It Doesn't Matter How Much You Care for Me

Effective teachers establish close and personal relationships with their students BUT they don't need their students to love them. In other words, they don't use their students to fill their own emotional needs. This will help a teacher avoid taking personally what students do or don't do and thus be in a better position to focus on the needs of the students.

A favorite quote of mine is, "It doesn't matter how much you care for me, but rather that I love you enough." It's important to remember that love can be an action even when it isn't a feeling. A teacher may not feel love for all his students but he can still demonstrate respect and care for all students. A teacher does this when he feels it is his responsibility to teach all students as much as possible regardless of how he feels about them.

Authentic Relationships with Students

When students are asked about a teacher who has made a difference they mention that this teacher was not just an instructor of academic skills but also someone who they knew cared about them. By providing protective factors for students teachers can develop these important authentic relationships with students.

The Search Institute has has identified 40 developmental assets--divided into external and internal-- that help students grow up to be healthy, caring, and responsible. Teachers can address many of them:

• External asset--support--caring school climate: Child experiences warm, welcoming relationships with teachers, caregivers, and peers at school.
• External asset--empowerment--service to others: Child has opportunities to serve in the community with adult support and approval.
• External asset--boundaries and expectations--school boundaries: Schools have clear, consistent rules and consequences and uses a positive approach to discipline.
• External asset--boundaries and expectations--adult role models: Parent(s) and other adults model positive, responsible behavior and encourage the child to follow these examples.
• External asset--boundaries and expectations--high expectations: Parent(s), teachers, and other influential adults encourage the child to do her or his best in all tasks and celebrate their successes.
• External asset--constructive use of time--child programs: Child participates weekly in at least one sport, club, or organization within the school or community.
• Internal asset--commitment to learning--learning engagement: Child is enthused about learning and going to school.
• Internal asset--commitment to learning--bonding to school: Child is encouraged to have and feels a sense of belonging at school.
• Internal asset--social competencies--cultural competence: Child continues to learn about her or his own culture identity and is encouraged to interact positively with children of different racial, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds.
• Internal asset--positive identity--self-esteem: Child likes herself or himself and feels valued by others.

For more information on the 40 assets, the 40 assets by age levels, a Spanish translation of the assets, and much more valuable information visit the website http://www.search-institute.org/

Teachers Need to be Warm Demanders

Relationships form the foundation of every classroom. In fact, caring relationships are at the very heart of the matter for student achievement.

Even though almost all teachers enter the teaching profession because they care about children, a large number of students, especially low-achieving students, feel "no one cares." What can teachers do to show they care?

Being a "warm demander" as described by Judith Kleinfield and later by James Vasquez characterizes the kind of caring that is effective, especially for ethnically diverse students. Warm demanders are committed, respectful, dedicated, and competent educators who are not afraid, resentful, or hostile towards their students. They provide a tough-minded, no-nonsense, structured, and disciplined classroom that creates a supportive psychological environment that scaffolds student engagement and achievement and exhibits a strong belief in their students' strengths and capabilities. These warm demanders display a "purpose of insistence" which means that they insist that the students meet established academic and behavioral standards. Because they have the attitude that not only can all their students learn but that they must learn they never give up on a child.

By establishing this type of caring relationship with their students warm demanders convince their students that they believe in them and that they have their best interests at heart.