In this episode, Mike Desparrois and Teresa Vineyard, welcome in fellow educator Dr. Emilie Johnson.
Dr. Johnson is a Professor of Education at Lindenwood University in Missouri. She has 13 years of experience in public school teaching, administration, and teacher training.
Dr. Johnson was awarded the St. Charles County 40 Under 40 Award, St. Charles County Ring of Excellence in Teaching Award, and The Missouri Governor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching.
In the Fall of 2017, Dr. Johnson became a School Consultant and Coach for CharacterPlus of St. Louis.
Dr. Johnson is most proud of her title of “mom” to two incredible young women ages 21 and 18. She is also a dog mom to Piper, Prada, and Murphy who keep her on her toes when they are not warming her feet.
Listen close to this robust and powerful conversation as the trio discusses character education, social and emotional learning, and the critical importance of the adult culture at a school.
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Speaker 1:
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Adam Salgat:
Hello and welcome to the Our Community Listens Podcast. My name is Adam Salgat. And on this episode, Mike Desparrois and Teresa Vineyard of Our Community Listens welcome then fellow educator, Dr. Emily Johnson. Dr. Johnson is a professor of education at Lindenwood University in Missouri. She also has 13 years of experience in public school teaching administration and teacher training. Dr. Johnson was awarded to St. Charles County 40 Under 40 Award, St. Charles County Ring of Excellence in Teaching Award and the Missouri Governor’s Award for Excellence in Teaching. In fall of 2017, Dr. Johnson became a school consultant and coach for CharacterPlus of St. Louis. She is most proud of her title mom to two incredible young women ages 21 and 18. She is also a dog mom to Piper, Prada, and Murphy who keep her on her toes when they are not warming her feet. Listen close to this robust and powerful conversation as the trio discusses, character education, social and emotional learning, and the critical importance of adult culture at a school.
Mike Desparrois:
Thanks, Adam. I’m really excited about the show today. We have Dr. Emily Johnson and of course, one of our residential education experts with me here at OCL, Theresa Vineyard. Theresa and Emily, how are you both doing today?
Theresa Vineyard:
Thank you, Mike. I’m doing really well. I’m glad to be here.
Mike Desparrois:
Great, Theresa. Emily.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
I’m glad to be here too. I spend a lot of time talking to people over technology. So this is great. It feels very familiar.
Mike Desparrois:
Very cool. We’re so excited that you’re able to join us today. So we appreciate you taking the time and I’m just going to kind of jump right into some questions that we have for you today. Kind of understanding and knowing your background. Can you tell us for the whole world to hear about your education background?
Dr. Emily Johnson:
I started my education background teaching fourth grade at a public school in St. Charles County. And I taught fourth grade for four years.
Mike Desparrois:
Oh, wow.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
Can I mention that Theresa was the special ed teacher.
Mike Desparrois:
You absolutely can.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
And Theresa Vineyard was the special education teacher and she provided services for my children that needed to have remediation or kind of pushing services. And Theresa, what did you do for my kids?
Theresa Vineyard:
Emily, I did several different things for your kids, but I specifically remember couple specific names that are coming to mind right now that I can’t say, but we had four who [inaudible 00:03:15] who we had such fun with. But typically did a whole lot of reading remediation with those four that I’m thinking of right now.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
So after I worked with Theresa, who taught me a lot of skills that I brought with me to my sixth grade position, that’s where I went next. I went to sixth grade at the middle school and I taught sixth graders at risk. They were identified by their fifth grade teacher as having some factor or factors that made it likely that they wouldn’t finish school with their peers. And they used an instrument that’s called the SARI, student at risk inventory so that students were all identified as having risk, but they were all very different for the reasons and the kinds of risks that they had. So some might be just extremely immature and like the whole middle school might’ve felt overwhelming to them. Some had disorganization and a few had undiagnosed special education needs.
So I did that for two years and it was very challenging. I felt often that I couldn’t exactly meet the needs of the kids because they had so many needs. And we struggled a lot with just how to keep them up with the curriculum and then transition them into the regular sixth grade, which was the goal. So I learned [inaudible 00:04:46] about what [inaudible 00:04:48] teacher who doesn’t have the skill. I had the will, but not the skill. And I had been really successful as a fourth grade teacher.
