September 2018

www.pbea.agron.iastate.edu

Hello to my international friends!

     In my session at the 2018 PBEA-PLC Teaching and Learning Symposium, we were able to talk about important teaching content items like creating lesson plans, developing delivery methods, and designing quality assessment. All of these components are definitely required elements for quality teaching, but we also were able to talk a little bit about that invisible, hard-to-define element that takes teaching from good to great. In our discussion, we were able to highlight the different domains of learning including the cognitive (knowledge and experience), psychomotor (physical skills, and the affective (feelings and emotions). In our discussion, we found agreement that teaching in the cognitive and psychomotor domains can be easy as they focus on content, but that meeting  the needs of the affective domain can be more complex and time intensive. 

       To that end, I would like to share a story from my own teaching that reminds me to focus on teaching the individual and not the process. Last spring, I had a family enroll a 10 year old student in private one-on-one riding lessons with me. The student had very little horse experience and her parents warned me in advance that this little girl had some developmental issues, but we did not go into great detail. Bearing this in mind, I assigned the student to groom and ride a smaller pony to keep her from being overwhelmed. She did demonstrate some anxiety in her first lesson, but we quickly overcame the fear and had a successful ride. Over the course of several months, this student really blossomed and improved her riding in leaps and bounds. Aside from some slight hesitation over trying new, more challenging material, this student responded like any 10 year old girl. She laughed. She smiled. She fawned over her pony.
        Eventually, the day came that I needed to move this student onto a different pony to continue to challenge her learning. My student completely shut down. She sat down on the bench and cried for an hour over what I considered to be a small change. My lesson plan was in shambles. I felt that I was wasting her parents hard-earned money by not spending that hour in the saddle. I was left with the choice of caving to the tears and allowing her to ride her old pony, or to let her cry and stick to my guns about the new pony. The extreme reaction over this change in her riding was alarming to say the least, but in my gut, I knew that caving would not be the answer despite her emotional turmoil.
      The next week when my student arrived, her father pulled me away from the student while she was grooming and putting her saddle on. I was certain that I was about to be berated for my teaching and for my insistence that she try this new pony. Instead, I was met with a tearfully thankful father. He began sobbing and hugged me saying that in the year since his family had adopted this little girl, she has had almost no emotional reactions to anything. To this family, this little girls tears were a breakthrough. He went on to say that the only time that his little girl showed emotion of any kind, be it sadness or joy, was when she talked about horses and her weekly lessons with me.
     The point of this story is that despite my trepidation, in this situation, teaching the student and not the content was the right choice. Through further discussion, it was explained to me that this little girl had spent most of her life in the foster care system. Change for this child was particularly traumatic. Learning to deal with small changes and even big changes has been a hurdle for this family. In this scenario, focusing on the affective domain allowed her cognitive and psychomotor skills to grow. She did successfully ride a new pony the following week, and ended her next lesson in smiles and gratitude for the opportunity to make a new friend.

     In my teaching career, I find that I have been frequently confronted with the reality that teaching the person allows me to improve my processes. I have worked with children with developmental delays. I have coached former prison inmates. I have taught veterans and abuse survivors to develop new stable relationships. In all of my teaching, I have never found a student who was not worthy of my time, patience, and consideration. I would encourage all of my colleagues to continue to recognize that each difficult student has a story, but it is our responsibility to teach with consideration for the person over the process. 

    I hope that sharing this quick story has brightened your day as it did mine! Many happy thoughts sent your way!

Miranda Morris, Graduate Assistant
Iowa State University Agricultural Education and Studies
mmmorris@iastate.edu