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This article was downloaded by: [University of Tennessee At Martin]On: 04 October 2014, At: 13:19Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registeredoffice: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK
Pastoral Care in Education: AnInternational Journal of Personal,Social and Emotional DevelopmentPublication details, including instructions for authors andsubscription information:http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rped20
Enhancing student self‐worth in theprimary school learning environment:teachers' views and students' viewsPenni Cushman a & Jackie Cowan aa University of Canterbury , Christchurch, New ZealandPublished online: 04 Jun 2010.
To cite this article: Penni Cushman & Jackie Cowan (2010) Enhancing student self‐worth inthe primary school learning environment: teachers' views and students' views, Pastoral Care inEducation: An International Journal of Personal, Social and Emotional Development, 28:2, 81-95,DOI: 10.1080/02643944.2010.481311
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Pastoral Care in EducationVol. 28, No. 2, June 2010, pp. 81–95
ISSN 0264–3944 (print)/ISSN 1468–0122 (online)/10/020081–15© 2010 NAPCEDOI: 10.1080/02643944.2010.481311
Enhancing student self-worth in the primary school learning environment: teachers’ views and students’ viewsPenni Cushman* and Jackie CowanUniversity of Canterbury, Christchurch, New ZealandTaylor and FrancisRPED_A_481311.sgm(Received 19 January 2010; final version received 15 February 2010)10.1080/02643944.2010.481311Pastoral Care in Education0264-3944 (print)/1468-0122 (online)Original Article2010Taylor & Francis282000000June [email protected]
This paper reports the findings from a study of teachers and students’ views regarding self-worth inthe primary school learning environment. The revised New Zealand curriculum recognises theimportance of self-worth in students’ motivation and ability to learn. While the need to enhance self-worth in the classroom has been well established in the literature, similarities and differencesbetween teachers and students’ understanding of the impact of various classroom interactions onself-worth has not received the same attention. The purpose of the research reported on in thispaper was to provide further insight for teachers, thereby enabling them to strengthen classroomrelationships and their students’ learning experiences in ways commensurate with enhancingstudents’ feelings of self-worth.
Keywords: education; self-worth; teachers
Introduction
Enhancing students’ experiences at school in order to increase the likelihood of‘achievement for all’ underpins the philosophy of New Zealand education. The revisedNew Zealand Curriculum positions young people as ‘lifelong learners who are confi-dent and creative, connected, and actively involved’ (Ministry of Education, 2007,p. 4). Positive self-identity (self-worth), in the sense of Bandura’s (1986) definition,which encompasses evaluation of self, is highlighted as an important student outcomein the curriculum document. The document also links the concept of self-worth to thecompetency of ‘managing self’, thereby associating it with self-motivation, a ‘can-do’
*Corresponding Author. School of Sciences and Physical Education, College of Education,University of Canterbury, Dovedale Avenue, Private Bag 4800, Christchurch 8140, New Zealand.Email: [email protected]
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attitude, and students who see themselves as capable learners (Ministry of Education,2007).
Elias’s (2003) statement that a school’s educational mission will be most successfulwhen it integrates efforts to enhance students’ academic, social and emotional learn-ing is supported by Adelman and Taylor (2000), who believe that if schools focus onlyon academic instruction in their efforts to help students attain academic success, thenthey will probably fall short of their goals. Of particular interest to schools in thisregard is research that establishes close links between students’ levels of self-worthand their learning behaviours and achievement (Zins et al., 2004; Hipkins, 2005).Hattie (2002) notes that success in one area at school can lead to success in otherareas, thereby enhancing confidence and contributing to students’ feelings of self-worth. These various considerations provide a strong rationale for ensuring thatteachers have a sound knowledge and understanding of the relationships betweenstudents’ self-worth and their motivation and ability to learn.