So it was two years where I spent a lot of time being introspective and it prepared me then for my next role, which was as an assistant elementary principal for a K-3 building and I observed and evaluated teachers in the classroom. And so my experience struggling a little bit with the sixth graders at risk helped me be a more compassionate, a more understanding, a more supportive evaluator than I might have been had I not had that experience. It’s two years, you’re trying, and you’re trying and you’re trying and still you’re frustrated and still it’s hard. So I might’ve had that like quick fix thought that I could tell somebody something and they’d be able to really quick fix it. Well, now we know I couldn’t. So when [crosstalk 00:05:54] experience.
Mike Desparrois:
What an amazing kind of journey and reflection of being really successful in fourth grade and moving up to sixth grade and trying to work with a different group, a diverse group. And seeing how they struggled and you kind of working through that and being able to take that reflection to administrators role really, and support them as well. I will tell you, you’re in safe company because I too am a special educator by trade. And something else that’s cool is, Adam’s wife is a special education teacher too. Actually, you’re surrounded by love.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
Well, you guys are [inaudible 00:06:32].
Mike Desparrois:
Theresa and I have this conversation pretty often. When we think about going through school to prepare ourselves for education and different teacher prep programs that are even out there, we talked about special ed and there’s very little support other than just like special ed one-on-one. But there’s also just not a great deal, especially for those of us who’ve been in the game for a while to really understand the people side of it. Really understanding the kids’ side of it and focusing in on those social skills and those important pieces of education. We’re taught a lot content, we’re taught a lot of curriculum, those pedagogy skills but focusing in on the people. So I’m really interested for you to talk a little bit for us and kind of give us a little background and character education in what you focuses and what you do in that area.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
So I think naturally, character education always appealed to me because I was a teacher that loved the kids and it was the relationship with the kids that kept me going. So I would often laugh and say, “I may not have been that great of a teacher, but I was good with the kids.” So when I was an assistant principal, I worked with the kids on behavior. When they came to the office and I had different kinds of training through the years. One that was fundamental was Boys Town Training. And I went to Boys Town, Nebraska, and I learned how to do the intervention for when a student is non-compliant in the classroom and needs to be removed. And so I know how to work through that. And then we did a social skills training with the student. Identifying what are you struggling with? Often it was not following directions, being disrespectful to the teacher, those kinds of things.
And so we kind of had a little mini lesson where I would say, “This is why this is so important. And if you can learn this, your life’s going to be easier. It’s going to be better. You’re going to get along well with the teacher. You’re going to get along better with other kids. And you’re going to have more opportunities to help in the classroom or be a school leader.” And so there would be body and to learn that skill, and then I would teach it. When the teacher tells for example, sometimes students would struggle with that. I’m like, “All you need to do is look at them and say, okay.” That would not have occurred to them that would be a way to react in that situation. So I would teach them that. And then there is a time when you can ask for clarification, but if you learn to just say, “Okay,” the minute they get the feedback, the teacher is going to kind of deescalate and feel heard, and that whole rapport builds.
So it was just fascinating. I loved that training. I felt like it did so much to prepare me for my role as assistant principal. And I wished I’d had it when I was in the classroom. It’s kind of behaviorism where you talk about this as the behavior that happens, what happens before it, what happens after, and you kind of get kids to take ownership for that, that it’s not just that the teacher doesn’t like you, that you’re having a response that makes it hard for the teacher to teach or hard for the other student because sometimes it’s between students not very often, but then they have that skill and you practice it with them. So I would actually like be in my office and make a little scenario and we would practice and I would say, “Oh, you know what? That was good, but you didn’t look at me. So let’s try it again. I want you just to look at me.”
And so that’s like a social skill that we talk about, but it’s important culturally to know that not all students want to make eye contact with an adult, some find it to be disrespectful or even rude. So I would say, “You don’t have to look me straight in the eyes, just look up, just glance.” And so they could learn that there’s a way to adapt it, that they feel comfortable. But if they’re looking down at their feet when they’re talking to the teacher, sometimes the teacher thinks they have shut down. So it’s like just glance up if you can. And then they get really good at that because then I would praise them, “Okay, great. You looked right at me. That was awesome. Oh, I liked seeing that.”
And so it’s about teaching them the skill that then they can take back to the classroom and hopefully other situations, I think it was very effective. It certainly changed my stress level when students would come to the office because we had already established that rapport. If you’re coming to the office and you’re very dysregulated and you’re very upset, I’m going to know you’re dysregulated. So I’m going to say, “Hey, it looks to me like you’re pretty upset. Something kind of happened today? Yeah.” And then I can say, “Well, I think you might need a minute or two just to kind of like calm down and breathe. So I’m going to let you sit here for a minute and I’ll be back. Is that okay? Yeah.”
