Assessing Classroom Climate Around Help

I feel like many of my students have learned to survive math class. I want to teach them skills that go beyond surviving so they can understand and flourish. The classroom climate around asking for help is so important to this task. Asking for help is an essential skill to succeeding in most areas of life. Yet from early childhood many children develop negative perceptions about asking for help when it is such a positive skill and attribute. It is a transferable life skill that is essential to learning and growing.

I am in my second year. I became intentional about creating a helping environment based on reflections during my first year. It took awhile to realize how much help my students needed and how to deliver that help. I was overwhelmed by the amount of students who needed constant assistance with basic tasks. I had tons of students who would sit and silently wait without putting a hand up. They did this after doing one problem because they wanted to ask me if their answer was correct. They did it when they struggled with how to do the problem. They did it when they weren’t paying attention to directions. It was overwhelming. I knew I had to come up with solutions to provide the support students needed to get working and stay working. I needed to find a way to multiply the support I provided.

I implemented several solutions this past year. I will talk about some of them more in specific posts. Below is the results of a student reflection on the climate around help in the classroom and my initial responses to the data.

End of Year Reflection on Classroom Climate Around Help

This is how students responded to two questions relating to the climate of help in my classroom:

(note that this assessment was conducted in June 2020 after students were home due to Coronavirus since mid March. It is unclear how that could have impacted their responses)

I am not sure how to feel about the results. On one hand I spent a lot of time putting in place measures to make asking for help easier and less invasive. I built connections with my students. I ask for feedback from students in the form of written reflections. I addressed negative behaviors when students responded poorly to others talking. I used positive reinforcement when students asked for help, learned from mistakes, and worked through a struggle. Due to the intentional efforts I thought I was doing a good job.

The results are not bad, but they are not great. I could assess that most students feel their classmates are helpful at least some of the time and they feel comfortable asking for help at least some of the time if not more. However, the three that were not comfortable asking for help is enough to make me reevaluate my efforts.

The follow up question about what would help them feel more comfortable didn’t yield anything helpful from the three. However, other students did report what would make them more comfortable. Most responses were more about personal development (not being shy). Some were situational - being able to ask alone or to have someone ask the student if they need help. The responses that stung were “when I am comfortable with my teammates” and “kids not laughing.”

Where do I go from here?

Personal Connections

It is a personal goal to continue to build better personal connections. The EdSurge article How 1-on-1 Time with Students Made Me a Better Teacher by Heather Stinnett provides a guide to building stronger connections. The article reinforces what I also learned from the “no” responders in the above reflection. That even the students that seem fine, that are doing fine, need extra support and connection.

Two of the students who said they did not feel comfortable asking for help were surprises to me. I felt like I let these students down and couldn’t help, but to think of these two students I thought were “fine” sitting silently when they needed help. That is heart crushing. I hope in the coming years I can manage my time efficiently enough to follow Stinetts guide to scheduled one-on-one check-ins with every student.

Student Connections

This year I had encouraged other students to act as peer tutors. They would actively help classmates. I also planned collaborative activities everyday using Kagan’s cooperative learning structures. Students were engaged each day. However, I feel like I missed opportunities to build student connections. I had planned a team builder activity for the first week of school. I put it off, and then again and again until school was over. I think seeing daily engagement provided a false sense of student connection. That is what the structures do, facilitate engagement, not connection.

I feel so much pressure to work on the content that I sometimes do not fit in activities that are just as important. Imagine if my students felt more connected with one another (more comfortable as one student stated). I could probably expect that students would feel more comfortable asking each other for help and also with asking their peers if they need help. I had the peer tutors in place, but I did not build the trust and connections for them to reach their maximum potential. I will place greater emphasis on connecting the students in more organic meaningful ways.

Explicit Development

One of my three classes this year was behind the other in almost every measure. The many strategies that I used in my other classes did not seem to work in this class. On a hunch I decided to assess how students felt about asking for help with open-ended questions about how they felt when they asked for help and how they felt about their peers who asked for help. The reflection revealed a large disconnect between how students felt about themselves when asking for help compared to how they felt about their peers. The students reported they felt “stupid” asking for help, but thought their peers were “brave” and “smart.” This was a wake up call for me. I had a lot to learn about what was going on inside of their heads if I wanted to help them learn math.

I put the results of the reflection into a visual and shared it with the class. I used the opportunity to address how we talk to ourselves and how we evaluate how peers view us compared to how they really see us. I talked about the role of asking for help and the view of others is how we should all view ourselves when we ask for help. I believe this was a powerful moment for me and the students. I did this only with that one class and only because I was seeking solutions in the moment. I plan to integrate this lesson into all of my classes and much earlier in the year. I can then continue the conversation about positive self-talk and tie it in with lessons on growth mindset.

Addressing the Laughing

It’s borderline embarrassing to see that a student wrote a concern about other students laughing when they ask for help. I think I feel embarrassed because it's so contrary to the type of environment I strive for. However, I have to evaluate the concern. First the student didn’t say people laugh. It was more of a concern that they would. Second, I can not stop students from giggling at times when adults find it inappropriate, but I can make sure I address the situation in a timely and appropriate manner. I definitely do that and I will continue to evaluate how I do that. I also set expectations about laughing at others.

There was definitely a shift in my class from the beginning of the year until the end in terms of understanding the expectations of respecting others and mistakes. Addressing mistakes became such a routine part of the class that honestly there were very little negative responses. It was rewarding to see my students focused on learning from mistakes instead of fearing them. I do think I have to reflect more on this area, because I do not see an environment that supports this concern. I am aware that I may have a blind spot. Perhaps, this concern is more rooted in personal fear and development that can be addressed with the above to solutions.

Personal growth

There were so many times when I was stressed and tired and I was a little inpatient with my students. I made such an improvement from my first year to my second in this area, but I know I have a long way to go. There were times when I thought, how can I say I create an environment safe for asking for help if I act anything short of happy when responding to students asking for help; even if it is because they did not pay attention or were not following directions.

The growth from my first year and second came from self care (reducing stress over the summer into the school year) and really understanding the students needs and accepting that addressing them means meeting them where they are. It means not expecting them to conform to what the world thinks students should act like. It was then that I could prepare to go to class and respond 10 times to the same question, be patient when kids did not pay attention, and provide remediation to all sorts of basic skills preemptively. I knew that kids would sit silently and not work then freak out during a quiz. I had to find ways to help students feel empowered to work without them asking.

I had to accept that my job was so much more about supporting them in learning than demanding that students learn my way. Obviously, we all know that, but to act it out in class is something else. To truly accept that supporting students can be annoying when they lose their attention or seem to not care is something truly important.

Not the End

When I reflect to learn it is not always a quick process. This reflection data is not that old. I expect that I will be able to add to my thoughts as the summer goes on. I will also develop better reflection questions and timing to compare during the year. I will assess, learn, implement, and reassess this topic every year.

#ReflectiveLearning #PersonalGrowth #AskingForHelp