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INSPIRE! Connecting with Students to Make a Difference
By Lee J. Colan
(This report is an excerpt from the book by the same title. The book is filled with practical strategies, inspiration, examples and exercises for teachers. View sample pages and read what influential educators are saying about INSPIRE!).
Why do you teach?
Perhaps your answer lies in one of the following responses that were collected from teachers across the country:
“I want to make a positive difference in students’ lives.” “I want to serve as a positive role model for children.” “I care about children.” “I want to help kids.” “I want to help build our next generation.”
Regardless of your own motivation, teachers have chosen the most noble of all professions.
Your talents, dedication, enthusiasm and passion for making a positive difference are the tools to inspire every student. Each life that you touch has the potential to grow into an awesome human being with positive impact felt by many people and miles away.
The challenge is that today’s technological advances have created a society of people who are information rich and time poor. Teachers, in particular, are bombarded with new techniques, methods, guidelines and strategies. Therefore, this book suggests a simple pathway to help you even more effectively connect with your students and to continue making a positive difference in their lives … and in yours!
Inspiring Connections
Several decades ago, researchers designed a 30-year longitudinal study of 15 boys from the same eighth-grade class in an inner city school. Each student was tracked through high school and into adulthood to age 45.
The researchers were astounded to find that of the 15 inner city boys, seven had become successful. Two were business owners, one was an educator, two were medical professionals and two others were employed by the government.
The researchers interviewed the seven men and asked them who or what encouraged them to finish high school and go on to seek tools that would make them successful. In every one of the interviews, the men mentioned their eighth-grade teacher, Ms. Perkins. They couldn’t pinpoint exactly what they received from her, but all remembered her, held her in high esteem and felt she had made a difference in their lives.
Although she had retired from teaching, Ms. Perkins had remained in the area and the researchers were able to interview her. Their first question, of course, was what she thought she had given these successful students. Ms. Perkins thought for several moments before she answered. Finally she gave this explanation, “I don’t think I did anything different from any of the other teachers those boys had, but I do know this. I loved those boys. Each one of them had a gift, and I felt it was my job to inspire them, focus on those gifts and build on them.”
Like Ms. Perkins, when you inspire students to see and develop their own gifts, you launch their journey to personal, not just educational, success. In short, you make a difference to those students … and they make a difference in the world. All of this positive impact starts with a connection – a connection between you and your students. Connecting with students is a prerequisite for inspiration – no connection, no inspiration.
Think about teachers who have inspired you. There was almost certainly a special connection between you and those teachers. You were attracted to those teachers – like a magnet to metal – because they let you know they valued you, respected you and were there to help you.
Those teachers, more than likely, also had great expectations for you. They expected you to do your best, to be your best.
It is exactly this kind of connection that inspires students to:
reach higher, confide in you, run faster, go the extra mile for you, seek your approval, communicate better, get involved at school, extend themselves to others, make good choices or study harder.
These are moments of recognition, acknowledgement and pride that complete the circle of inspiration. The circle starts when you inspire your students, and then, in their own ways (and in their own time!), they inspire you.
Inspired Students
Inspired students have a strong intellectual and emotional commitment to their own development – all aspects of it.
There will be those who grasp new concepts at warp speed and plunge into every project like a sleek Olympic diver, leaving little splash in their wake. There are also those students who are just as enthusiastic, but when they dive into a new concept or begin a project, they enter the water with a clumsy belly flop. They might have to repeat their dives several times before seeing progress.
Whatever the individual student’s capacity, you will know when students are inspired because you will feel their enthusiasm and, ultimately, see the results.
Inspired students also have more fun. They will be fully present in the classroom – their minds and hearts, not just their bodies. They will perform at higher levels and be motivated to do more, having fun doing their very best at whatever they attempt.
However, even the most inspired student also has challenges. Consider this: Each day, as they file into your classroom, your students bring backpacks, purses, books and supplies. What you may not immediately see is the baggage each one also carries.
For one, that baggage may be the aftermath of an argument she had with her father about money, or the baggage could come from witnessing a skirmish between her parents. Baggage also comes in the form of insecurities because one student cannot afford the same designer clothing worn by many of his or her classmates or because they don’t consider themselves as attractive as other students.
Students carry baggage filled with the self-doubt or frustration that comes with growing up and facing changes. There is also the baggage that accompanies the transition from one grade to another or from one life situation to the next.
Realistically, you cannot control each student’s total environment. In fact, you often are able to control very little of it. BUT, you can help inspire the strength and confidence it takes for each student to lift up their personal baggage and cope with life’s challenges. The pathway to inspiration is not always smooth. There will be rocks in the road. Although these rocks might look like stumbling blocks, the key is to use them as stepping-stones – opportunities to help students learn, change and grow.
The Connection Code
The paradox of today’s technologically connected world is that it has created greater social disconnection. As a result, you are a critical connector for your students, now more than ever!
As you know, connecting with students is not about money or resources; it is about you and them. The connection code is simple, yet powerful. The inspired student says, “When my needs are fulfilled, I am inspired, plugged in and I perform at my peak ability. When my needs are met, I’m motivated to pay attention to those who meet my needs.”
On the other hand, uninspired students are simply students with unfulfilled needs. The connection code also states that when my needs are not met, I’m frustrated, out of control, unfocused and disconnected – in a word, uninspired.
Nothing fancy here. There are six basic needs – three intellectual and three emotional. All students have these basic human needs, and they have remained the same even as our educational systems, technology and programs have evolved. Yes, times have changed, and our world has certainly changed, but our basic needs have remained the same. The connection code is found in the minds and hearts of students … where basic human needs are fulfilled.
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Intellectual Needs (the Mind): |
Emotional Needs (the Heart): |
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· Autonomy |
· Purpose |
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· Achievement |
· Belonging |
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· Mastery |
· Appreciation |
Therefore, inspiring your students is a two-sided challenge: intellectual and emotional. Their minds and hearts go hand in hand. All three intellectual needs must be fulfilled to inspire a mind. Likewise, all three emotional needs must be met to inspire a heart. When all six needs are fulfilled, you have an inspired student in your classroom. One for whom you have made a real difference, and one who will make a positive difference in the world!
The remainder of this book describes the six student needs and “connectors” you can use to fulfill these needs … and ultimately pave a pathway to even greater inspiration!
Act to Inspire
Don’t wait for inspiration to act. Act to spark inspiration.
Make a difference for your students by fulfilling all six needs. Act on these connectors to pave the pathway to inspiration.
Meeting your students’ needs and inspiring their minds and hearts is a long journey, and there are no shortcuts. The 12 connectors are simple but not necessarily easy.
You may not see the sparks of inspiration until you are well into the race. That’s usually about the time your students seem to give it all back, and you see the positive results of your efforts – their performance, extra effort, creativity, openness, caring, participation or expression of gratitude.
Of course, you must start the journey – action yields inspiration. A marathoner doesn’t start the long race thinking about mile 26. She starts the race, thinking about the first mile, and then she takes it one step at a time.
As an inspiring teacher, you carry a candle of inspiration with you everyday. The amazing thing is that you light a candle for many students each day, yet your flame never goes out. It’s the wonderful gift of teaching. Helping students always makes a difference!
To learn more about the six student needs and the “connectors” teachers can use to fulfill these needs, check out INSPIRE!
Copyright © 2005 by Lee J. Colan
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