So you do some questions where you get their permission and then they feel like they’re part of the process. Then when the student looks calm down, you actually praise that, what we would refer to as an approximation of behavior. “Oh, I love that you’re staying seated in that chair. You’re still a little bit loud, so I want you to lower your voice, but thanks for sitting in the chair.” They’re not used to having any affirmation for doing something well. So it’s like, “Thanks for coming to the office. This is where we take care of problems when things get too big.” And they can kind of like calm down. So then by the time I had worked with them two or three times, they could automatically come in, regulate themselves what we used to refer to as the orange chairs because had that orange plastic seat. But regulate themselves before I worked with them.
Theresa Vineyard:
Dr. Johnson, it sounds like the interventions were so full of love. I just need to say that. It’s obvious that you really loved your kids and you love to work with them. And you mentioned that about yourself earlier. So I just wanted to say that. And I’m also really glad you mentioned that cultural differences exist in how you deal with kids. Very important too. You now work for Character ed Plus in the St. Louis region, tell us a little bit about what you do for them.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
So I have two jobs. I’m a professor of education at Lindenwood University and I’m a school consultant and a site evaluator for CharacterPlus. CharacterPlus is a nonprofit organization. We have been in the St Louis area for about 33 years. CharacterPlus was started by Sandy McDonald who worked with a group of school superintendents and a few parents way back when 33 years ago, he felt like people were coming into the worst academically prepared, brilliant but they were lacking some of the character that we would like to see in our workforce. And he would use the example of maybe they didn’t work a full day. They weren’t productive for the full day or maybe they didn’t know how to cooperate and work with others, or maybe they didn’t know how to show respect to the manager.
So that is where it started. Of course, I wasn’t there during those days. But it has been going for 33 years and it’s in St. Louis City and County, St. Charles County and we even have schools outside of Missouri. We have some in Kansas City that use a process of, the community identifies the traits that important to them, the school community. And then those are the values and traits that they teach so that it has a very grassroots approach.
Theresa Vineyard:
Well, isn’t that interesting? Wow.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
And if there is a trait or let’s say tolerance. If someone feels strongly that tolerance should not be one of the five core, you can agree to disagree and leave that one aside and then work on the traits that you can all agree on. And they usually end up being kind of the golden rule of things. We like kids to be respectful, responsible, honest, caring, and then different school districts will add what they feel is really important.
Mike Desparrois:
I think that’s such a powerful message. And I love how you said how long it’s been around. Character ed is not new. Social emotional learning is not new. I think that Castle is celebrating their 26th year this year. It’s kind of really been highlighted the last few years and I’m almost ashamed to say, this is something we should have been really focused on when it was being born and brought out. And it’s kind of sad that society had the critic catch up to where we’re at right now. And so I love the ideas and the thoughts that it’s being really pushed out. That you also get schools to be able to look at the different traits and kind of where they want to focus and how that’s built.
But I also kind of want to reverse a little bit to some things that you said when you went through the Boys Town Training. That was actually one of the very first behavior trains I ever did when I started out teaching students who were, “Emotionally disturbed,” in the self contained classroom. And it really kind of made me understand that you don’t focus on the behavior, you focus on the kid that is displaying a behavior that you can support. So what I think is just fascinating about your story is how you really role modeled what to do and how to support the kids to co-regulate and help them self regulate to bring stuff down as we kind of know the behavior world.
And I’ve been doing a little research on you. [inaudible 00:17:15] background in the character because I love character education. And I’m looking at your document on your webpage. It says, what we stand for. And I really honed in on number five. It says, caring adults need to model character. And Emily, if you could just speak to that, because that’s something we’re really pushing in Our Community Listens where we could be good at is working with the adults to help the kids. So with and for kids and not necessarily to them, but if you can kind of speak to that, I think it’d be great.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
Sure. Well, that’s one of our core beliefs is it starts with the adult culture and the adult culture is everyone in the school, not just the teacher, it’s all support staff. It could be bus drivers. We even train bus drivers in districts on how to just be aware of traits and how to recognize them when you see them. But the adult culture is crucial because you can train teachers and character ed and have them talk about social emotional learning in the classroom, and then the teacher can be in a disagreement with another teacher and there can be things that happen and they think, “Oh, the kids don’t know.” Well, the kids know.