While the need to enhance self-worth in the classroom might be well established,there has been debate within the educational system as to how endeavours to buildself-worth should be implemented. In his critical examination of notions of self-esteem in the classroom, Beane (1991) noted that during the 1980s many schools inwestern education systems were given packaged programmes associated with buildingself-worth. He, along with more recent commentators and theorists (see, for example,Puurula et al., 2001; Manning, 2007), criticised these programmes for failing torecognise that efforts to promote students’ self-worth must be embedded within theculture of the school and its mode of curriculum delivery because it is the balance ofinteractions between the individual and his or her environment that enhances thegrowth and development of self-worth.
It is well recognised that human beings have a powerful need for connectedness andthat connectedness is linked to the development of self-worth (Lee & Robbins, 2000;Townsend & McWhirter, 2005). As Hargreaves (1998, p. 835) reminds us in regardto the relationship between teachers and students:
Good teaching is charged with positive emotion. It is not just a matter of knowing one’ssubject, being efficient, having the correct competencies or learning all the right tech-niques. Good teachers are not just well-oiled machines. They are emotional, passionatebeings who connect with their students and fill their classes with pleasure, creativity andjoy.
McGee and Fraser (2008) similarly recognise that the relationship between teachersand students is both intimate and objective, suggesting a finely tuned balance betweenthe affective characteristics of the student–teacher relationship and recognition thatthe reciprocal nature of this relationship requires an interplay of communication,trust, empathy and challenge. According to Alton-Lee (2003) and McGee and Fraser(2008), the importance of teachers creating an environment where the emotional andpsychological well-being of their students can be nurtured cannot be underestimated.In addition, Nuthall (2007) advocates the need for teachers to recognise that in theirown classroom the environment is co-constructed by both themselves and theirstudents. Nuthall found from his classroom-based research that a substantial amount
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Enhancing student self-worth in primary school 83
of what students learn comes from their peers, and that teachers thus need to capitalisemore on peer culture to foster learning.
Despite the importance of these notions to the development of students’ self-worth,Brookfield (1995) and Nuthall (2007), among others, recognise that it is difficult forteachers to create an environment conducive to enhancing self-worth unless theyexamine and understand similarities and differences between teachers’ and students’understandings and perceptions of the impact of various classroom interactions. It isessential that teachers are aware of the extent to which their own values and philoso-phies relating to learning permeate their classrooms and affect students’ experiences(see also, in this regard, Hipkins, 2005; McGee & Fraser, 2008).
Brookfield (1995, p. 94) suggests that teachers need to be able to see themselvesthrough students’ eyes:
No matter how carefully we monitor our actions, we can never really know their full impacton students. Events, words, and decisions that to us mean very little are taken as highlysignificant expressions of our power and authority by students.
Perry (1988) offers similar advice. He says that teachers and students inhabit ‘differ-ent worlds’ in the same classroom. Thus, students may perceive actions and the sameexperiences in very different ways from how their teachers experience them, a claimthat is again borne out by Nuthall’s (2001, 2007) work. A lack of understanding ofthese differences can, Perry continues, unintentionally result in heightened classroomtensions.
The findings and views of the researchers and commentators presented herestrongly indicate that if schools are to realise the curriculum document vision high-lighted at the beginning of this article, teachers must understand how their teachingstyles and relationships with their students impact on students’ self-worth. The studydocumented in this article asked New Zealand teachers and their students what theythought influenced development of student self-worth in the classroom and whatteachers need to do in the classroom to enhance that self-worth. Analysis of theirresponses focused on the similarities and differences between the teachers’ andstudents’ understandings of student self-worth and how it can be facilitated.
In conducting this research, we recognised the complexity of the multi-facetedinterface between students and their teachers in the classroom. Nevertheless, wehoped that such an investigation would provide further insight for the participatingteachers, thus enabling them to strengthen classroom relationships and theirstudents’ learning experiences in ways commensurate with enhancing students’feelings of self-worth.
We also carried out the study mindful of Nuthall’s (2001, p. 6) claim that ‘Teachingis a very personal and individual thing and, to be valid, research on teaching mustinclude the subjective and personal elements of what goes on between teachers and theirstudents’. Nuthall (2007) later added that this knowledge, along with understandingof how classroom practices affect the changes taking place in the minds of students,is central to teachers’ ability to create and adapt their teaching and management prac-tices to best accommodate students’ academic learning and emotional well-being.
