The Teacher Burnout Podcast

Unlocking Student Stories: Building Meaningful Relationships in the Classroom
. [00:00:00] In today's episode, I want to talk about unlocking students' stories and building meaningful relationships in the classroom. Stay tuned.
Welcome to the Teacher Burnout Podcast, where we explore the challenges of burnout for teachers and share practical strategies to support teacher well being. I'm your host Barb Flowers. If you're a teacher looking for ways to prevent burnout or an educational leader searching for strategies to support your team, this podcast is for you.
Let's dive in.
Welcome back to the podcast today. I want to talk about unlocking students' stories and building meaningful relationships in the classroom. The beginning of the school year is such an exciting time for building relationships and getting to know your students. But it can also be a big challenge for teachers across all grade levels. You get to meet your students.
You get to start building these relationships and I can remember how exciting it was to see the names on my class list. So I taught first grade for a little [00:01:00] bit. And in my building, I was in a first through fifth grade building. So they were new. So I didn't know who they were.
I might've had siblings after teaching for a couple of years. It was always exciting to see if I had a sibling on the list. But then when I taught third grade, I always loved to see if one, I was going to have a former student from when I taught first grade or if it was just a student, I knew from the building. So it was always really exciting to see who my students were.
You know, teachers always want to know who's in their class and get a feel for what their class is going to be like. Is it going to have a lot of struggling students, a lot of students who are maybe above level behaviors, what does that look like? so it can add a lot of stress, even if we don't think it's stressful, that can be really stressful.
The unknown always is right. We're always looking for certainty. And when you have a class list of 20, 25 kids, And you don't know anything about them and you're not sure how they're going to interact with each other and interact with you. That can be stressful. , and then also another added layer of stress to that is if you have some [00:02:00] students where the previous teachers come and talk to you and are like, oh, you have so-and-so, you know, and they tell the stories about them and give their 2 cents or how you should deal with that student. That can add another layer of stress.
Maybe you saw concerning behaviors of a student in the hallway or office I had when I was a principal, certain students who would be having meltdowns in the hallway and then the teachers would get the class list and see that student on there. So, you know, you see that student having a meltdown and you think, oh my gosh, what's this year going to be like, Also, you might look at data or maybe you're already into the school year where you have initial assessment data for the beginning of the year, and you see how much they're struggling and you think, oh my gosh, this year, how am I going to get these kids to where they need to be? Whatever challenges you're seeing with your class lists. I just want you to remember that every student is more than their past experience or their current challenge. Every student has a unique story.
So maybe they faced a trauma. Maybe they just are in a difficult situation. [00:03:00] Our primary job as teachers at the start of the year is to really learn these stories and get to know our students as more than just the data or what you've heard about them. So really think about, you know, the. Think about these students and think about them coming into your classroom and what experience you want to give them.
So, today I want to talk about three tips for getting to know your students. And we're going to talk about some examples and ways that you can do this. So my first tip for getting to know your students are to incorporate regular practices, to learn about your students. And I'm talking about all year.
So we don't just do getting to know you activities. At the beginning of the year, we need to be getting to know students. All year, because things are gonna happen. Their behaviors might change. And we just need to know what's going on. So some examples of this, if you're an elementary in my school that I was at, we did a lot of daily morning meetings where kids would get in a circle and they would rate their selves on a one to five, how they're feeling that day.
And they might share something. Sometimes teachers had a [00:04:00] prompt, like. What's your favorite food? Or they could share a story. So if they didn't want to share something personal, they could just share their favorite food. Another thing I know kids love to do is star the week in elementary. Those presentations allow them to just get up and talk about themselves, share pictures, share about their families.
So that's a great way to learn about students. , with older students, having weekly journal prompts, where they come in and write, and if they want to share that in a small group or the whole group, whatever your class is comfortable with. Also doing icebreaker activities like two truths and a lie.
That's always a fun one. And high school doing something like a Ted talk style presentation. Where a student does a presentation on personal interest. Or collaborative class projects that allow kids to incorporate, you know, personal experiences, sports that they like activities that they like doing outside of school.
So anything where you can really learn about your students learn about their interests. And incorporate that into the classroom is going to really help you bring those meaningful relationships, [00:05:00] because the more you know about kids, the more empathetic you're going to feel when something happens. And I'm not saying. Empathetic like you, excuse behaviors, but you're going to understand where your kids are coming from and you're going to be there to support them.
