TEDxEnola - Dr. Jason Conway - Classroom Environment: It's not about YOU, It's about THEM
Summary
TLDRThe speaker discusses the importance of creating a positive classroom environment, emphasizing that it's not about the teacher but about the students. Reflecting on personal experiences, the speaker shares an epiphany about how competition and certain teaching methods can alienate students. They highlight the challenges teachers face, including changing student values and lack of social skills, and advocate for structured interactions, a sense of belonging, and teaching social skills as part of education. The talk concludes with a call to see beyond oneself and focus on the students' needs and development.
Takeaways
- 📚 Classroom environment is not about the teacher, but about the students and their relationships.
- 🪞 Reflection is crucial in improving one’s teaching practices, but it’s hard to look critically at oneself.
- 💡 The speaker had an epiphany when a student said they hated Fridays due to a competitive game, realizing he was alienating some students.
- 👥 Positive classroom environments lead to higher academic achievement and better social interactions among students.
- 🛑 Teachers often overlook student feedback, fearing it might reveal harsh truths about their classroom management.
- ⚖️ Modern students come with different values and social skills compared to previous generations, leading to challenges in building cooperative environments.
- 🏫 Schools and teachers can no longer remain neutral on teaching social skills, as parents may not provide these skills at home.
- 🔄 Belonging, equity, and social skill development are key to fostering a positive classroom environment.
- 🎯 Classroom and team leaders should structure interactions to ensure all voices are heard and valued, not dominated by a few.
- 🔍 Visionaries in education should keep their eyes open to reflect, envision, and grow beyond the status quo for the betterment of students.
Q & A
What is the main focus of the presentation?
-The main focus of the presentation is on creating a positive classroom environment, emphasizing that it's about the students rather than the teacher.
What analogy does the speaker use to discuss self-reflection in teaching?
-The speaker uses the analogy of looking in a mirror, explaining that it can be difficult to reflect honestly on oneself, especially in relation to one's teaching practices.
What epiphany did the speaker have regarding his classroom environment?
-The speaker realized that although students enjoyed his lectures, some students felt alienated by the competitive Friday activities, which led him to reevaluate the importance of creating an inclusive environment.
Why is building a positive classroom environment important according to the speaker?
-Building a positive classroom environment is important because students need to feel safe and connected in order to be academically successful. Research indicates that a positive environment increases students' academic achievement and efficacy.
What challenges does the speaker mention in creating a positive classroom environment?
-The challenges include teachers having a different perception of the environment compared to students, a lack of emphasis on social skills, and students arriving with different values and social abilities than in the past.
What is the speaker's view on teaching social skills in the classroom?
-The speaker believes that teaching social skills is an essential part of education, and teachers should take responsibility for it rather than assuming it is solely the parents' role.
What are the key elements of a positive classroom environment according to the speaker?
-The key elements include a sense of belonging, feeling needed by others, equity, and finding value in one's actions, which leads to increased engagement and learning.
How does the speaker illustrate the concept of equity in social interactions?
-The speaker gives examples such as waiting in line at an amusement park or sitting next to someone on a plane, emphasizing the importance of fairness and social norms.
What does the speaker suggest to improve classroom interactions?
-The speaker suggests structuring interactions in a way that allows everyone to be heard, and providing opportunities for students to practice social skills in a supportive environment.
What is the final challenge that the speaker leaves the audience with?
-The speaker challenges the audience to reflect on how they envision their classroom or team environment, encouraging them to focus on the students' growth and success rather than their own reflections.
Outlines
🔍 Self-Reflection in Teaching: A Classroom Epiphany
The speaker opens by discussing the importance of self-reflection in teaching, using the metaphor of a mirror to explain how difficult it can be to critically assess one’s teaching practices. He recounts a personal epiphany where he realized that despite believing he was engaging students, his competitive teaching style was alienating some. This sparked his passion for creating a better classroom environment, shifting his focus from himself to the needs of the students.
📊 The Decline of Social Skills Among Students
The speaker shares concerning statistics about student ethics, highlighting a gap between what students report as acceptable behavior and their actual actions. He notes that students today often arrive with poorer social skills compared to the past, leading to challenges in fostering a cooperative classroom environment. The speaker stresses that educators must address these gaps, as parents may not be instilling necessary social skills, and schools must take on this responsibility.
