In this episode we are going to be talking about how you can make your students feel important. Everybody wants to feel important and valued. Everybody wants to feel good about themselves and if you can help your students feel important, you will need to build their self-esteem and their confidence. Then they will be more likely to buy into what you want to do with them in the classroom. They will be more willing to protect the classroom environment and work for you and behave for you as well.
Before we get into it I want to let you know that this episode is brought to you by the Behavior Management Blueprint. This is my FREE e-book on the five key essentials of classroom management and it also comes with a free mini video course as well. You can download that by clicking the link at the end of the blog.
Prefer to watch the Video, Click here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EAnGwB4Wrg
So here are four tips on how to help your students feel important.
1. Compliment and Praise
So the first thing is this: compliment and praise. Everybody loves being complimented and praised and your students are no exception. Look for opportunities every day to compliment your students not just about their work but just generally. For example, if they get a new haircut notice the haircut and say, “Hey I love your new haircut and your new hairstyle!” If they wear new shoes say, “Hey they are cool shoes.” Look for ways to complement them and notice them. Praise them if they have done something well. Say, “Fantastic job, I love the way you did that, you worked really hard today, I am really proud of you”. Praise and compliments go a long way to building self-esteem. They also go a long way to managing behavior. Students will behave in a manner that will get them the most attention.
So if they are being complimented and praised for their good behavior that is how they are going to continue behaving. Use lots of compliments and praise, it’s a very powerful tool in making students feel important.
2. Show Appreciation
The second thing is this: learn to show appreciation. When a student does something for you, when they follow your instruction or complete a task well say “Thank you so much for doing that quickly, thank you so much for bringing your bag in” or “Thank you so much for setting up my computer, I really appreciate your hard work today”. Show appreciation. People love to be thanked and appreciated. The more you appreciate your students the more they will actually want to do things for you so they can get that appreciation.
When students are being appreciated on a regular basis they will feel like the teacher cares about them, the teacher notices them when they do the right thing. I had a friend who always used to say “Manners are for free” and saying thankyou is a free way that you can actually build good relationships with your students. So make sure you do appreciate them and say thank you whenever they have done something that you are happy about or pleased about.
3. Learn your Students names
The third thing is this: learn your students’ names. This is especially powerful for relief teachers, high school teachers or specialist teachers. When you teach a number of students, it can be a little bit tricky but take the time to learn students’ names. Use their names if you learn them quickly. What that will show them is that you care about them, that they are important to you because you took the time to learn their names. It is a very little task, it may take a little bit of practice but there are a number of techniques for learning names so I recommend you google that and learn how to remember kids names very quickly. Students love it when the teacher learns their name quickly. It shows that they are important to you as the teacher.
4. Acknowledge their communication
The fourth thing is this, acknowledge their communication. So when a student wants to talk to you, maybe they are standing off to the side and are waiting but you are talking to another student. Students can get impatient and sometimes they find it difficult to wait their turn so they will sometimes try and interrupt. When that happens, say, say a simple thing like, “Hey Brad I know you want to talk to me but could you jjust wait one minute please?” Acknowledge them, tell them that you have noticed them and that will help them to wait a little bit longer or help them to feel important because you’ve acknowledged them.
The other thing is acknowledge emails. If your students are writing to you asking questions about their work or asking questions about their progress, make sure you acknowledge them. If you can not give them information straight away say, “Thanks for your email, I will come back to you in a couple of days once I have got that information” or “I do not know just yet but I will let you know in a week’s time”. Acknowledge people and let them know that you have seen their need for communication, you have seen their need to have some time to discuss things and that you will get to them very quickly.
So these are four things that you can do to help your students feel important. Compliment and praise them regularly, show them appreciation, say thank you whenever they do something that you appreciate. Learn their names quickly and use them often. Acknowledge their communication, if they are trying to communicate with you let them know that you have seen them, let them know you have seen their email and that you will come to them as quickly as possible.
I hope you found that really interesting. If you want to learn more tips like these, do not forget to check out our online course called “Behavior Management Essentials.” The link is in the description below. It is four hours of content, a deep dive into behaviour management, taken from our live workshops. If you have enjoyed this, then share it with somebody that you think would benefit and I will see you next time.
If you would like to learn more about managing classroom behaviour effectively, why not check out our FREE video course Behaviour Management Blueprint. See below for details.
https://calmerclassrooms.today/blueprint/
Essential Strategies for Effective Behaviour Management
