Fall 2024      Volume 52, Number 4

Professional Development: Connecting with Our Students
By Sophie Degener, Adelfio Garcia, and Ivy Sitkoski

Document: Column  

Introductory Paragraph:  For the past several years, as I have sat down to write the introduction to our fall “Professional Development” column, I have been overwhelmed thinking about the burden that has been placed on teachers. Teaching has never been an easy career, but the last few years have made many teachers reconsider their career paths or even leave the profession altogether. Covid-19, book censorship, attacks on public schools, conflicting notions of best practice in literacy instruction—all of these and more have pushed teachers to their limits. But for this column, I don’t want to focus on those things. Instead, I want to focus on one critical aspect of teaching that never fails to get me through the most challenging times: the relationships that I build with my students. If you’re like me, when you look back on your teaching career, the moments that bring you pride and joy are those moments when you made a connection. Perhaps a read-aloud discussion that engaged the whole class around a deep and weighty topic. Or a one-on-one conference when a lightbulb of understanding went on for a student who’d been struggling. Or maybe the time a student who avoided talking with you suddenly flashed you a smile and opened up about their weekend. It is moments like these, big and small, that make it all worthwhile. The books that we have reviewed for this column all offer us insights for connecting with our students. The first review looks at the second edition of Peter Johnston’s Choice Words, which provides an essential lens for considering how we interact with students in a way that lifts them up rather than shutting them down. The second and third reviews both focus on teaching writing—showing us that all students are writers and have stories to tell when we encourage them to write about what they know and what matters to them. We encourage you to read one or more of these books and reflect on the things you can do this year to build stronger, more meaningful relationships with your students. It is these relationships, after all, that will help us all get through the tough times ahead.

DOI:  https://doi.org/10.33600/IRCJ.52.4.2024.42

Page Numbers:   42-45