🏫 The Importance of Belonging and Equity in the Classroom
This section emphasizes the need for a sense of belonging and equity within the classroom. The speaker gives examples from everyday life, such as people wearing sports jerseys, to illustrate how being part of a group fulfills a basic human need. He explains that classrooms should be environments where all students feel they belong and are treated equally. The speaker also discusses how educators can structure interactions in a way that ensures all voices are heard, avoiding dominance by a few students.
🧠 Social Skills and Structured Interaction in Learning
The speaker challenges educators to structure classroom interactions so that all students have the opportunity to participate. He encourages teachers to create environments where social skills like listening and being heard are practiced regularly. Using humor and relatable examples (such as awkward elevator rides), he highlights how modern technology has led to fewer face-to-face social interactions, making it even more critical to intentionally teach these skills.
🔮 Visionary Leadership in Education: Looking Beyond Ourselves
In the final section, the speaker talks about the power of visionary leadership in education. He shares a personal story about playing Connect Four with his son, which led him to think about the reflection of oneself in others and the potential for growth. He concludes by urging educators to look beyond their own reflection and consider the broader impact they can have on their students’ development. The message reinforces the idea that teaching is about helping others grow, not just about the teacher.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Classroom environment
💡Reflection
💡Social skills
💡Belonging
💡Competition
💡Equity
💡Feedback
💡Teamwork
💡Student engagement
💡Vision
Highlights
The speaker reflects on the challenge of self-assessment in teaching, using a metaphor of looking in the mirror to improve one’s own practice.
An epiphany led the speaker to realize that their competitive classroom activities were alienating students rather than fostering inclusion.
The importance of a positive classroom environment is emphasized, as it directly impacts students’ academic success and efficacy.
The speaker argues that education overly focuses on content and neglects the relational aspects between students.
Teachers often have an inflated perception of their classroom environments compared to how students actually feel.
There is a growing gap between the values students bring to the classroom and those expected by teachers, with many students lacking key social skills.
Many teachers take a neutral stance on social skills education, expecting parents to teach these skills, though this is increasingly not the case.
A sense of belonging is crucial in classroom environments. Students thrive when they feel part of a community.
The speaker stresses the importance of feeling needed by others in both classroom and team environments.
Equity is a key element of classroom dynamics, with fairness in participation being essential for student engagement.
The speaker uses humorous examples, such as airplane and elevator interactions, to illustrate social norms and their relevance to social skill development.
Engagement in the classroom is driven by students finding value in what they are doing, which increases their learning and relationship-building.
Structured opportunities to listen and be heard are essential for balancing participation and fostering a cooperative learning environment.
Teachers should model and practice social skills with students, embedding these lessons into everyday classroom activities.
The speaker concludes by encouraging teachers to have a clear vision for their classroom environments, keeping in mind that it is about the students’ growth and not the teacher’s performance.
Transcripts
[Music]
thank you Jill all right thank you all
right okay morning everyone great uh
great to see everyone here today uh
today we're going to talk about
classroom environment and it's really
not about you it's about them and one of
the the things and uh forgive me Bridget
my wife for stealing this this morning
is is a mirror and if you think about a
mirror it's wonderful for reflection but
yet I think there might be a flaw in the
mirror because one of the toughest
things to do is to look at yourself in
the mirror especially about the practice
that you do if it's teaching or leading
a company or what that might be and so
let me share with you one of the
epiphanies that I
had and this should be
on
help that's why I'm the guinea pig
first very good thank you do I just just
turn it on should be
on I'll just point to you how's that
sound all right and so uh many years ago
I had an epiphany a class a classroom
environment Epiphany and what happened
was I thought I was doing a great job in
teaching kids and inspiring kids and so
I would tell funny jokes in class and
they'd laugh they'd see me in the
hallway and realize and say hello to me
and I thought I was doing a really great
job until one day I had a student come
up to me and say you know Mr Conway I
love listening to your lectures and your
stories but I hate Fridays and I was
taken back and I thought hating Fridays
well why would you hate Fridays well
here on Fridays like all across America
social studies concentrates on current
events and so on Fridays we would do
this Jeopardy game towards the voga cup
and I really really made a big deal out
of this and I thought kids were having
fun but what I realized was I was
alienating kids because what I did
through the competition is I really then
exposed many of the social skills kids
were lacking when it came from winning
and losing sharing taking turns and so
on and so forth and so after that
Epiphany I really decided you know what
classroom environment is my passion and
I want to look deeper into what makes a
good classroom environment and so on
click all right so why is it important
