Читать книгу Assessing with Respect - Starr Sackstein - Страница 17

Taking the time to develop deeper relationships with students will nurture the learning environment. Your students will trust you and therefore will be more willing to take risks when you ask them to step out of their comfort zones. The knowledge you gain about your students can inform your lesson design, formative learning experiences, and eventually summative assessments. Continuing to foster deep connections is likely to encourage students to not only seek your help when they need it but also follow your suggestions when you provide them.

Ultimately, the time you invest in building these important relationships will pay dividends in student commitment to learning and buy-in in the future, especially if the cultural backgrounds of your students differ from yours. Taking the time to understand the backstories of individual students—where they come from, who they are in every sense, what their socioeconomic situation is—will help you make better decisions and engender continuing trust.

Additionally, the importance of expressing vulnerability—for example, admitting when you don't know something or asking for help—can't be overestimated. Allowing yourself to be vulnerable with students as learners and human beings opens the door to modeling how this vulnerability draws people closer together. It is an opportunity to demonstrate the trust it takes to share personal information and to give students a sense of the value you place on your relationship with them.