Forward from LeAnn Stewart on today's blogger: I have the pleasure of working with a dynamic, forward-thinking educator, Ms. Charmain Carter. She has worked for nearly a decade with students who have experienced less than ideal life situations and educational opportunities. Charmain is dedicated to building strong student engagement and today, shares three straightforward ideas on how to create those student-teacher/mentor relationships that support student success.

William Butler Yeats once wrote, “Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.”

With the current landscape of education reform focusing on standardized testing, Common Core State Standards and teacher evaluation rubrics, how do we re-focus on igniting the fire in our student learners to ensure we are developing a generation of life-long learners? It’s quite simple to identify and state, but more complex to actually implement. Belief, commitment and consistency will ensure student course completion, graduation and the development of life-long learners.

Remember when the grandest day of the school week was Friday’s “Show and Tell”? Everyone brought something or someone they believed to be important and had an opportunity to explain why this person or item was the most valuable thing in their life. We “oohed and awed” in amazement, and we too were convinced of the importance of that person and/or item. This is the same concept teachers should employ when igniting the fire in student learners. We believe and understand our students are valuable and important…. we just want them to know we believe this. Three key factors that teachers should “Show and Tell” students to ensure their educational fire is ignited and remains burning:

• “Do your best to be YOUR best” - Help students to understand they are being measured against their own talent and efforts and not against their classmates. We understand that each student enters at a different level of academic-readiness and we must consistently encourage them for their gains. Progress monitoring and sharing that progress with students is vital to motivation and continued dedication toward our “Goal is Graduation”. Students want and need to know that we believe in them, through our words and our actions. When we build relationships with students, we begin to know when they are giving their best effort and when they are not. Then, we can have those honest and uplifting conversations with students to let them know that we know they are not giving their best effort, but we believe in them. By using progress monitoring data and pro-social interactions, we can guide students back on track to “being” their best.
• “Don’t let my floor be your ceiling” - Explain to students that your minimum requirements for them should not be their maximum expectations for themselves. For example, if your Academy has a minimum amount of assignments a student must complete each day, make sure students understand that once they reach the minimum number, they should continue moving forward. We want to build a culture where students understand that if what is being asked of them is less than their actual intellectual or academic capacity, they should always work up to their capacity. We want to encourage students to constantly challenge themselves. When students challenge themselves they will discover talents and determination they may not have known they possessed, therefore “igniting” their fire as learners.
• “You are more than a test score” - Encourage students to embrace assessments. Give them examples of how assessments are a natural part of life and, often, great things come out of being assessed. For example, getting a drivers license, being selected for a job, earning an award, scholarship or fellowship, etc.. All require various types of assessments. Whether the assessments are for personal, educational or professional reasons, life is filled with them. So, let’s help students see assessments as an opportunity to “show and tell”, opposed to seeing them as an unnecessary obligation. Obligations are often viewed as negative, laborious and unrelated to future success, whereas, opportunities are generally viewed as something positive that will lead to greater rewards and gains.

--posted by Charmain L. Carter, AdvancePath Academics Educational Consultant for Louisiana