As an educator is it important, or more exactly it is imperative that we are able to connect and empathize with our students. I had an experience that brought a whole new level of thinking, understanding, and empathy when I thought about what our students go through, possibly on a daily basis.
As an educator, I have taken classes, attended PD, read books and articles, shared on social media and even started this blog all in the name of learning, to better my skills and craft of teaching, so I can better teach and support my students. The majority of the time most of the activities and interactions are within or slightly out of my comfort zone, yet I am able to work through to the next level of understanding without any problems. While these activities help to make me better they really don’t help to build empathy for my students. Until this past weekend.
You see, I put myself in a situation that brought about feelings of being overwhelmed, inadequate, trepidation, and anxiety; all in the name of learning. Through Twitter I am slowly learning about the use of comics/graphic novels in the classroom so to learn more I went to the Denver Comic Con not once but on two separate days. This was a mind-blowing experience. I’m not really sure what I expected but what I saw, heard, and tried to understand left me lost.
As I walked through the isles that were jam-packed with people (all ages some in regular street clothes, majority dressed in costume to represent their favorite comic character), books, art, and merchandise I thought about students. While sitting through fifty-minute educational presentations to learn more and as my confusion and frustration rose I thought about students. I thought about students new to a school, new to the country, those that have additional educational or social-emotional needs, our students in general and how just the act of going to school, being exposed to new faces, rules, expectations, curriculum (the list goes on) can make our students feel like I did this weekend…overwhelmed, inadequate, trepidatious, and anxious.
While in this situation I was able to conceal my emotions – although my face may have shown otherwise – our students aren’t always able to conceal their emotions. This is where connections and empathy are imperative. The next time I see a tell on a face, tears, hear crying, or maybe what appears to be physical aggression I will quickly reflect back to this weekend and work to better understand where these feelings might be coming from. Students need to know it is okay to be feeling the way they are, that we will work through the feelings to get to the next level.
I wanted this weekend to be learning about comics/graphic novels. Instead, it was about stepping out of my comfort zone to better my ability to make connections and empathize with students. We work with the whole child, we need to make connections along with having gone through situations in order to empathize to help our students learn and grow.