So they know if teachers are treating one another disrespectfully, if they are not being kind. They know if the teacher is rolling her or his eyes, when they walk away. They know how the teacher responds to administration. So it’s very important that it starts with the adult culture and an agreement that we’re going to identify what we believe in as a staff. What do we want to bring to this place where we work and how do we want to treat each other because that starts first and then it can branch out.
Theresa Vineyard:
Do you find after you present or after the teachers go through your training that they live those principles?
Dr. Emily Johnson:
Well, I think it’s hard because we’re all human and I don’t live my own principles every minute of every day. And they’re in the crossfire of quick decisions, a lot is of going on. So I think they don’t always maybe measure up to this high standard they have of themselves because they’re human and things are happening so quickly in the classroom, but teachers are really hard on themselves. And teachers are very self-critical, I’ve found. So in my work at Lindenwood, I believe a lot in teacher self-care and recognizing teachers are working harder than ever, and it’s very stressful. So in my announcements every week to my class, I just say, “Hey, you guys, I see you. I know how hard you’re working. I appreciate you. You make me proud to be a teacher.” And a lot of comments I get, texts and messages. They’re like, “We don’t hear that from anyone.”
Theresa Vineyard:
Oh, well, it’s sad.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
Yeah. So I think it does begin with the adult culture in the school, but it’s also our culture of school districts. We to take care of the teachers, they’re the frontline and they take care of the kids. And until we really make a commitment that teachers are our number one priority, they’re our greatest resource. And we have to keep them healthy and well physically, mentally, emotionally, I think it’s just a struggle. I just know this time right now is so hard for teacher.
Theresa Vineyard:
It isn’t. It’s getting harder every year. It gets tougher and tougher. You’re so right. They’re the frontline. They’re on the frontline trying to deal with lots of different [Giannis 00:21:22], who have so many different needs. And just so many state mandates they’ve got to live up to and principal expectations and parental expectations. They have a lot going on. A lot-
Dr. Emily Johnson:
And very difficult parents who themselves are not regulated.
Theresa Vineyard:
That’s very true.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
So they have to monitor when can I call this parent, is after the best time, or should I call at this time? What reaction am I going to get? So it’s very stressful for them.
Mike Desparrois:
But Emily, I think that’s a really… I love how you talk to your teacher group and the students that you have at the university and just recognize that because you see a lot of that on social media. There’s a really heavy burden, especially right now on COVID depending on the community you’re in and what is being asked for you as a teacher because it’s all over the place. Whether it’s hybrid, it’s in person, it’s both, it’s this, it’s that, something weird. You talked earlier before we started the recording that there’s Zoom, there’s Teams, there’s Google classroom. There’s so many different things educators are having to learn on the sly often times that you said skill and we’ll. I think we all come into the education world with this will.
So we like kids and we want to be around kids and we want to support kids and really help them grow regardless of what our content. But that is something we really have to hone in and continue to teach and continue to develop. And it’s not just the pedagogy skills or that the content skills, but it’s also like those human skills that character ed and social emotional learning, things we teach at, OCL can do, but a continuation to just be there with people and lead with empathy, especially teachers so that they can have that same set to turn around and give them the kiddos, right?
Dr. Emily Johnson:
Absolutely. And we talk about this at CharacterPlus. I talk about it with my students at Lindenwood, but no one can do self-care for teachers. They have to prioritize themselves. And it’s very difficult because they are giving care people. They are often the kinds of people that do for others before they’ll do for themselves. So I give them the analogy of the oxygen mask on the plane, put it on yourself before the child. And I’ll just say, “This is a priority that you spend time with someone that makes you feel good or builds you up. You have coffee with a friend, you spend time outdoors.” These small things that you can do that make us feel cared for that I think a lot of teachers don’t give themselves permission to do normally, but especially now, because they are inundated with all these new requirements. They’re creating content constantly because they’re having to present it in a different way.
They have to then try to meet the needs of parents who are having difficulty with their child’s online or hybrid experience. So, I mean, they’ll tell me, “I worked till 10 o’clock last night.” This is there every day. So I agree with you. It’s so difficult. And now what my students are telling me is the requirements and the expectations literally are changing by the week. This week you’re doing it this way, next week I want you to pivot and be able to present your instruction this way. Next week, a new thing comes out, then there’s the worry like, “Oh, now we’re going back to school.” And for all of us who have teachers are married to a teacher, getting the classroom ready is a real thing. We, as teachers want our classroom to be organized and ready for our students.