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Method
Two large, suburban, full-primary Christchurch schools, one situated in a high-socio-economic neighbourhood and one in a low-socio-economic to middle-socio-economic neighbourhood, were selected for the small-scale qualitative study. Fourteachers, nominated by the principals of their respective schools, were selected totake part. The selection process, described as purposive sampling by Mutch(2005), enabled principals to select teachers who demonstrated general character-istics of a ‘well-rounded’ classroom teacher. Each teacher was individually inter-viewed in a semi-structured interview that took up to 60 minutes to complete. Aspart of the interview, teachers were asked to verbally rate (on a scale of one tofive) the importance of their relationship with students on students’ self-worth.Four to five students from each teacher’s Year Eight class (12–13 year olds) wererandomly selected to take part in focus group interviews, each 45–60 minutes induration. Pilot group interviews were conducted with the student focus groups toestablish ground rules and practise group discussion prior to the audio-tapedsession. These sessions, in which a topic suggested by the students was discussed,also allowed the researcher and students to become acquainted so there would bea greater likelihood students would feel comfortable responding to the questions.Twenty-three students eventually took part in the study. This particular age groupwas chosen because of their growing awareness of interpersonal relationships andtheir ability to articulate their understandings and perceptions of self-worth(Manning, 2007).
In this article, we report on the responses to several questions that were part of alarger study about self-worth in the classroom. The teachers were asked thesequestions:
● What factors impact on a student’s self-worth in the learning environment?● What strategies do you use, if any, to enhance your students’ self-worth?
The students were asked:
● What sorts of things does your teacher do that help you feel better about yourself?
No suggestions or prompts of any kind were provided by the interviewer during theinterview. The interviews were audio-taped and transcribed by an independenttranscriber. Data were examined for emerging themes that were then organised intocategories. This thematic analysis (Mutch, 2005) allowed us to approach the text(data) with an open mind so that we could uncover the key messages, look atstudents’ and teachers’ use of words, and identify recurring themes.
In the next section, we outline and discuss the teachers’ reports of what theyconsidered they did to enhance students’ self-worth in the classroom environmentalongside the students’ perspectives on what they thought their teachers were doingand/or should be doing to enhance students’ self-worth. Although the size of thesample group restricts the reliability and validity of findings, the results suggest partic-ular areas of interest that warrant further investigation.
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Enhancing student self-worth in primary school 85
Findings and discussion
The overall tenor of the teachers’ and students’ comments was that the affective sideof education has a strong impact on students’ achievement and general school expe-rience. Both groups were unanimous in their view that positive relationships betweenteachers and students enhance students’ good feelings about themselves, which thencontributes positively to their learning. Asked to rate (on a scale of one to five) theimportance of the teacher–student relationship on students’ self-worth, three teachersrated it as a five, and one as a four to five. Because of the major life changes thesestudents were confronting in terms of the physical, emotional and social effects ofpuberty as well as the imminent transition from primary to high school, the teacherssaw issues centred on relationships and building self-worth as particularly important:
Going through the puberty thing, they’re so much more self-conscious, and it’s so muchmore important for them to fit in and do the right thing … But it’s quite hard: what willwork one day won’t necessarily work on another day.
One student, when commenting on student–teacher relationships and the subse-quent influence on learning, stated:
Sometimes you feel disappointed and you’re like, ‘No I can’t do it’. They [the teachers]make you feel good, so you try again … gives you confidence about other subject areas,makes you want to learn, makes you good at it.
A teacher similarly commented that the student–teacher relationship has a hugeinfluence.
Actually, it is the key really to getting them on board and their feeling about themselves.You know their feeling about themselves impacts on everything around them. A poor senseof self-worth impacts on students’ motivation and their effort sometimes.
