Teachers' positive attitudes

In addition to transmitting information, the teacher must be benevolent and open up channels of communication with his or her learners. To do this, what attitudes should be adopted?

Empowerment through the teacher

With the Internet, MOOCs and Youtube, learning knowledge and skills has become accessible to all. Instead of democratizing the process, this situation seems to have increased the social divide via the digital divide. Indeed, it appears that it is learners from backgrounds with higher socio-cultural capital who take advantage of this access to knowledge to develop their skills.

Teaching in a classroom or auditorium is and remains an essential means of giving every student equal opportunities for social emancipation.

Is teaching an art or a task?

Many professions are being called into question by automation and robotization. The digitization of schools is improving the quality of learning, and enabling teachers to concentrate on essential tasks by simplifying the administrative processes surrounding their function.

But teaching is an art and a matter of sensitivity, and this cannot be automated. The teacher has to figure out how to manage the class group, how to create channels of communication with each of his learners so that learning can just begin. Without a human link, without feelings, without relationships, it's unlikely that a learner will want to get involved in a learning activity.

Creating this bond is undoubtedly an art.

Best practices for creating a bond with your learners

Times have changed, mentalities have changed and technologies have brought their share of new developments and disruption to the role of teaching. Let's take a look at the factors that remain essential and what the paradigm shift implies.

1-. The teacher's respect for learners

Whether in class councils, deliberations or examination boards, teachers sometimes make disparaging remarks about learners. The effect of feeling scorned can be catastrophic.

Unfortunate words may also be spoken directly to the pupil or learner. The role of teacher no longer commands respect in its own right. It's now a matter of one-to-one relationships.

Every teacher must respect the student as a person, whatever his or her attitude or results. Without this prior consideration, any relationship is likely to be complicated, as the absence of respect will engender reciprocity with potentially very negative consequences.

2-. High expectations

The teacher's role is not to validate skills that the student has learned in class or elsewhere. The teacher's primary role is to transmit knowledge and enable or encourage the acquisition of skills.

Rosenthal, with his theory of the Pygmalion effect, demonstrated that learners are influenced by the teacher's expectations of his students. It is therefore essential to be optimistic about their performance.

3-. Communication channels and availability

Opinions differ as to the teacher's availability, given the existence of messaging, e-mail and other immediate means of communication. It's important to be able to use these means wisely and, above all, to set guidelines for their use.

4-. Other practices

Research carried out in the UK has also highlighted these practices:

• Effective pedagogies take students' opinions seriously.
• Effective pedagogies depend on behavior (what teachers do), knowledge and understanding (what teachers know) and beliefs (why teachers do what they do).
• Effective pedagogy involves clear thinking about long-term learning outcomes as well as short-term goals.
• Effective pedagogy builds on students' prior learning and experience.
• Effective pedagogy involves scaffolding student learning.
• Effective pedagogy uses a range of techniques, including structured group and classroom work, guided learning and individual activity.
• Effective pedagogies emphasize the development of higher-order thinking and metacognition, and make good use of dialogue and questioning to achieve this.
• Effective pedagogies integrate assessment with learning.
• Effective pedagogies are inclusive and take into account the diversity of learners' needs, as well as issues of equity between students.

The teacher also depends on the audience

Just as in a performance, the teacher depends on his or her audience. It's important to bear in mind that while he or she can do everything necessary to promote learning and success, this is not necessarily a sufficient condition.

Some class groups may use the means at their disposal to achieve success with as little effort as possible. In some levels of teaching, learners are represented in various bodies. If the usefulness is real, the systems can go astray.

The mentality of the students, their deviated means of success, their social capital and the importance they attach to the school or academic institution are external factors over which the teacher has little control.

Teaching is great when the elements align so that learners achieve their objectives. Endogenous factors can be optimized, but there remains the question of exogenous factors that can lead to frustration.

Illustration: (nl) Teachers and sheep- Rijksmuseum
https://www.europeana.eu/portal/record/90402/RP_P_2015_26_909.html

Sources

https://www.psychologie-sociale.com/index.php/fr/theories/categorisation/3-l-effet-pygmalion-a-l-ecole

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