So when you tell, especially an elementary teacher or an elementary special ed teacher, early childhood, we’re coming back, they want to be able to make that classroom a welcoming environment. And so it’s like an added task that normally they would do on August.
Mike Desparrois:
Yeah. It’s a [inaudible 00:25:53], right?
Dr. Emily Johnson:
I had students tell me they had to prepare their classroom because they were going to have to teach remotely from their room and then take their classroom down because now they were going to teach from home. Those are the kinds of things that it sounds silly maybe, but at that’s their work environment. That’s where their resources are. That’s where their things are. And that is important to teachers. And sometimes I think our communities don’t realize that those kinds of things are upsetting and difficult for teachers. And no one would like their office moved at their corporate job routinely with no notice. So this is the kind of thing that I think a lot of it requires us being super protective and sensitive to the teachers and also educating the community because like you Mike, I’ve seen on Facebook really distressing posts from parent groups that make me think, “What must it be like to be a teacher and read that”
Mike Desparrois:
Yeah. [inaudible 00:27:04] for sure.
Theresa Vineyard:
Hey Dr. Johnson, just getting back to character ed for a second, how do you [inaudible 00:27:10] success in character education? Is it different school by school?
Dr. Emily Johnson:
There are a lot of different ways that schools measure success. CharacterPlus is an evidence-based program and we’re listed actually on the Castle website. So there is research that shows that when culture and climate improve, discipline rates go down and academics come up, that is the ideal. And we know that we can’t always reach that level in all schools, depending on what they’re dealing with. So we talk about things like a culture and climate survey, looking at the data is attendance better. Our kids wanting to be there, are they having less days where they leave early? Are they and again, looking at office referrals or academics as well. But I think for each school it’s probably a little bit different, but for 30 years, this has been part of the St Louis area.
So there are schools where this is a part of their fabric, character education and this idea of social, emotional learning and supporting kids with decision-making, it is who they are. Often on administrators support will make the difference. And so sometimes it’s hard if an administration changes and they’re not as invested in social emotional learning, but we have learned that it can continue. There can be pockets of teachers that are just committed to this work.
Theresa Vineyard:
Like we’ve talked about that when personnel leave the sustainability sometimes it’s kind of hard to keep it on. So it’s wonderful that you seeing schools that it continues on because of that long history. What are some things that need to be in place or some measures that need to be in place that are important for schools to have in place before character ed program might start with them?
Dr. Emily Johnson:
Well, we talk about working with all the stakeholders. If you’re going to create this kind of emphasis, and it hasn’t been there before or is kind of re-energizing, then you want to start with all the stakeholders and including staff, parents, teachers, et cetera. So when you start those conversations of, what do we want our school to be like? What do we want our students to be like when they graduate or when they leave here and go to the middle school? So it begins with those philosophical questions. What’s our mission, what’s our vision? What do we believe? And then from there it becomes sort of clear what things we want to focus on, because this is what we believe. And that’s how it starts.
Mike Desparrois:
Emily, there’s so many… Oh, I guess we just call it behavior trains, behavior backgrounds, influences. How do you see character education playing with the school that says, “We’re a positive behavior intervention school. We do restorative practices.” That type of stuff. Does it play well in those arenas?
Dr. Emily Johnson:
Well, we always talk with teachers about adapting it to the reality of where they work and doing what you can do to make it work. One of our controversial recommendations is that we get away from extrinsic rewards and we don’t reward kids for good character by giving them a token or a ticket or a toy. And that is entrenched in many schools. And it’s a hard thing for them to be able to move away from. So that’s the highest level of implementation as your kids do not expect a ticket for opening the door for someone. Do not ask, is this going into the drawing, because then they’re motivated not to do the behavior because it’s the right thing and it feels good. They’re motivated to do the behavior because they want prize, the ticket.
Mike Desparrois:
So building on that, how do you get kids to realize that it feels good and it’s the right thing and not focus on the actual tangible motivator?
