Coaching students to identify who they are as humans holistically then designing alliances with them.

Guiding students to ownership and responsibility of their learning process is key to maximizing student engagement.

Every Friday morning for five months, I have been working together with a group of educators from a New Hampshire school district. A part of the work has been helping the teachers create better student engagement tools.

For 5 years, I gained a number of skills working online with adult learners coming from different blue collared jobs from various industries. I took that experience of coaching adult learners and created a coaching model to support all types of learners. Now moving to supporting K-12 educators, I am utilizing a lot of those same skill sets. As we focus on student engagement in particular in the “digital era”, educators have to respond with a more coaching approach, coming alongside the students to identify who they are as a human holistically, in order to take those attributes and then design alliances with them.

How can educators put judgments aside based on how they view the student to differentiate, based on what the student is actually doing? If a student is displaying negative attributes that sometimes prevents a teacher from being able to view that student holistically as a human.

Here are a few questions you can ask to take to and create a relevant connection with students:

Who is the student?
What inspires their identity?
What do they care about?
What impact do they want to make?
What are they passionate about?

A better understanding of students holistically creates opportunities for relevant connections, increasing engagement and buy-in. Neutralizing oneself as an educator is crucial, finding relevant connections allows students to take ownership in how they engage in class. Guiding students towards ownership and responsibility of their learning process maximizes engagement, but building trust and vulnerability by meeting students holistically is essential. The group of educators we work with perseveres, trying different methods and transforming student engagement.

"It's really important to neutralize yourself as an educator when engaging with your students, even if there's a certain negative vibe that they're presenting."