to build a positive classroom
environment well number one when you
look at any environment that you enter
into our brains immediately scan what's
going on to see whether or not it's safe
whether or not um we're going to get
along with others what are the
repercussions of talking or not talking
and so on our brains naturally do this
and so um when entering a classroom
students do the exact same thing and the
research is very clear that with
positive classroom environment ments we
see that academic resear uh the academic
achievement and efficacy rises in
students that's why it's important and I
think personally that it is a much
overlooked area of Education we
concentrate so much on content but not
enough on how do kids relate with each
other how can we get away from thinking
classroom management is about me when
really we should be thinking about how
classroom environment is about
them so what are the challenges that we
see in building a positive uh classro
environment well one of the things that
we see is
Click we see that many times when we
look at ourselves in a mirror we see
only ourselves and it's very hard for us
to understand or see the reality Beyond
ourselves and so when students perceive
or share their perceptions of of
classroom environment many times it is
much lower than how the teacher looks at
that classroom environment because many
times it's a reflection upon their
classroom management and not about the
relationships between students and so
when students have an opportunity to
give feedback as teachers that scares us
to death I don't know about you but when
rap my teacher came out right all of us
went there and said what are they saying
about us I may even added a few comments
to bump up my scores I know all of you
have done that as well right but it's
very hard we dread hearing from our
students sometimes because the harsh
reality that may come so we're very
satisfied with our once a year
observations from ministrators because
we can put the pony show on for any one
given day but truly how are reflecting
upon our classroom environment or our
team environments for that matter a
second challenge or problem would be
that of sharing basic positive values if
you think years ago of the values that
students had coming to our classrooms
and those coming uh to our schools today
they are much different in fact let me
share with you just a few stats in a in
a research study uh they found that 83%
of students that were uh surveyed lied
to their parents about something
significance 64% lied to a teacher about
doing something significance uh 36%
copied off the internet or cheated on a
test I think they lied about lying uh
and 64 I'm sorry and 30% stole something
from somebody else but yet overall 95%
of the students were happy with their
ethics and morals and so there's a
disconnect between what we expect and
what is coming into our
classrooms and so when we have students
coming together with a lack of social
skills we see that the environment is is
unable to become a Cooperative one and
what we're missing is opportunities to
teach kids social skills because they
come to us unprepared as they may have
earlier another point or another
statement of problem would be that many
times schools are taking and teachers
are taking a neutral position on social
skills it's not our job that's the
parents well guess what they're coming
to us and we've got to teach them what
they don't know and unfortunately we
have to get over the fact that parents
are not teaching their kids the same
social skills that are necessary to be
successful because what's happening is
there's a gap between what businesses
want and what production is coming out
of our schools in terms of social skills
teamwork collaboration and so
on so what are the key elements of
environment well first a sense of
belonging think about your classroom or
your team environment that you may be
leading as a leader how are you
promoting this sense of belonging for
instance all of us like to be part of
something I mean if you think about what
just recently happened at Penn State and
how all of us gathered together to show
that we are Penn State think about every
Sunday and when you walk around and you
see people with uh NFL jerseys on um my
little boy Brooks every Friday wears his
Dover Eagles T-shirt with pride
because there's a sense of belonging and
when we look at what type of
instructional strategies that are
occurring across our classrooms how
indeed are students feeling that sense
of belonging another item to think about
is the feeling needed by others it feels
darn good when somebody needs us I can
remember the very first time when I
taught Arthur to read a clock I was in
third grade and went to the resource
room at the time and I remember the
feeling that I had teaching him it felt
darn good to feel feed in meaned by
others and conversely then it's good to
know that I can depend on others who
need me and if you think about a
classroom environment or a team
environment we all need each other to be
successful and so as classroom
instructors team leaders how are you
promoting that feeling of needing one
another for to accomplish whatever goal
you're setting out to
accomplish Equity all of us believe in
equity even as old as we are right now
equal turns is important for instance
have you ever gone to an amusement park
maybe Walt Disney World and all of you
have been in a queue that maybe have
been a little wide and all of a sudden
the people behind you start inching up
like they're going to pass you so what
do you do you throw them the look what
do you think you're doing and then when
you come to a turn in the line what you
do is you hug the the corner so they
can't get in front of you you're
laughing because it's so true we as
adults care about social skills okay I'm
to give you another example if you think
about relating with others I don't know
about you but when I get on a plane I
want to know the person next to me's
