QLC 3 (Theme – Observations versus Evaluations)

In the third QLC (from which Sarah was absent due to a scheduling conflict) the teachers began to share their experiences using NVC in a more detailed way. Having outlined the differences between observations and evaluations during the previous meeting, the

teachers had gone away with several ideas about how to apply this in a practical setting. The following stories reflect their individual experiences since the last meeting.

Jake started the conversation by sharing with the group how it was much easier for him to separate observations from evaluations retrospectively, as opposed to in the moment. He gave an example of an interaction he had had with a student last week, saying:

I had this situation last week with a student who has a really relaxed attitude towards his learning and I find that quite difficult to work with because he is a senior student and I have expectations for him … I went to talk to him in class, but he wasn’t there and then five minutes later I saw him with his girlfriend … he had just left the class to go find her and he was eating his lunch and it was like 11:30am in my class. So I went up to him and said I wasn’t happy with the way he was engaging in the class … it wasn’t very NVC, I was quite in my emotions … What was amazing though was that he said … I don’t really want an assessment from this class, I’ve never wanted that, all I want is to do cool projects … That conversation was really useful for me as it brought me into myself. I’d assumed that he wanted credits and to do the assessments.

During this story Michael responded by summarising what Jake had said in order to clarify what had happened:

So when you said that he is not engaging in the work it turned out that he is just not interested in the assessments. So by sticking to the observation, without the

assumptions, we are never wrong … and by just sticking to the observation it gives him [the student] an open door to respond in exactly the way he did.

This comment prompted Jake to further elaborate on why he reacted the way he did:

The other thing is the expectation on us in our role as teachers and what the school expects from us and for me it’s huge … I feel like I’m carrying this all by myself and I feel a big pressure to get results and promote this [teaching] area … and that came into that [conversation with the student] a bit for me … it’s quite interesting to be

confronted with that.

Jake’s experience highlights how external pressures influenced his interpretation of challenging behaviours and affected the way he communicated with this student. In this instance, as the student was aware of what he wanted from Jake’s class, his directness and honesty had helped Jake to understand and empathise with his reasons for not engaging in the way that Jake had expected of him. This dialogue helped remind Jake to connect to his own feelings and to re-evaluate his own expectations on what his students need.

87

Building on Jake’s comment, Michael also noted how it was difficult to apply NVC in the moment, providing two examples of this from his practice. In his first example, he

commented:

I always think about it [NVC] too late … For example, I gave exams back today in my junior class … I generally try not to judge, I just give the results back … the results were generally good overall … [However,] one student told me he was disappointed because he didn’t do well … and I said yeah, it’s true, you didn’t do very well. In retrospect, I could have responded differently.

While in his second example, he said:

I had some university students come into class today to give a presentation and the students were not very focused and being a bit noisy. I was disappointed that they weren’t showing proper respect to our guests and told them to please make an effort tomorrow to show more respect … I don’t think it was judgemental, but I did see a few of them looking down disappointed at their tables, and that’s not really what I want, I want to emphasise a positive connection with the students … It’s too bad, as I had half an hour to think about what I was going to say and it never came into my mind to try and use NVC.

However, despite these instances where Michael did not think about using NVC in the moment, he did provide one example of talking to a student who was consistently becoming absent from class. In this conversation, Michael said:

I tried to stick to observations … I showed him the schedule with all the afternoons he misses … and we had a good conversation … and I thought about it only because we are having these conversations here … so at least I have one example where I know I’ve done it, so I can try to reproduce it with other students.

While both Jake and Michael had focused on observations within the classroom, Peter shared an example of using NVC (feelings and needs) to address a student who he perceived to be unmotivated and that frequently made loud comments during class. In confronting the student on this behaviour, Peter said:

Hey… I need to feel like everyone has the opportunity to do their best and my job is to manage that. I feel like you’re not really taking that on board … I didn’t go into his needs right then because that’s actually quite difficult to figure out … and then I just said, hey you’ve got a choice, either come in and self-manage or I will have to ask you to leave … He [the student] responded, yeah, fair enough, and shifted where he was sitting and quietened down.