These views align with research confirming links between the teacher–student rela-tionship and student motivation and attitudes to learning (Clark et al., 2001; Nuthall,2001; Hipkins, 2005).
Although the teachers through their comments revealed their understanding of theimportance and value of positive teacher qualities, it was evident that they did notalways understand the degree to which their various teaching strategies and interac-tions influenced student attitudes and behaviours. Said one:
The look on your face when you’ve seen them do something … I think there’s probablyhundreds of times that you don’t realise that you are actually giving messages.
A closer examination of the theme ‘enhancing self-worth in the learning environ-ment’ shed some light on this matter. Three factors of particular interest to bothteachers and students emerged from this analysis: teacher qualities, teacher strate-gies, and the classroom culture. The students’ comments and the teachers’comments regarding these factors aligned in some instances and varied in others.Also, when one group (either teachers or students) provided fuller responses to anyone question, it could not be presumed that this group necessarily placed greaterimportance on it.
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Teacher qualities
The teachers’ and students’ answers to the interview questions contained mention ofa number of personal and professional qualities of teachers that teachers and studentsconsidered to influence the development of student self-worth. Table 1 presents thequalities cited by teachers and those cited by students. Only those aspects referred toby more than two teachers or students are included in the table.
Both students and teachers cited a good sense of humour. Students valued ateacher’s ability to relax with them and ‘have a laugh’. Both teachers and studentsreferred to the need to see the ‘funny side’ of things and for teachers to joke withstudents when appropriate. One teacher spoke of the benefit of ‘using humour, tryingto see the funny side of things. Classrooms can get a bit serious at times’. Studentsagreed. Their appreciation of humorous banter in the classroom is illustrated in astudent’s comment that ‘Our teacher tried keeping a straight face when we were danc-ing next to him. I was like … “Oh come on, just laugh,” and he’s, like, “He, he, he”’.
More frequently commented on than humour, however, was a teacher’s ability totreat students fairly. One female student spoke of the potential repercussions ifstudents viewed a teacher’s action as unfair: ‘It has to be fair, or otherwise we won’tdo it’. All four teachers commented on this matter. They noted that students of thisage have a strong sense of social justice and so tend to judge a teacher’s interactionswith them in this context. ‘I think’, said one teacher, ‘that fairness, that equity thing,is really big for them … They have a strong sense of justice and you’ve got to get thatright’.
In two of the focus groups, students highlighted the need for consistency betweenwhat teachers say about teacher–student communication and teachers’ actual prac-tices in this regard. For example, three students discussed a teacher’s encouragementto confide in them; they viewed this as a positive quality. However, this same groupof students expressed concern over teachers potentially sharing these ‘confidences’with other teachers and students. They related examples of teachers discussingstudents’ confidences in the staffroom and of overhearing teachers discuss the confi-dences that other students had shared with them.
The following comment from a student was a typical expression of concern:
Yeah, it goes to the staffroom, and everyone talks about it … like if you tell them somethingyou can tell because another teacher will come up to you and start to talk about it andyou’re, like, … how did you find out?
Table 1. Teacher qualities that enhance self-worth
Teachers’ views Students’ views
Sense of humour Sense of humourFairness FairnessSocial justice Consistency in practices
ConfidentialityTrust
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Enhancing student self-worth in primary school 87
The students’ comments implied that events such as this destroyed in an instant anytrust that had been built up between a teacher and a student. The comments alsosuggested that the loss of trust resulting from a breach of confidentiality could lead toa disconnection between student and teacher, a lowered interest in learning, andbehaviours associated with learning avoidance.
Work by Skinner and Belmont (1993) and Wigfield and Eccles (2002) establishedthat when teachers are involved at a personal level with their class, students tend tohave more respect for and trust in their teacher and a sense of belongingness withinthe classroom. The comments by the teachers and the students in this present studyprovided support for literature identifying trust as a critical part of the student–teacher relationship and essential to the development of self-worth (Hartley-Brewer,2001; Van Maele & Van Houtte, 2009).
