Do Teachers Need To Be Liked?
A recent Robert Pondiscio post took me right back to many, many teacher lounge debates. "Do students need to like their teachers to learn?" was the question both in his post and in my lounge, and it seemed to come up again every time a student teacher passed through our halls.
The frequency with which this came up for newbies led me to think that maybe being liked is one of the answers that young teachers land on as they search for an answer to "How do I know whether I'm succeeding here?" This is one of the challenges that come with teaching being a solitary profession-- teachers have no place to get feedback except from students. But if you are looking for affirmation of your professional conduct from a child--well, that is not a great way to do adulting.
Teaching also comes with the challenge of being a profession in which relationships are very important, but they also mostly have to be created out of whole cloth by the adult in the room, and there isn't much in life that prepares us for that.
So out of all that young teachers may land on, "Well, if I can get the kids to like me..." It doesn't help that so many fictional teacher models center on a beloved hero teacher who we get to see being beloved but not so much actually teaching.
But trying to get young humans to like you just leads to all sorts of problems. Heck, it leads to all sorts of problems among the young humans. The key to social success in high school is confidence, and "Please like me" energy projects the opposite. In a teacher, it projects both a lack of confidence and weakness, and while younger students may take pity on you, older students will not. And if they figure out you can be played by threats that are simply coded versions of "If you don't give us our way, we won't like you," you are done.
Teachers will sometimes land on other unproductive approaches to creating the relationship. For instance, "rule through fear" crowd. But mostly what you teach through that approach is some combination of sneakiness and resentment. Your students may comply when they are in front of you, but you'd better be careful about when you turn your back. Can they learn this way? Maybe, but I wouldn't bet on it.
So what is the answer? Respect and competence.
Treat the students with respect. Know what you're doing. I would add "be kind," but that term is too open to misinterpretation, so let's leave it for now.
The experts say that one sign that a marriage is doomed is when contempt sneaks in. Same is true for the classroom; when you show contempt for your students, it's game over. The opposite of contempt is respect-- you treat them like they are functional, capable human beings deserving of decent treatment. And here's a hugely important fact lost to many in our current political climate-- you don't have to like someone to treat them with respect. You don't have to agree with someone to treat them with respect. You just have to recognize that they are human, and as such, deserve a certain base level of respect.
Respect for students goes hand in hand with providing them with competent teaching and high-but-realistic expectations. Throw in Not Wasting Student Time as well.
As a teacher, you've stepped up to take on a particular role, and students will sooner or later judge you based on how well you fulfill that role. "He's a nice guy, but a lousy teacher" is not the dream. The dream is to teach the students, to help them increase their understanding of themselves and the world.
Pondiscio says that students like teachers they learn from (not vice versa), and I guess that's sort of true. But every kind of person in the world is going to pass through your classroom, and some of them are not going to like you, ever. Trying to win them over is a waste of time, but modeling how to respectfully get the work done even when you don't necessarily like the person you're working with-- that's a lesson they (and the other students watching how things play out) can carry into the world.
I've spent the last 20 years with teenagers, and I don't think teens really "like" adults. Not in the way that they like their peers and favorite entertainers. Adults are more like rocks, or furniture, existing as part of the landscape of the teen world. That said; they certainly like the feeling of being in certain spaces, even classrooms, and they recognize the adults around them as creating those spaces. So I don't worry about whether my students like me, I just try to create a space where they like learning. It doesn't always work, but when it does it's magical
My two most influential teachers, one in h.s., one in college were teachers who I feared. They were strict, demanding, and uncompromising. Their expectations were high, and if we failed to meet them, we'd wish we had never been born. They didn't humiliate us when we screwed up, just a look or a raised eyebrow or even worse, dead silence was all it took. We worked our butts off for them, and they did not go overboard with praise when we succeeded because there was always the Next Thing for us to learn. We joked that they showed up in our nightmares, which was literally true. Teens are a challenge to teach. They push their limits and can smell a phony a mile away.
When I was fresh from University, I taught high school art for 3 years and the kids ate me for breakfast at times. In the afternoons I'd drive down to the University and teach a late afternoon photography class, which was a welcome contrast because the students actually listened to my lectures. So fulfilling. One day I said, "When you take a photograph of a person,"... pause for them to start taking notes ... "You are stealing their souls. (pause) Any questions?" "Yes, is this going to be on the midterm exam?"