But yeah, I mean you're going to have,
- [00:38:59.820]if you were in the field of education,
- [00:39:04.650]if you're in the field of ensuring
- [00:39:07.050]that or trying to ensure that people grow
- [00:39:10.080]and develop in productive ways,
- [00:39:12.510]difficult conversations are a part of this.
- [00:39:15.387]Yes.
- [00:39:17.372]And by being,
- [00:39:19.980]you know, somewhat thoughtful in the ways
- [00:39:21.690]that we're approaching it,
- [00:39:24.690]it can make them a little less hopefully difficult.
- [00:39:29.160]Yes.
- [00:39:29.993]Right, to prepare for, so.
- [00:39:32.340]conversations, maybe that's what we wanna go for.
- [00:39:37.006]Me conversations.
- [00:39:37.956]But I mean there's still,
- [00:39:39.142]they're still going to be tough.
- [00:39:40.020]Yes.
- [00:39:42.257]But by really thinking through
- [00:39:43.920]how you're establishing that classroom space,
- [00:39:46.380]by really setting up a solid context and environment.
- [00:39:50.730]And I feel like you are really good at that.
- [00:39:53.639]I try
- [00:39:54.660]And succeed,
- [00:39:57.270]excruciatingly honest Guy.
- [00:40:00.060]Just say thank you.
- [00:40:01.020]Thank you, I appreciate that.
- [00:40:03.120]By making sure that you're setting up having channels
- [00:40:06.210]for building trust, whether they're digital,
- [00:40:09.480]conversational, practice based.
- [00:40:11.760]Yeah.
- [00:40:13.330]And then focusing in on those behaviors
- [00:40:16.260]and being clear about what they are
- [00:40:18.180]and helping that student
- [00:40:19.260]with a plan moving forward and then following up.
- [00:40:21.420]I think that will be, I think that's,
- [00:40:24.210]that's a handy kind of heuristic.
- [00:40:27.120]Yeah.
- [00:40:29.338]For if you're a first time instructor thinking,
- [00:40:30.690]oh, I have to have a conversation with a student about this.
- [00:40:33.930]What do I do?
- [00:40:36.150]How do I do it?
- [00:40:38.880]Yes.
- [00:40:39.930]Anything else you would add?
- [00:40:42.090]Not taking care of the tough conversation is going
- [00:40:44.640]to create a contagion.
- [00:40:46.200]So it will spread.
- [00:40:47.640]And other students either will adapt those behaviors
- [00:40:51.559]or will be bothered by those behaviors to the point
- [00:40:54.450]that they stop paying attention
- [00:40:56.700]or they get less out of the class.
- [00:40:58.860]Right.
- [00:41:00.129]So that's not taking care
- [00:41:01.680]of these behaviors is probably a bad option.
- [00:41:04.410]Yes, yes.
- [00:41:05.940]That is the one thing I did want to say.
- [00:41:07.980]Because some,
- [00:41:09.030]there's an instinct to try
- [00:41:10.320]to avoid taking care of those hard conversations
- [00:41:13.080]because it feels confrontational.
- [00:41:15.330]Again, what we're saying is it's not confrontational.
- [00:41:17.940]We're here to help you.
- [00:41:19.860]But it does carry with it some challenges.
- [00:41:22.590]It does carry with it some challenge.
- [00:41:24.150]And I think for instructors,
- [00:41:26.040]perhaps some stress.
- [00:41:27.360]Yeah.
- [00:41:28.193]Around that.
- [00:41:29.026]Yes.
- [00:41:30.221]But remember that like if these behaviors
- [00:41:32.010]are getting in the way of students learning,
- [00:41:35.070]it doesn't matter
- [00:41:35.903]how well you know your content,
- [00:41:36.810]you're not teaching them and that's your job.
- [00:41:39.180]Yeah.
- [00:41:40.230]So you have to do this as part of your job.
- [00:41:42.450]And I've never had a tough conversations
- [00:41:44.550]or a conversation I regretted.
- [00:41:47.160]I regretted not having a tough conversation.
- [00:41:49.290]But the other way has never happened.
- [00:41:50.123]Yeah, I don't think so.
- [00:41:52.530]Also, when you have a tough conversation,
- [00:41:56.010]block about a half hour afterwards to just decompress.
- [00:42:00.480]With or without somebody else.
- [00:42:03.720]That you can talk to. Right.
- [00:42:05.823]Just have that time to decompress.
- [00:42:07.650]Yeah.
- [00:42:10.137]But tough conversations, they're going to happen.
- [00:42:13.320]You will be able to get through them.
- [00:42:15.840]It's part of our dedication to elevating students.
- [00:42:21.619]So I think that's all we have.
- [00:42:23.040]That's all we have for this time.
- [00:42:24.900]It feels like a lot.
- [00:42:25.733]It feels heavy.
- [00:42:26.566]It was a little heavy.
- [00:42:27.660]So next time maybe not so heavy.
- [00:42:29.340]Little lighter. Yeah.
- [00:42:31.440]Little lighter.
- [00:42:32.273]All right.
- [00:42:33.562]We'll see you in the next one.
- [00:42:35.635](upbeat music)
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