Almost every school I’ve worked in or with, has as a part of it’s regular PLC collaborative time a type of meeting in which they discuss concerns educators are having regarding specific students. These meetings have the best of intentions - after all, everybody working together to solve a challenging problem can only help, right?
Sure. In theory.
Except often these meetings, well intentioned and full of caring, empathetic professionals, can often deteriorate quickly into collective griping about student behavior, or worse, specific students. While “venting” is one thing, a room full of people complaining to / at each other has perhaps never made anyone feel better. And when the topic of our complaining is the very kids we’re committed to helping? That just creates an inherent animosity between teachers and students that is not healthy to their education or our careers.
Take a look at these seven tips for keeping your “student concerns” meetings solution oriented, positive and effective.
1. Stay solution oriented
There’s a fine line between a teacher seeking help with a challenging student, and a frustrated adult negatively complaining, whining or….um…”itching”. You know, as in “itching to help this student learn”. Yeah, we’ll go with that.
True Edunators will get frustrated and express that frustration with passion, but they’re very rarely heard….um…”itching” about kids. In fact, it DRIVES THEM CRAZY. They care about their students, and love each of “their kids”. So to hear others talk so negatively about kids hurts their heart.
Stay solution oriented. In fact, change the entire name of the meeting. Call it “Student Solutions” or some other appropriately positive sounding thing. When you use words like “concern” or “problem” it makes it sound like the purpose of the meeting (or agenda item within a larger meeting) is focus on listing the negatives. It’s not, it’s to find solutions to problems you or your students are facing. Focus on that.
2. Try it without the names of students.
Here’s an interesting idea: instead of immediately starting the conversation by saying “So, I have Mark Clements in my 8th hour class and he just loves to hear himself talk…” focus on the problematic behavior instead by removing the student name, and maybe even the gender. By saying “I have one student that I cannot seem to keep from talking when the class is quietly working” it changes the entire tone and dynamic of the conversation. Now, teachers are immediately focused on the problematic behavior and brainstorming potential solutions, instead of lamenting the fact that THEY ALSO cannot seem to keep Mark from talking. :)
Even if we get passed the part where everyone takes turns telling their horror story about a given student, we still end up down a rabbit hole where we attempt to help the student by digging deeper...only to dig WAY TOO DEEP for the scope of our meeting. In a meeting designed to provide Tier III supports for specific students, then yes, we’d want to talk about things like siblings and family history (maybe), behavioral history (probably) and medical concerns (if appropriate).
Unless the solution you’re looking for is specific to a kid, or a group of kids, let’s avoid identifying factors. Keep it general, and it keeps you from falling down the rabbit hole. Which brings me to my next point.
3. Know the purpose of the meeting
I once observed a very skilled and knowledgeable school improvement consultant named Ginny Vandelicht (@GinnyVandelicht) ask a group of teachers in our building “What’s the charge of this group?” It paused the entire conversation as the team stopped to consider their own purpose.
Is this meeting to identify a problem? Or develop potential solutions? Did they exist to advise another group or person (such as a principal) or were they charged with implementing the solution themselves?
Knowing the purpose of the meeting helps to keep things focused, like a mission statement does for an entire school or company. Each team should have a mission statement, or at least a mission. If the purpose of your meeting is to discuss instructional strategies or develop assessments, then specific student needs probably should be saved for another day.
If this is a weekly data team meeting of grade level or department level teachers trying to support each other and their students then eliminating names to force discussions about behaviors, not people, and staying solution oriented may be all you need. However, what if your “charge” is primarily academic, to provide “Tier I” instruction, determine its effectiveness, and develop solutions for struggling learners (or possibly identify students in need of referral to a different team) ? Then you’ll probably want to start by …
4. Make a list of students first
When you enter the period of your meeting where you’ll be discussing the needs of specific students, either come prepared with a list the group decided on in advance of the meeting, or begin the meeting by making a list. Then, set a predetermined amount of time to discuss “student solutions”. Have someone write the list of names on a board and make sure someone is taking notes.
Listing the students in advance helps us prioritize our time with the discussions that might take the longest, and perhaps gain a quick overview of what the potential problems are. Looking at a list of students to discuss, in relation to the amount of time we’ve alloted to discuss them, also helps keep things moving along and prevents us from admiring the problem.
5. Don’t “admire the problem”.
This is good advice for any collaborative group, but can be especially powerful for teachers talking about struggling learners, when the issues seem so many. It’s another pearl I gleaned from my friend Ginny (@GinnyVandelicht). It sounds a little something like this.
“Ok, so next on our list is Anthony Troublebutt.”
*The whole room audibly sighs, groans or is otherwise exasperated*
“So, where do we start?”
“He’s having a rough time right now with his parents custody issues.”
“Yeah, have you seen where mom is living now?”
“I’m not even sure the electricity is working….”
“I’ve got a friend, who has a sister who works at the high school where his older brother goes and she said that she heard that her boyfriend was arrested for drugs last week.”
“Oh my gosh, with all this going on is it any wonder his grades are down?”
And now we’re “admiring” the problem. Yes, some kids have a lot going on. Yes, these things make learning difficult. So….what are we going to do to help them? Focus on solutions. Not problems.
6. Ask the question “Why?”
Finally, as we talk about the problem we’re facing with any specific student, focus on the why. Whether the problem is behavioral, or academic, keep asking the question “Why?” until you get to something you can control, or at least influence. Then, when you think you have an idea that might help….
7. Make a plan for following through.
What are we going to do differently to help this child be successful? What do we need to to, to make that happen? Who’s going to do it? Who’s going to make sure it happens? How will we know when it was successful? This doesn’t need to be a multi-page, expansive document. Keep the “plan on a page” idea in mind and go from there. But whatever you do, DO SOMETHING. Our most struggling learners need us to be productive in these meetings (or pieces of meetings). Try something different, even a bad idea is better than no-idea.
Need even advice to get your meeting running smoothly? Check out our 5 steps to improving collaboration
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