Dr. Emily Johnson:
I think we’re making strides in that area with social emotional learning being more widely talked about. Teachers are really embracing it. And I think they’re coming to realize like the importance of having kids check in with themselves about how they’re feeling and what their emotion is. A lot of the classrooms, especially elementary will have like a sign outside the door with like red, blue, yellow and then the child puts their hand on this color that represents how they’re feeling. Yellow is happy. Red might be angry. Blue might be worried, whatever it is for that classroom or that school. And I think by helping kids recognize how they feel as they in the room is powerful, because then when you ask them, “How do you feel when that happens?” Something good happens. They might be able to check into that and like tap into it, I should say. They might be able to actually feel what it feels like.
So you mentioned restorative practices and one of the character ed foundational sort of instructional pieces is a community circle or a circle or a class meeting. Where students sit together with the teacher on the floor, kind of a circle where everyone could make eye contact with everyone else. And I’ve watched so many amazing ones. That’s part of my greatest part of my job at CharacterPlus, is I get to go to classrooms and see teachers in action. And they’ll start with a morning check-in. Like, how are you feeling? And then they might say, “Why. I’m tired because my dad was away for work and he caught in late and we had to pick them up from the airport. Or I’m excited because tonight’s my cousin’s birthday.”
So then they can also pass as you guys know. So it goes around the circle and if you don’t feel like sharing, you can just say pass. But I think that’s another way for students to realize not only how they feel, but how their classmates feel and how their teacher feels and their teachers a person with emotion and exhaustion and just like they are. So it’s really powerful when that sharing happens and then the teacher says, “I’m so excited because it’s my daughter’s less than after school,” or whatever it is, I think it’s really powerful. So just kind of in summing that up, I think they will be able to move away from extrinsic tokens and tickets as they start to intrinsically become aware of their own feelings, motivation, their own realization that, I don’t really care about that pencil. That’s the prize. And so-
Theresa Vineyard:
As you speak, I keep thinking self evaluation. That’s what you’re trying to get them to go toward as well as observing feelings other people are having too. And that’s a new skill for a lot of kids, but after it’s taught, they can start practicing it more and more.
Mike Desparrois:
Yeah. It’s a really new idea, kind of an education that we really explore feelings. I remember sitting in class being a kid and people are like, “Oh, you just need to be happy. You just need to be this.” And feelings are feelings and we really need to allow people to explore those. I think a lot of times we’ve created behaviors in kids as a result of, but I’m not really being allowed to explore that. So when Theresa and I talk about feelings a lot. We talk a lot about with our group is. It’s okay to talk about it. It’s okay for people to have that exploration. And it’s a very healthy thing. It’s almost unhealthy when it gets shut down. Yeah.
Theresa Vineyard:
We try-
Dr. Emily Johnson:
I think that what happens is when kids aren’t able to kind of tap in and think about their feelings, then that’s when we can have interruptions in learning, concentration, focus, alertness, because they are preoccupied with the way that they feel. And they haven’t had really any training in how to recognize what it is and recognize that an emotion is bleeding. It’s like a wave that washes over you just because you’re sad right now, you might not be sad at 10:30 when we go out to recess. So that is something I think is really important for kids, is just to learn that emotions are fleeting.
Theresa Vineyard:
We talk a lot about in OCL about effective confrontation, which has to do with feelings and what behaviors are making you feel a certain way, and then the impact on somebody’s behavior because of how you’re feeling. So we spend a lot of time on feelings at OCL. We also spend a lot of time on listening skills. What does CharacterPlus talk a lot about reflective listening?
Dr. Emily Johnson:
Three hallmarks that we believe should be part of a great school culture. We refer to it as the ABCs of character and it’s autonomy, belonging, and competence. And when you create conditions, students have some autonomy, feel great senses of belonging to the school, belonging to the teacher, belonging to the classroom, belonging to the football team, belonging to choir, whatever it is, and then competence that they are able to do the work that’s presented. Then you find that they are good listeners and are productive. Students who focus and get to work because they realize they will be heard. And so with autonomy comes the idea of student voice and choice. Let’s hear from our students about things that they care about at school and when they are listened to, they become better listeners. It’s important for teachers to feel a sense of belonging in the school as well.
Theresa Vineyard:
That’s true.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
That all teachers feel, they have autonomy, belonging and competence. It’s for the whole school community, not just students. And it’s important that we [inaudible 00:38:45] in a school building make sure that we are including all the teachers and making them all feel welcome and engaged. And so those are the hallmarks.