Although the teachers acknowledged the importance of open communication indeveloping relationships and connectedness with their students and the need tomaintain their students’ trust, they said that sometimes the issue of student confi-dentiality presented them with a dilemma that they found difficult to resolve. Thisdilemma relates to provisions of the New Zealand Code of Ethics for RegisteredTeachers (New Zealand Teachers’ Council, 2004). On the one hand, the codedirects teachers to ‘protect the confidentiality of information about learners’. Onthe other hand, the code states that teachers must ‘promote the physical,emotional, social and spiritual wellbeing of learners’. These statements makeevident the notion that the primary professional obligation of teachers is to thosethey teach and that, unless a student’s well-being is at stake, the confidentiality ofstudent disclosures must be paramount in teachers’ subsequent actions. Thedilemma arises when withholding information does not appear to be in the bestinterests of the student. The findings of this study suggest that some teachers areunaware of their obligations around student confidentiality under the code and/orneed clearer guidelines on how to handle such situations with professionalism andsensitivity.
Teacher strategies
The teachers and the students shared similar views about teacher strategies thatenhance self-worth. As Table 2 shows, these strategies all concerned the relationshipbetween teachers and their students.
All four teachers acknowledged that teachers need to develop a positive relationshipwith every student. Positive relationships were seen as those that included recognitionof each student’s individuality—emotionally, socially and academically. ‘You’ve gotto try and provide all of your kids with an opportunity to grow and develop’, said oneteacher, ‘and they’ve all got different talents, so … you’ve got to try and seek out theone thing this kid’s really good at’. The students’ comments revealed that they, too,understood the power of this approach. Several students spoke of the positive effectson motivation and confidence brought about by teachers showing a personal interestin them. One noted: ‘Because if a teacher’s … if people are being nice to you, you look
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forward to it, and if you look forward to it, you concentrate more’. Anotherremembered his teacher’s ‘comforting’ nature, particularly in regards to a publicperformance: ‘He was just like smiling at us and giving us the thumbs up and stuff. Itmade us feel real confident’.
Teachers and several students mentioned the importance of the start of the schoolday in establishing and maintaining teacher–student relationships and monitoringstudents’ feelings and behaviours. Not only could teachers chat informally to studentsat this time but they could also address any issues that might adversely influencesubsequent learning. One teacher mentioned that a simple ‘Hi, how are you?’ wassufficient for her to gauge a student’s mood. Several students said that they likedteachers using their nicknames as part of a positive relationship because this was oneway in which teachers could demonstrate their recognition and affirmation of eachstudent’s individuality: ‘He was real cool. He just, like, always encouraged us andstuff, and he gave us all, like, nicknames’.
The four teachers all commented on the importance of making explicit for studentstheir knowledge of what students were engaged in outside school hours and classroomtasks. This practice, they said, emphasised to the students that teachers valued themfor more than just their academic abilities. It also, meant, explained one teacher,taking time to get to know students in order to recognise topics of interest and impor-tance to them:
Give them jobs that build on their strengths; for example, the wee guy who did the recy-cling. It’s a leadership thing for him, and it’s not a huge one, but he’s just happy to go anddo it automatically. He’s picked up on that, taken responsibility for something, and it’sactually coming through in his work.
The teachers also emphasised the need to recognise and constructively addressindividual students’ feelings about learning in order to enhance that student’s self-worth and subsequent achievement:
I had a boy … he doesn’t like to write things down. I put him in a film-making groupbecause that’s something he loves, and his self-worth just went up, and it was somethingthat was shown to the whole school, and it was, like, ‘I’ve done something really positive,and it’s something that everyone’s seen and everyone’s loved’.
Table 2. Teacher strategies that enhance self-worth
Teachers’ views Students’ views
Positive relationships with students Treats students as individualsTreats students as individuals Shows a personal interest in studentsShows a personal interest in students Praises appropriatelyPraises appropriately Uses nicknamesProvides opportunities for leadership EncouragesTrusts students Provides opportunities for leadershipLinks learning experiences to personal interests Gives students responsibilitiesEncourages
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Enhancing student self-worth in primary school 89
These findings support McGee and Fraser’s (2008) view that effective teachers striveto connect with students in ways that enhance the learning experience.