My second tip is communicate with parents and families to gain insights. So you could send home in elementary, like an, all about me family project, where they share. It's kind of like star of the week, have a classroom open house with informal parent chats. You know, try to get parents into the building as much as possible.
That's going to allow you to get to know them. In middle school, high school, you could email parents surveys about students' strengths and challenges. , you could create a class website with a parent communication forum. You want to be careful about that though, of not having parents always communicate with each other, but just communicate back with you. Organize student led conferences to discuss goals and backgrounds. Implement a family heritage research project where, students are researching maybe their culture, their family heritage, where they came from. These are just [00:06:00] some great ways that they can share their stories with you. And let you get to know about them and their family. I think it's really important to know about family dynamics.
I personally am divorced and I have two elementary aged students. And so I always like to make sure that the teachers know that. I mean, my kids are very open and we'll make sure that the teachers know that as well, but that really impacts them a lot, you know, is just, they have two homes that they live in.
And so. Where they're going, what day are they at their dads? What day are they with me? How are they getting home from school that changes all the time. And so the teacher understanding that dynamic, I think is really important. Trying to understand as much as possible, like
who lives with the students and what dynamics do they have going on at home?
And then my third tip is to make it a point to connect with each student daily. So in elementary, having a personalized morning greeting at the classroom door. , maybe you have lunch with kids sometimes. Middle school, high school, using exit tickets with a check-in question or have a connection calendar [00:07:00] where you may have a calendar of times that you make sure to connect with kids.
One-on-one it can be harder when you have hundreds of students. So find a time. That you can have that one-on-one connection with kids. That's going to really help them build that relationship with you. And the other way around, rotate through student work groups. So if you have kids working in a group, you know, have check-ins with those work groups. And talk to students in a group, but making sure you're checking in with each student as you do that, use a digital platform for daily student reflections that kids can even typing comments.
And then you respond all of these ways that students know that they are going to touch base with you at some point really helps so that if something's going wrong, it's, you're going to have more of a connection with them that they're going to feel more comfortable talking to you if they need that adult to talk to.
So you really want to do that. I know in some middle school and high schools too, To a strategy that they have since there's not one classroom teacher. Is, they will make a teacher who's responsible for maybe five [00:08:00] students and checking in on those students and really watching them. Because you want to have those connections.
You want to know kids' stories so that, you can really pay attention if something's going wrong with them, or just be an adult, someone that they can talk to and come to when there's a problem. And by implementing these strategies , and building the connections with students, you're going to create a more inclusive and supportive learning environment where not only kids are going to do better, but as an adult, you're going to feel better about what you're doing, because it really helps with a lot of issues when you create relationships. When you have relationships with your students, it's going to help your communication with parents so much. It's going to help your communication with the students. It just helps so many things that it's going to help with your own wellbeing when it comes to teaching because of those relationships, the issues that I've seen in my experience, as a principal with teachers, with parents, it all comes down to relationships.
It all comes down with people not feeling included, not feeling [00:09:00] communicated with. So relationships are key. And the beginning of the year is a great time , to really build those meaningful relationships with kids start off right away, show them that you care about them, make sure that they know how much you care.
And when kids know that, then parents are going to know that as well. And it's going to make a huge impact. In your overall interaction with students and parents and how you interact. And like I said, deal with your own wellbeing. Deal with your own overwhelm and stress. It makes all the difference when you have those relationships in place.
So again, I just want to go over those three tips, incorporate regular practices to learn about your students. Communicate with parents and families to gain insights. And make it a point to connect with each student daily. I hope you found this episode, helpful.
Join me in the resilient educator academy for more opportunities to talk on working with students, building those relationships with difficult students. You know, there are students that sometimes we have a hard time building. Relationships and connections [00:10:00] with, so join the resilient educator academy.
It's a great place to get support for that. And when you join, I give you two one-on-one sessions. And so you have that opportunity to work with me. One-on-one where we can go through those individual scenarios that you might need some individual coaching. So thank you so much for joining me today for another episode of the teacher burnout podcast.
Make sure to follow me on Instagram at Barb flowers, coaching.com. If you love the show and you're listening on apple, scroll down in your app and leave a review. That helps other people find the show. And keep in mind, you have the power to shape your life. According to the mindset you choose. I hope you have a great week and I'll see you back here next time.