Theresa Vineyard:
Dr. Johnson, you just referenced the three hallmarks of character ed, which is autonomy, a sense of belonging and competence and OCL is just starting some work in that area of students and self-efficacy. They have higher self efficacy when they have a higher sense of belonging [inaudible 00:39:31] for school and in the culture of their school. Can you speak to that a little more or?
Dr. Emily Johnson:
Sure. I think they are interrelated and students have to feel autonomy, to feel competence, et cetera. So it’s kind of like a circle. That’s how I see it in my mind kind of like a wheel. But I believe, and we talked about this at the beginning of the podcast. I believe in the human part of teaching. So to me it’s always belonging. It will always come back to that. In my heart is the most important thing that that student feels when he or she walks in that classroom, on that gymnasium floor, in the computer lab. I belong here and I’m a part of this group of people, I belong here. This is my place.
And there are a lot of things that teachers can do to create that sense of belonging, including creating opportunities for students to do like a one or two minute interview with each other. And then it’s not just dependent on the teacher, but if over time you have set it up that the first two minutes of class, there’s some little interview or something that each student does to another, like what’s your favorite food or what’s your favorite Netflix show or whatever the teacher feels is appropriate. Then they belong to each other. And I think that’s the key.
Theresa Vineyard:
We are starting to really look at the different patterns or behaviors of teachers to create that sense of belonging in the classroom. And it’s a significant list, significant results occur when teachers display some of those behaviors. So we will be looking much more into that because we’re seeing such a connection with, like I said, self-efficacy and sense of belongingness in the classroom.
Mike Desparrois:
Thank you Dr. Johnson and Theresa for this wonderful conversation. I wish we could just go on and on but we do need to bring the podcast to a close. But before we do, I had such a dynamic talk. I want you to think just for a moment about a key takeaway for each of us, with what we discussed today, that we can share with our audience. And Theresa, I’m going to start with you. What’s one key takeaway you have from our conversation. And then Dr. Johnson, if you would share yours as well.
Theresa Vineyard:
Well, I think the million dollar question in education has always been, well, there are many million dollar questions, but there’s always been, how do we move away from extrinsic rewards to intrinsic rewards? So I liked that Dr. Johnson was giving us the [inaudible 00:42:32], the explanations of the more social emotional learning is talked about in the classroom. The more it’s exhibited by teachers, the more kids are going to buy into it. I loved the idea of the cards on the outside of the classroom wall, so they can start self-evaluating their feelings before the day starts. So that’s my key takeaway.
Mike Desparrois:
Thank you, Theresa. Dr. Johnson.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
I think my key takeaway is we haven’t done enough to talk about the social emotional needs of teachers. And I’m hearing just from our conversation that, that’s something that I could probably do more. I have always felt that I was an advocate of the student and I always had the student’s voice. And over the years now I’ve worked with teachers so long. I refer to teachers as being my people. That’s I’ve worked with them. That’s why I love to like talk with any teacher anywhere. I just love to talk to teachers, but now I feel like I really understand that maybe my new role will be, I need to be a champion of teacher self care.
Mike Desparrois:
I love that too. I’m going to go with one of my favorite topics and Theresa is smiling, because she probably knows what I’m going to say. And it’s what we just covered was the of belonging, because I know as a student growing up who struggled academically, the teachers who could provide that sense of belonging, not just with themselves, but with all the kids in the class, I excelled it and I did well. And then the teachers who didn’t provide that sense of belonging, or didn’t really seem to care or know how to provide it, maybe they didn’t have the skillset to do it. I know I struggled immensely with, so I think that, that’s one of my key takeaways is providing that sense of belonging. Not just with the kids, but how do we support the teachers to show them how to do those skills as well too.
I just want to thank you both for just a robust, powerful conversation. And I’m just looking forward to continue on this relationship down the road.
Theresa Vineyard:
Dr. Johnson, I just want to say, thank you so much for joining us today. Your words we’re encouraging, they’re inspirational, they’re positive. I wish more teacher candidates to have you in the classroom, because I think you’re really starting people out in teacher education on the right foot. So thank you so much. And Mike, thank you also for including me in today’s interview.
Dr. Emily Johnson:
I want to thank you all for having me. I realized while we were talking that it’s so important for me to reflect on my own work and I rarely have an opportunity to talk about it in this way. So this was really reaffirming for me. And it was also great to hear all the things you’re doing in your work with teams and working with people. And I just appreciate being here. So thank you.
Speaker 1:
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