The students’ responses to the interview questions reinforced the teachers’comments. In each focus group, students referred to the value of teachers recognisingtheir needs as individuals. One student stated he thought highly of ‘someone whocould identify what a person needed or wanted’. While students wanted teachers torecognise their individuality, several cautioned teachers about singling out studentsin front of the class for praise or positive recognition: ’You’re a little embarrassed,especially if they just single you out, cause, yeah, they make you stand up … you feelgood, but a little embarrassed’. However, the teachers’ comments indicated theirawareness of this concern on the part of students. Each teacher expressed reservationsabout using ‘public praise’ as a means of promoting student self-worth. Theyobserved that while some students respond well to being singled out, others find thisapproach a negative and potentially humiliating experience. The ‘not being singledout rule’, the teachers said, tended to pertain to more able students who generally donot want attention drawn to their achievements and to other students whose need forpeer acceptance does not sit well with receiving public praise from a teacher.
In their acknowledgement that students respond differently to various kinds ofpraise, the teachers discussed the importance of recognising the students who valueda quiet word or comment on their work in preference to comments made in frontof the class. One teacher emphasised the sensitivity in this regard of 12-year-old to13-year-old boys, who, the teacher said, are particularly likely to be humiliated andembarrassed by public praise. All four teachers also noted that as students get older,they no longer respond to the more generalised praise that tends to affirm and moti-vate younger students. Rather, these older students need to know how they have eachearned praise. This commentary supports work by Owens (1997), who foundyounger students tend to feel special simply because they are relatively egocentric andsee themselves as unique whereas older students feel special if they see themselves ascompetent and capable.
Hattie (2002) and McGee and Fraser (2008) also recognise that while praise playsa vital role in enhancing self-worth, it must be reinforced with more specific informa-tion. If students are expected to feel special as a result of their competencies and capa-bilities, they need to have delineated for them the knowledge, skills and attitudes thatmark them as competent and capable. The views of teachers and students aligned withthese beliefs that teacher praise is an important strategy in the development of self-worth, but they emphasised the negative repercussions of praise that is non-specificor overdone. Commentary from a couple of students showed that when a teacher ‘over-did’ praise, it was seen as meaningless and sometimes ‘just annoying’. Statements suchas this emphasised the students’ need for praise that they perceived as genuine. It wasevident from both the students’ and the teachers’ comments that the potential for praisein the form of specific feedback was immense, but getting it right for individuals wasdifficult for and often not managed well by teachers. Clark et al. (2001) and Burnett(2002) acknowledge this fine line between productive and unproductive praise, adistinction that was clearly supported by the teachers’ and the students’ comments.
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Both teachers and students suggested that encouraging students to take on respon-sibilities and leadership roles contributed to the development of student self-worth.For the majority of students, the teachers’ trust in their ability to carry out such roleshad greater importance than might be supposed by the teachers affording them theseroles. As one student said, ‘Everyone would know you and everyone would trust yousince the teachers trust you … makes you feel like leaders amongst leaders’. Anotherstudent, using his older brother’s experiences as an example, considered that thepositive spinoffs of a teacher’s trust extended further than the primary schoolenvironment: ‘Through your whole high school years … you can be trusted by all theteachers because a teacher from this school tells the whole high school people that youcan be trustworthy’.
Providing support for research by Miller and Moran (2007), all of the teachers andmost of the students commented on and discussed the importance of a teacher’sencouragement. ‘If you do something well, she compliments you, and if you make amistake on something else, then she’d say, “Oh, you’ll get it better next time”’. Theteachers considered that they were encouraging students when they guided studentsto put themselves forward and try something new: ‘You can encourage every singlechild to try something new’, said one. It was particularly interesting to note from theinterview transcripts that teachers’ comments relating to encouragement focused onencouraging students to attempt something new, whereas the students’ commentscentred more on the importance of being encouraged to try again when mistakes weremade. The importance of teacher encouragement in respect of student self-worth wasespecially evident during one of the student focus group interviews, when the studentsgave anecdotes relating to classmates about what a lack of encouragement could meanfor them. They spoke of one boy, whom they considered gifted artistically. ‘No-onesays he’s good at drawing,’ explained one of the students. ‘He’s just, like, when hestarts to draw, the teacher tells him off, and he doesn’t get encouraged for all his gooddrawing … It just discourages him, and he doesn’t do much in class’.
