Non-Cognitive Skills

Any class would be the ideal class with a group of expert learners who were purposeful, motivated, resourceful, knowledgeable, strategic, and goal directed (Ralebate 53).

                                                                         Phtoto credit:  college.library

A class full of students with this skill set would be fun to teach. In my mind’s eye I could see a bustling classroom where the teacher was actually at the side lines assessing the above skills, only stepping in when asked for clarification or to redirect the learning. Students would be on task and excited, but more importantly learning with everything they've got. Since reading Mindset by Carl Dweck I have been focusing on "strategy" with my own son, and it has been paying off. When he shares meta-cognitively how he resolved issues, problem solved, I smile...he is being strategic. More importantly I am hearing about this after the fact, he didn't run to get me to solve his problem, he worked it out on his own, additionally he uses the word "strategy" his description.

Photo credit: https://fromthegreennotebook.com/2013/09/24/leader-development-ends-ways-and-means/

A student was very upset recently and wanted to vent about two different teachers who had been rude to her. The teacher’s frustration had come out as rude. But I saw the situations very differently.

Scenario 1: the teach says "you guy are very lucky, look on the board; I have some extra credit for you this week." The student says, "oh great what is it?" The teacher, frustrated, says "I just said it was on the board." Student was very upset with the rude tone of the teacher. The teacher was frustrated with the student’s lack of "expert learner" skills. I would say that this same situation plays out every day in every classroom that has not explicitly communicated the expectations that students should be working to become "expert learners." This situation could have been a very different scene. First, teacher should have made these "expert student" skills clear at the beginning with examples and then been reinforcing these skills through the school year to the extent that the teacher should be monitoring and assessing these skills and then conferencing with students about their personal progress toward "expert learner" status. Then when this scenario arose, the teacher would merely say in a non-judge mental tone "what strategy might you employ to find the answer to your question." Students would be used to this kind of feedback. 

Scenario 2: the same student went to the Math class later and had a similar negative interaction. She had 5 questions about the homework. She asks her first question related to the homework, the frustrated teacher answers the question, but insinuates the question is a dumb question. The student is embarrassed and angry at the tone of teacher, and won’t ask her last four questions. In my mind it's the exact same situation. The teacher is assessing students "expert skills" but without having told the students what the expectation is for them. When the student didn't employ the "expert skills" like trying to find the answer on her own first, the teacher gets frustrated and makes her feel inferior, thus creating a hostile learning environment. Communicating with students your expectation of "expert skills, then providing examples, and finally assessing through conferences with students-personally- their progress (mastery oriented feedback) throughout the year,  will change the relationship between teacher and student, change the classroom climate, and improve student's "expert learner" skills.