Many of our students come to school experiencing many challenges—and bring their feelings about them to our classes.
Today’s post is the first in a series in which teachers share stories about how they supported one of their students to turn around some of those challenges.
I’ve previously written about a number of experiences where I’ve had some limited successes.
‘Yes, It Can Be Done’
David Upegui is a Latino immigrant who found his way out of poverty through science. He currently serves as a science teacher at his alma mater, Central Falls High School, in Rhode Island, and as an adjunct professor of education at Brown University. He co-authored the book: Integrating Racial Justice Into Your High-School Biology Classroom: Using Evolution to Understand Diversity (2023).
I was warned about “Bella.” Even before the class first met, another teacher, clutching my roster, hissed, “Just one good thing: Bella gets suspended a lot. You won’t see much of her.” Ignoring the prejudice, I took back the roster. This was a new year, and Bella, a senior, deserved a fresh start. My class, I knew, would spark her curiosity.
Bella was a senior in my anatomy class, and from the very beginning, I treated her like every other student—fully believing and acting in ways that valued her immense capability and eagerness to learn.
One day the principal set up a student-shadowing activity where some administrators followed a selected student all day as they participated in all schooling endeavors. He decided to shadow Bella and, therefore, he visited my classroom during the last period of the day (our anatomy class).
When she came into the classroom, she sat in the front row where she always sat so that she could clearly see the board and fully engage with the material. Once our class started, she took out her notebook and began by answering the opening question I had posed for everyone. She raised her hand and provided her answer, which was not fully correct. With gentle guidance, she arrived at the fully correct answer, a smile blooming on her face.
The rest of the lesson unfolded like a well-rehearsed dance. Bella and her partners meticulously grouped bones (long, short, irregular, and flat), whispering names, memorizing ridges and grooves. She scribbled notes, absorbing every detail. By the end, a short reflection wrapped it all up. With a triumphant high-five, she left, feeling accomplished.
The principal stayed behind to speak with me. “Before today,” he confessed, “I wondered why Bella passed only your class. Now, I wonder how we can get other teachers to treat her like you do. She was ... a scholar.”
Bella did struggle at times, and at least on one occasion, she told me that she waited to confront another student until after my class so she wouldn’t miss anatomy. There were days when she was suspended, including the day when we were doing rat dissections. That day, she came after school and spent an hour with two volunteer students and me, conducting the dissection—because she “wasn’t going to miss it for the world.”
Every day, our class showed Bella that she mattered and that she was capable. I kept her in mind when I lesson planned and ensured that scaffolding was provided for her success.
Our anatomy class, in some ways, became Bella’s mirror, reflecting her worth and capability. She turned things around, graduating with her class, and earning the coveted “Resiliency Award.” As she shared her triumph, we captured the moment in a photograph—a constant reminder that every student carries a unique story, a yearning to be valued and empowered. Bella, and Cesar Chavez’s words, “Si Se Puede!,” strongly remind me: Yes, it can be done.
‘Math Trauma’
Vanessa Vakharia is called by many “The Lady Gaga of math education.” She is the founder and director of The Math Guru, a math and science tutoring studio in Toronto. She is also the host of the Math Therapy podcast and the author of the soon-to-be-released book Math Therapy. She failed grade 11 math twice and considers that the best thing that ever happened to her:
One of my favorite breakthrough moments with a student actually happened quite recently. It was exam season, and as we well know, for those students who are already anxious around math, high-stakes testing tends to further trigger familiar responses to math trauma such as flight, fight, freeze, or fawn. For this particular student, let’s call her Julia, her go-to in math class for as long as she could remember had always been freeze.
Julia had come in for a math-therapy session with me two days before her math exam. I love these sessions because they allow us to go deep into the root causes of math trauma and really tackle the emotional component of learning, and as my favorite brain-based learning expert Liesl McConchie says: A student’s emotional relationship with math is foundational to their cognitive relationship with math.
I started by asking Julia how she was feeling about her math exam, and she immediately said one powerful word: “scared.” Then I asked an equally powerful question: “Why?”
I find that when students are anxious about math, it seems totally obvious that they should be scared every time they encounter math, but actually asking them why changes the dynamic because it allows them to really interrogate the anxious feelings that have become totally normal for them. I used a cognitive behavioral therapy strategy with her that I call “Then What?,” and our conversation went something like this:
J: Scared
V: Why?