The classroom culture
McGee and Fraser (2008, p. 11) describe classrooms as ‘microcosms of society withall the power relations, hierarchies, cliques and subcultures evident in society’. Theteachers’ comments showed their understanding that the classroom culture is multi-farious in nature, and that it is the product of the dynamics between students andtheir teachers, and students and other students, factors over which the teachers feltthey could exercise control. ‘It’s up to me … it’s something I try to do, and it’s justabout making the environment so everyone’s part of a team’. Each of the teachersreflected on the importance of spending time at the beginning of the year developingpositive and supportive relationships and a safe classroom environment. Because ofthe teachers’ perceived responsibility for this dimension and their need to establish aclassroom culture that would support their preferred teaching style, it is not surprisingthat the teachers made a greater contribution in their commentary than the studentsto this matter, as is evident from the listings of factors in Table 3.
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Enhancing student self-worth in primary school 91
Each teacher acknowledged the contribution that the classroom culture couldmake to students’ self-worth and overall success at school. The teachers said thatrecognising students’ individual needs and interests was integral to a positive learningenvironment. ‘Every kid wants to be given the opportunity to be their own person anddo the things they’re really good at … and it’s about finding the balance for each kid’.Student commentary, such as that expressed by the student who thought highly of ateacher who could recognise what a person needed or wanted (see previous section),showed concurrence with the teachers’ position. McGee and Fraser’s (2008) viewthat every student needs to have a ‘place to stand’ also aligns with this position. Intheir book on teacher pedagogy, the two authors discuss the teacher’s responsibilityfor monitoring the culture of the classroom by not only recognising differences andaddressing injustices, but also moulding the learning environment so it becomes asafe place for all students. The four teachers agreed that a learning environment mustbe safe if students are to be encouraged to take risks of the kind that promotes optimallearning: ‘making it safe’ and ‘making it some place the kids want to be’ were typicalcomments.
For Alton-Lee (2003), group cohesion is an underlying component of a safe andsuccessful learning environment. Although the teachers’ comments supported herviewpoint, what the teachers had to say cautioned against teachers emphasising groupcohesion to the point where they overlook each student’s uniqueness. One teacherexpressed this idea as follows:
I’d like to think that I really look at the kid as an individual rather than the group of ‘brightkids’, the group of ‘sporty kids’ … give them opportunities to show their strengths andshow what they’re good at, and also, you know, give them opportunities to do things thatthey’re not good at.
Although the four teachers gave higher priority to meeting students’ individualneeds than to group cohesion, their comments clearly showed their understandingthat relationships between individual students and groups of students influence theclassroom culture for better or worse. One teacher used ‘flexible grouping’ to ensurestudents were continually talking and working with different students in the class.Although there was only minimal reference from the other teachers to the importanceof capitalising on peer culture to foster learning, the same teacher recognised that a
Table 3. Factors in the classroom culture that enhance self-worth
Teachers’ views Students’ views
Positive teacher/student relationships Individuality recognisedGroup cohesion Peer relationshipsIndividuality recognisedGoal-settingHigh expectationsPeer relationshipsEmotional safety and trust
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student placed in a group of higher achievers might think ‘“Oh, she’s put me with so-and-so, and she’s really good,” and suddenly you’ve got a whole different attitudegoing on. And that helps to build self-confidence as well’. There was, however,recognition that students with good self-worth are better able than students with poorself-worth to develop positive peer relationships and consequently to form cohesivegroups within the classroom of the kind that further enhance self-worth and motiva-tion to learn.