In this example, while Peter’s expression of his feelings were mixed in with his thoughts (i.e., I feel like you’re not really taking that on board), he was able to convey his underlying need of being able to contribute to student learning (i.e., I need to feel like everyone has the opportunity to do their best). After sharing this example, Peter went on to say:

88

I’ve been using it [NVC] all the time and what I’m finding is that when I’m not doing it [NVC] perfectly every time I can hear when I get it wrong and I can see the reactions the students have … and then I just back-pedal and say, hey, what I meant to say was…

From this remark the conversation then shifted towards how the teachers thought it was often difficult to communicate with students who displayed challenging behaviours in the moment.

As Peter stated, “students expect to be told off as the first strategy”, while Michael

commented, “that just telling them off is a quick fix that has bad consequences in the long term, but in the short term it works”.

The overall conversation during this meeting reflected a general desire by the teachers in the QLC to move towards a form of communication that acknowledged the underlying reasons behind challenging student behaviours and emphasised forming more cohesive relationships with their students. At the end of the meeting, I introduced step four (request versus

demands) and gave the teachers information on this aspect of NVC, which we then briefly discussed before concluding the meeting.

Shaping the third QLC meeting

During this meeting I noticed that the input from the teachers increased as I began to gradually shift from being a participant to more of an observer. As all the teachers who were present had trialled NVC in their classrooms, they each had stories to share and were eager to collaborate together to see if, and how, NVC could be incorporated into their respective practices. An example of this is illustrated when Michael suggested role-playing a scenario for Peter who had expressed difficulty in motivating his students to learn in one of his classes and wanted to practice creating a conversation with that student. During this role play, Peter focused on expressing his own feelings and needs to the student, however, he then realised it was better to focus on the student’s feelings and needs through empathy. In speaking to Michael, who portrayed one of his students, Peter said:

I noticed that you haven’t started your work yet … and I feel that if you’re here you should be using your time constructively. I just want to see you using your time well;

otherwise I question whether you should be here.

Michael pointed out to Peter that he felt judged (as the student) and suggested that Peter empathise with the student’s needs first, rather than go straight into expressing his own needs.

From this conversation, Peter came up with a sentence stem to focus on the student’s needs as opposed to his own, “what do you feel you need out of this hour to help you learn?”

89

In this example, while Peter was able to point out an observation (I noticed you haven’t started your work yet), he then expressed an evaluation of what he thought the student should be doing (I feel you should be using your time constructively), rather than how he felt about it. Through a discussion with Michael, he decided that focussing on the student’s needs in that instance would be of more value in creating a connection and facilitating student

learning. This type of collaboration between the teachers manifested several times throughout the meeting, with all the teachers encouraging each other to explore their stories critically and come up with new ideas. Additionally, the teachers reflected on how the language they used could either facilitate or hinder student-teacher relationships. I believe that these processes helped to create a supportive and positive environment within the group and allowed space for the teachers to take risks, such as role-playing on the spot, in order to develop new strategies.

At the end of the meeting, I asked the teachers if there were some situations that they would like to trial NVC in before the next meeting. Peter mentioned that he wanted to practice using requests rather than demands, while Jake responded that he would like to use requests with several of his students and try to acknowledge the positive side of what they are doing more.

Michael stated that he would like to see what scenarios came up during the week and apply NVC spontaneously.

Summary and personal reflections

The major theme involved in this QLC centred on discussing the differences between observations and evaluations, as well as the difficulty of applying theory into practice. My overall impression at the time was that this QLC meeting flowed really well in comparison to the previous two meetings. This was borne out in the transcripts as shown above. As it became more experiential from the teachers’ perspectives I was able to step back, which allowed the teachers to engage in more in-depth discussions. However, I was still aware that I could not take a ‘back-seat’ completely until the teachers had a firm grasp of the basic

fundamentals of NVC, so my participation in several of the conversations continued.