Affective Habits 1/2

For the next four or five blog posts I will focus on an article I read in Educational Leadership, a magazine published by ASCD (American Society of Curriculum Developers) about Highly Affective Teachers.  The Highly Affective Practices are designed to help teachers examine their individual emotional states and how that interacts with students.  Emotional states or wellness of students is a variable in our setting that often doesn't get discussed much.  As teachers/support staff we must be able to not only be content experts but experts in helping students deal with multiple life situations.  Here is the link to the whole article; http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/oct15/vol73/num02/The-Seven-Habits-of-Highly-Affective-Teachers.aspx.

The linked document here is only the first two habits.  I would recommend just looking at the first two habits.  We will examine all of them over the next few posts.


Here are some questions to consider:
1.  The article questions an educators response to when a parent complains about a homework assignment.  What did you think of those response?  Is that how you respond?
2.  Can you find joy in your students' successes?  Have you ever done this before?
3.  In the article, it calls perspective hope when there isn't hope.  What do you think that means?  Have you ever experienced that in your classroom or maybe missed that opportunity in your classroom?

Motivating Students

For all educators motivating students has been an ongoing battle.  We know that the students that are motivated from within often times are more successful in and out of the classroom.  Those students that are not intrinsically motivated can be motivated extrinsically but it takes a lot of effort on the educator/coach part.  Over time I am sure that many educators have developed their own form of motivation for students that they most likely adjust a bit each year.

Click here to read a short article about motivation.

Here are some questions to consider:
1.  One of the suggestions is to "keep your eyes on the educational prize."  Can you think of a time that you kept your eyes on the prize to help motivate a student?
2.  Researchers had learners write a paragraph about new learning and "how it would it would be useful in their lives."  Think about your content area...have you or can you connect your content to real life?  How did students react to it?
3.  Can you remember a student that increased their intrinsic motivation over time?  Why do you think this happened?  Can you repeat that in other students?

What Length?

Teachers/Educators go to long lengths for their students.  The list is endless and unrelenting in regards to what we do that is "above and beyond" so that our students can get everything possible out of the day or class period.  The below article talks about some of those things that we do as educators and the lengths we go to.  Thanks for going to those lengths, it is appreciated.

Click here to read the article.

Questions to consider:
1.  Do you keep a balance between the "lengths" you go and your time "away" from work?
2.  What do you do to get your break from school?

Raving Fans

This past summer I read the book Raving Fans written by Ken Blanchard and Sheldon Bowles.  This book was recommended by a staff member.  The book is all about customer service in different industries.  I think in education we do work in the customer service industry on more than one front.  Thinking of a person from the community coming into our building and being greeted to viewing our students as customers in some cases.  Really customer service is how a person treats another person.  In the linked article by Mark Sanborn he discusses ways to "not get fired by your customer."  Take a look at the article and think about ways it can translate to your classroom.

Click here for the article.

Questions to consider:

1. Are customers happier when they do business with you? If not, what will you do differently?
2. Are customers unhappier after they do business with you? If so, what will you do to change?
3. What are you doing to teach you team how to create positive emotions and experiences and prevent firings?