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MY GOAL IS NEVER TO TEACH YOU HOW TO PARENT, HOW TO MANAGE OR HOW TO TEACH- MY GOAL IS TO SUPPORT THOSE I WORK WITH TO SEE THE EXPERIENCES THEY ARE HAVING THROUGH A DIFFERENT LENSE, BE ENLIGHTENED AND, ULTIMATLEY, BE EMPOWERED THROUGH A NEW PERSPECTIVE!
The work I do has it’s lovers and its haters, I have grown to understand and accept that through the years. I believe, through my own experiences in education, that there is a defence mechanism built into many teachers and parents that puts them on the back foot and hinders their ability to accept advice and support without taking offence or believing that they are being judged. This is why I ALWAYS make a point of explaining to the parents and professionals I work with that I am NEVER criticising or judging them or there practice.....it is usually quite the opposite to be honest, and I take my inspiration from them!
Where does this feeling of judgement come from though? Well, this is my take….
From a parents point of view, I believe it is, in its most simplistic form, social pressures. Pressure to do what everyone else is doing and as well as they seem to be doing it, making sure we are parenting in the right way 24/7, ensuring our children are keeping up socially, emotionally and academically and earning as many awards as little Jonny is on Facebook...the list goes on but you get the idea! This can bring about a constant feeling of pressure and anxiety to make sure you are 'doing it right' when in actual fact....what is right? Each child is individual, each family has it's own dynamics, is there a 'perfect parenting guide'? I don't think so, and if there is I'm not sure it won't work for every Tom, Dick and Harriet because we are all very different!
From a Senior Leaders and Teachers perspective, well, they are being put under CONSTANT scrutiny and shaming processes by an archaic education system that is failing to evolve with the world around it! There, I’ve said it- I’ve opened the can of worms that those on the front line in education are ALL thinking about!
Teachers and their leaders are constantly being judged on how they are performing in a system that is based on the believed needs from decades ago- so much so that schools have their performance reported for all to see in league tables- yes....league tables, you know, as in who are the best and who are the worst performers!!!!!
No context though, no focus on social and economic environments or information to show if the individual schools are actually meeting the needs of the children and families that they are supporting, just purely academic results and progress based tables! I read somewhere that the league tables were abolished in 2001, however, conversations with Senior Leaders and a quick Google search have told me otherwise!
So with all of this in mind, is it any wonder that when somebody like me comes through the doors of homes and schools to support parents and teachers in developing their daily practice to meet the needs of the children they are supporting on a social and emotional level, and understanding more about the specific needs of individual children ( none of which is taught to any depth during Initial Teacher Training or the none existent standard parenting school by the way), that they feel they are being judged? No, I expect them to feel like that, so that is why I go out of my way to explain, in detail, that this is not what I am doing and it is not what I am there for.
I am in family homes because the adults in the household have been brave enough to ask for advice and support to help themselves and their children thrive in life and become the best that they can be!
I am a schools classrooms because their Senior Leaders and Governors have been courageous and forward thinking enough to support their staff in developing their knowledge of social and emotional development and specific needs based on the identified needs of the community in which they are based.
It means their Headteacher has had the passion and insight to understand that, regardless of the system they are in, they are there to support so much more than academic results - because, ultimately, they understand that it is not academic progress and results that make the world spin and remembers why they started in education in the first place, to change lives.
Its shows that their whole school ethos is based on the understanding that children are all amazingly individual and fantastically different which means that they don’t always fit into the same box to get the best out of them and help to thrive in life.
That's why I'm there- to support the change.
I am a third eye in the school, the classroom and in the home, not to judge and criticise, but to help all parents, leaders and staff to see the woods for the trees and develop their systems and practice to meet the needs of the children and young people that they are supporting with their development. Yes, I understand and believe that academic progress is important, but we ALL know by now that if the social and emotional needs are not met at home and in school then academic progress will not be made anyway- Abraham Maslow told us this back in 1943….nearly 100 years ago!
Teaching, parenting and supporting children is a tough tough job, only those that have done it and are doing it know just how hard it is, and I believe parents, teachers and support staff need all the support they can get to develop their practice to meet the needs of modern day children- Generation Alpha I believe they are labelled? We need to create helpful processes to support change.
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“ developing a systematic way to help teachers get better is the powerful idea in education today , the surest way to weaken it is to turn it into a capricious exercise in public shaming, lets focus on creating a personnel system that helps teachers improve”
- Bill Gates
Bill, I wholeheartedly concur and I also believe this principle to be true for parents!
The thing is, as parents, we love our children and we strive to do the best that we can, and as professionals working with children, we love the children we work with and want to support their development in the best possible way. However, if we are ground down through the fear of being publicly and/or privately shamed then the imagination and discovery that we all wanted to create when we first became a professional, parent or both, may be lost....and then, we simply become less relevant in their lives. What a travesty that would be when you consider that is the number one reason we are doing what we do in the first place- to make a significant difference in the lives of our little people!
To combat this, my quick and immediate advice is to do what you can to constantly remind yourself of why you started your teaching or parenting journey in the first place!
Finally, just to be clear, I do not claim to be an expert in parenting or teaching- I do not believe that anybody is truly an ‘expert’ in any of these things’, but I DO believe that the ethos and approaches that I promote should be shared because without this foundation of approach, professionals and parents are in danger of being lost in the abyss of the pressures and expectations of the world around them.
Lots of Love,
Jim.
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