What if it’s fear?
The student goes home and leaves the backpack unzipped on the bedroom floor. Video games, Netflix, and social media medicate the student after a day of high school. Maybe after a day of failure.
When they return to school the next day, they often stiff-arm the whole experience. They jam papers into their backpack in a manner that says “I don’t really care to ever see that paper again!” They disrupt the learning of nearby students. They lack focus. They are disengaged.
The common diagnosis is ADD, ADHD, ODD, poverty, poor parenting, disengagement, disenfranchisement, or disobedience. But what if it’s fear?
What if I came to school as a student and every hour on the hour I was met with something that I could not do or did not understand? How would I cope? After a day of failure or the threat of failure, I would want to feel powerful. Nothing says power better than a great video game.
The common solution to berate ourselves as educators for our lack of . . . something. In blogs, writers sneer at education that lacks creativity and is steeped in control and suppression. But what if students don’t have a mechanism for dealing with their own fear?
The solution is not the absence of fear but the introduction of courage. Courage acknowledges fear. What does a fearful student need? What skills would allow them to face the day and go home victorious rather than needing something to medicate the experience?
I wish I could teach them to stop and think about their day. I wish that students would take five minutes and think through their day. I wish I could check-in and ask some questions. What happened today? What was discussed in class? What was confusing? What was understood? What was clear? What questions do they have for tomorrow? My sense is that “I don’t get it” is answered by hiding, avoidance, and shame. That grows fear and encourages coping mechanisms that are usually counterproductive to learning.
I would teach them to put stuff where it goes. I wish that students valued the tasks of education by valuing its currency: paper.
I believe victory and courage are found in the short game. Attempt the work. Reread the notes. Organized the backpack. Think about what happened today and what might happen tomorrow.
Little successes come by facing fear with action. Action develops habits. Habits build the power to push through what might turn away the more timid.
Oh, to have the wisdom to teach students to face fear!