name so when I'm yelling please hold me
I know who I'm talking to but how many
times have you gotten on a plane
and you barely spoke a word or even
looked at them because if I look I might
have to engage is that a social skill
problem I'm not sure but I at least want
to know who I'm going down with do
something one time to freak people out I
love doing this go on an elevator and we
have social norms when going on an
elevator when you're the only one you
walk in and you sometimes stand in the
center right but when somebody else
comes in where do you move to one of the
corners see everybody knew that so you
move one of the corners and where does
that person come they go to the other
corner right and so the third person
comes in where do they stand dead center
right and where are you looking the
numbers because if you're looking at the
numbers you don't have to engage so of
like kids texting in the hallway not
looking up making eye contact because
that might mean they have to talk so
here's your challenge over the next year
at least one time go into an elevator
and be that third person instead of
facing forward simply turn around and
face him it will freak them out I'm
telling you but why is that so
uncomfortable for us what haven't we
done to prepare people to communicate
with one another in a social setting
that may be unfamiliar to them because
let's face it we have more of those
opportunities of being with unfamiliar
people than with people that we're
familiar with in this age of technology
and and
and work and so on another thing to
consider is of course value and action
we of course want to know that what
we're doing has value and when we have
value we have engagement when we have
engagement we have gains growth in our
knowledge and in our relationships when
we see no value then obviously we shut
down and we check out thus having a high
school dropout where seven ,000 students
a day are dropping out of our high
schools okay
7,000 kids a day obviously there's a
loss of belonging because schools should
be the place where everybody's accepted
everybody is given a
chance a chance to be needed a chance to
feel as though that they're equal upon
others I'll give you a good example
growing up I don't know about you but
when a teacher would call on a student
you always had those one or two kids
would always raise their hands right and
as soon as they called on suie I checked
out because hey Suzy's got it and
eventually you start seeing over time
kids raise their hands less why because
they let others do the work for them
that's how I got through high school and
most of college because I made sure that
I was in a group that had a smart kid
and a cute girl all right yeah that's
how I got through because I didn't have
any individual accountability
but now what can we do to improve the
fact that kids are coming to us with
lack of social skills and so on next
slide so here's what we can do I propose
and challenge all of you no matter what
capacity that you serve in is to look at
how you are structuring the interaction
am among your classrooms and among your
teams how in the world are you
structuring it is it allowed to be a
free-for-all where you have Hogs logs in
that conversation dominating and all of
you know people who dominate
conversations right and you can't get a
word in right and that then produces
people who will become disgruntled or
disenfranchised because why should I
bother even trying because it's going to
be dominated by others and so how do we
structure interaction well there's two
things that I really want to promote for
you and that is number one opportunities
to listen to others and be heard that's
a key in a structured way as soon as you
say so what do you all think about that
obviously the dominators are going to
talk first and dominate the conversation
but think of ways in which you can
structure the time Andor turns for kids
as well as your employees to give
feedback because we all have been in
meetings where it has been so boring we
start texting checking email and so on
and so forth all right last but not
least
I'm going to leave you with a final
thought you know if you have a vision of
what your team oh thank you okay thank
you sorry time out this is where the
commercial is right all right so I
thought I was running out of time all
right opportunities to practice social
skills all right look for ways to
enhance them if you see something broken
have them practice it model it practice
and they'll internalize it but it's not
a separate unit for a guidance
Department to do it is embedded in
everything that we do because kids will
do as we do and so I leave you with this
final thought that environment means so
much to the success and the
collaboration and cooperation of any
classroom any team that you might be
leading and so if you have a vision of
your team keep in mind that Visionaries
dream with their eyes open while while
others keep their eyes closed or shut to
awaken to status quo another other words
you have to see it and keep your eyes
open to what Vision you have for your
classroom environment or your team
environment in fact this morning uh when
I woke up I realized you know what my
little boy taught me yet one more lesson
and you know I was doing this uh mirror
thing and you know what I said we can
improve this mirror in education so we
were playing Connect Four last night and
as I was peering through the Connect 4 I
saw my little boy being a reflection of
me but yet growing as his own individual
and so I thought what if we develop a
mirror an educational reality mirror
that looks like this where I have a
reflection of myself but I'm able to see
through to the other side so I challenge
you how are you reflecting and how are
you envisioning what your goals are
Beyond yourself so again it's not about
you it's about them next
slide and that's it next
slide so thank you very much appreciate
[Applause]
it is this our
exit hi
[Music]
Mom
[Music]
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