Learning to teach better: Tone down the criticism
Condescending attitude towards students will not make them improve their performance.
Our teacher started the geography lesson with a puzzle. “What does GDP stand for?” she questioned, prompting a few overzealous students to raise their hands.
Yet, ignoring these over-enthusiastic students, my teacher, for motives known best to her, picked on Zainab, who was sitting with her head bent over her book, to answer the question. It was clear from Zainab’s blank face that she didn’t have the faintest idea what GDP meant. She simply said that she didn’t have a clue. On hearing this, the teacher, apparently in an attempt to “motivate” the girl to study harder, pressed further and expressed her disapproval at the girl’s lack of knowledge in a grave manner. “A Grade-Seven student must know this,” she said condescendingly.
Now that I recall this episode, it seems that the teacher over-reacted at Zainab’s ignorance, as if she had failed to accurately tell her own date of birth. Since this is one piece of information everyone remembers, regardless of their age, only a failure to know this information deserves such a harsh response. But to criticise a student, who fails to answer a random question, is not always the best teaching approach — or so my experience, both as a student and as a teacher, suggests. More importantly, psychological findings also support this view.
True, most teachers adopt a critical approach in the classroom only to encourage students to study harder. Nevertheless, most students would admit such a method, discourages them from subsequently participating in the classroom. Thus in the following geography class, the students who didn’t know what GDP stands for, filled the seats in the back rows, for fear of being singled out for not answering a question they had no idea about. These back benchers felt that if GDP was something they should have surely known about, and yet did not then they were essentially dumb, and it was best to save face by hiding at the back.
Thus the so-called weak students, afraid of being insulted in front of their friends by the critical teacher, do their best to stay as far from the teacher’s sight as possible. Of course, the teacher would justify his stance by saying that for he never meant to appear condescending towards the student. Yet if students consider it an insult, then no matter how well-meant the the teacher’s disapproval, it still remains an insult.
Sadly enough, it is not just about occupying back row seats to avoid interacting in the class, many students would agree that criticism from a teacher discourages “weaker” students and they avoid attending class altogether.
In my opinion, just as it is typically believe about a capitalist society — the poor get poorer and the rich get richer — criticism in the classroom causes academically weak students to further deteriorate in their studies, whereas the bright ones have an incentive to get brighter. Usually, only a minority of students naturally adopt a positive attitude towards criticism and consider it a challenge to improve their knowledge. In the case of a student who may already be struggling in class, even a minor blow to his self-esteem can often hurt his confidence and thus weaken his academic progress.
The result of Coopersmith’s investigation regarding the development of self-esteem in 1968, showed that boys with high self-esteem were confident about participating in class and not unduly worried about receiving criticism, whereas those with low self-esteem were oversensitive about criticism.
The devastating effects of constant criticism on students cannot be overemphasised, especially on those who lack confidence.
Therefore, a conscientious teacher who pressurises children to rise up to a certain standard through censure, often tends to harm students’ confidence and capabilities than a teacher who just lets the children, to use the psychologist’s phrase, find ‘their own level’. Vulnerable students are particularly susceptible to long-term harm from even the most well-meaning criticism. If teachers adopt an uncritical approach in teaching children, and rather comment on a child’s performance by using encouraging words, the supposedly “weak” students will be encouraged to participate in class.
Published in The Express Tribune, September 17th, 2011.