CURMUDGUCATION: Trust And Teaching

CURMUDGUCATION: Trust And Teaching

Trust And Teaching

Among the may lessons we get to glean from the coronavirus semester is this one: trust matters.

Trust matters a lot. And it matters in little things as well as big things, because little things set the stage for big things. You can start out with silly stuff like "My inauguration crowd was the biggest ever," and folks can just wave it off as harmless, but at the other end of the road is a major event for which the public needs a dependable national-level source of information, and there is not one to be found.

Trumpism is a symptom of a larger disease, fed and watered by the internet (which is neutral on the subject of truth) and actively supported by the fringe media (which is actively opposed to it). Fox is only the most successful of the breed. There are plenty of others out there pushing conspiracy theories and fear-feeding bullshit (go see just how much is out there pushing the idea that the coronavirus is caused by 5G phone networking). Both sides do it, but the right does it more effectively (Fox News).

Trust is a quality that literally erodes-- the more of it that is worn away, the harder it is to build, and the faster even more is lost. In the absence of trust, fear grows. And fear makes people stupid. And people who don't know how to build or gauge trust become increasingly desperate for someone or something that will tell them what to think, what to feel, what to do.

That leads to the most classic of mistakes--mistaking confidence for competence.

This is a mistake that young humans are particularly prone to make (I once read a piece arguing convincingly that the key to being popular in high school is being confident).

So what is a classroom teacher to do?

First, earn the trust of your students. Create a trust-filled environment, and put the maintenance of that trust at the top of the list of your teaching values. That means being honest, including about CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: Trust And Teaching