J: Because I’m going to freak out and not be able to answer anything.
V: Then what?
J: I’ll fail!
V: Then what?
J: Well … I’ll have to take the course again in summer school!
V: Then what?
J: Well, nothing, I guess, it’ll just be annoying
V: Then what?
J: I don’t know, I guess I’ll eventually pass and not have to take math again?
That’s it. It seems simple and kind of anti-climactic, but we’ve gone from fear and panic to “kind of annoying,” which really de-escalates the whole situation and allows Julia to come back into her body and calm her nervous system, a technique that would be extremely useful for her to revisit during the exam in case she went back into catastrophizing!
Finally, we reframed the exam so that instead of a “high-stakes test I might fail,” it turned into a “great opportunity to practice the new skills I’ve learned this year.” My favorite way to do this is to follow up the “Then what?” activity by saying something like “Now that we know that the worst case scenario isn’t so bad, let’s pick something we can focus on that has nothing to do with your fear and instead allows you to celebrate and even ENJOY writing the exam!”
Julia agreed that she was actually proud of how hard she had been studying. We decided to focus on writing the exam with pride instead of fear and letting go of attachment to the outcome so that she could stay in the moment instead of in the anxious attachment of the worst case scenario.
Three days later, I received a message from Julia that said:
Hey! I finished my exam. I have no idea how I did but I felt really proud of myself for using the “Then what?” strategy twice when I started to panic and, whatever my mark ends up being, I’m really proud of how far I’ve come!
This is everything for me. Helping Julia truly see and value herself as a learner separate from the temporary external validation that good grades can bring is how we heal broken relationships with math!
Teaching Teachers to ‘Engage’
Dominique Smith is the director of student services at Health Sciences High & Middle College in San Diego:
Meet Renee. The labels this student had—lazy, runner, rude. Yes, Renee left class a lot and said things that made teachers angry. Renee was generally defiant but not to the point that warranted more formal interventions such as suspension. In my home state, we no longer suspend students for willful defiance, despite some recommendations on TikTok that we should be hard on these students and teach them a lesson.
Yes, Renee needs to learn a lesson, but suspension has not been a great teacher. In fact, Renee had been suspended 21 times in 8th grade and 17 times in 7th grade before coming to our high school. Renee’s suspension record reached back years.
When Renee engaged in disrespectful behaviors and actions, teachers sent a message to the restorative-practices team, and someone would come to meet with Renee to provide feedback and coaching about how to be in a classroom. But teachers were rightfully frustrated. The amount of time Renee was out of class was significant, not just for these behavior conversations but for using the restroom, needing water, and just generally dawdling outside the classroom. Obviously, teachers were not feeling efficacious when it came to Renee. So, we changed our practice.
Rather than a member of the restorative-practices team talking with Renee in the hallway, that staff member took over the class for a few minutes so that the teacher could have the conversation in the hallway. We taught teachers how to engage in impromptu conversations and use affective statements. They were able to express their feelings and note the impact that Renee’s actions had on them.
There was an almost immediate change in teachers’ efficacy. They felt heard. They noted that they got their say and could let the problem go. And they said that they appreciated some of the comments Renee made about why specific behaviors were happening, such as feeling academically underprepared.
Change in Renee’s actions and behavior came more slowly, but they did happen. Renee developed a strong, growth-producing relationship with one teacher that then spread to others. Renee learned that actions have consequences and people get hurt. And Renee learned that it was easier to act in pro-social ways, such as asking for help as needed, rather that acting out in ways that distracted the class.
Renee graduated several years ago, and our practice of allowing teachers to share the impact of these types of behaviors has continued. We no longer steal the conflict away from teachers but rather support them to explain the impact that it has had on them and their classroom.
Thanks to David, Vanessa, and Dominique for contributing their thoughts!
Today’s post answered this question:
What is a story about how you turned things around with a student or many students in a single class who faced a number of challenges and exhibited those challenges in the classroom (no real names, of course)?
Consider contributing a question to be answered in a future post. You can send one to me at lferlazzo@epe.org. When you send it in, let me know if I can use your real name if it’s selected or if you’d prefer remaining anonymous and have a pseudonym in mind.
You can also contact me on Twitter at @Larryferlazzo.
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