McGee and Fraser (2008) state that although teachers cannot expect every studentand every peer group to build and maintain positive friendships with every otherstudent and peer group in the class, they can teach students to co-exist in peacefulways. When speaking of classroom culture, all four teachers used expressions such as‘trust’, ‘emotional safety’, making the classroom ‘a place where students want to be’.Each teacher also drew on the analogy of ‘family’ when describing the type of class-room they thought best promoted student self-worth. They observed that familydenoted support, teamwork and the freedom for students to be themselves. Althoughnone of the teachers discussed his or her perceived position or role in the ‘family’, allfour said that they needed to model the kinds of behaviours and attitudes they hopedtheir students would emulate in the classroom and wider school community.
The four teachers viewed goal-setting as an important contributor to a learningenvironment that enhances self-worth: ‘Goal setting and those sorts of things thatreally promote that we’re in this together and that as a team we will really goforward’. As well as being viewed as a supportive and cooperative process, teachersstated that goal-setting gave students a personal benchmark, although care needed tobe taken to ensure that the benchmark was realistic for each individual. Nonetheless,the importance of high expectations was clear: ‘If you set the goal up there, set thestandards high, you know they’ll come up’. The teachers further qualified theircomments by stating that if teachers did not provide opportunities that allowstudents to meet their goals, they risked diminishing students’ feelings of self-worth.None of the students mentioned goal-setting when discussing influences on studentself-worth.
Implications and conclusion
The findings of this study support literature that points to a positive relationshipbetween student self-worth and student learning (Hargreaves, 1998; Clark et al.,2001; Hattie, 2002; Hipkins, 2005; Nuthall, 2007). This body of research alsoemphasises the role that teachers play in promoting student self-worth within theclassroom and beyond.
The four teachers in this study said they were highly mindful of their part in devel-oping student self-worth and so strove to develop positive relationships with theirstudents, especially by paying attention to and tailoring their teaching to students’individual needs. The teachers said they found the times before the start of the formalschool day, such as when students were arriving at school or entering classrooms, asparticularly important in establishing good relationships with students. The teachers
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also acknowledged the value of utilising information gained at such times to enhancetheir students’ subsequent learning experiences.
Both teachers and students emphasised the value of personal connection time andthe opportunity it afforded them to relax and joke together. Students’ commentshighlighted the importance of positive relationships with their teachers to the extentof even valuing their teachers using students’ personal nicknames.
While acknowledging the importance of this personal relationship, it was evidentthat students did not want personal information they disclosed to teachers to beshared with others. The students’ comments suggested that teachers not honouringthis assumed confidentiality would not only have a detrimental effect on the teacher–student relationship but also on student motivation to learn. When disclosures causeconfusion or concern for teachers, teachers need to ensure that they adhere to ethicalboundaries in handling them (New Zealand Teachers’ Council, 2004).
Although the teachers were aware of and practised a large range of strategiesdesigned to enhance self-worth in the classroom (e.g. recognising and catering forindividual needs, developing a positive and supportive relationship with each student,using encouragement, praise and even nicknames when appropriate), it was thestudents who placed the greater emphasis on the need for these strategies to beexecuted sincerely and with consideration of the individual recipient’s feelings.Students valued, for example, praise that was specific, pertinent to their learning andgiven in the privacy of a one-to-one interaction.
The study also highlights the importance of the classroom culture in enhancingself-worth. It supports Nuthall’s (2007) proposal that teachers should capitalise onpeer culture to foster learning because, in the absence of a democratic and collabora-tive environment, teachers’ efforts to provide positive encouragement and supportmight inadvertently lead to increased classroom tensions. Most importantly, thestudy findings complement existing understandings of the complex and multifacetednature of the classroom interface between teachers and students. In so doing, itreminds teachers of the importance of gaining understanding of the inherent unique-ness of their own classrooms and how the dynamics of relationships between teacherand student and between student and student within those rooms influence studentself-worth and, from there, motivation to learn.
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