Passing notes in class: Using note writing to build compassionate student-teacher relationships by Kathryn Fishman-Weaver
I believe in passing notes in class. I’ve passed notes in my elementary, secondary, and higher education classrooms. Quick, personal notes, often on quarter sheets, running up the margins of a student’s paper, or most recently, via text message, are an easy and effective tool to build compassionate student-teacher relationships. These relationships are essential for advancing student achievement. In the following article I build the case for why establishing positive and compassionate student-teacher relationships is necessary to support students and how note writing can be a vehicle for this aim. I outline specifics of how I have used note writing to build these supportive student-teacher relationships in my own teaching practice across K-20 classrooms.
There is a body research that supports the link between student-teacher relationships and learning. In his book, Inspiring the Best in Students, Jonathon Erwin (2010) writes that the key to motivating students and increasing engagement lies in the student-teacher relationship. “If students like and respect you [the teacher], and feel cared for and respected, they will learn anything you have to teach (13).” Carl Rogers also wrote about the link between relationships and learning. Rogers’ framework concerned the capacity a teacher has to develop relationships with their students through facilitative conditions such as genuineness and empathy. Aspy and Roebuck (1977) tested the correlation between these conditions and student outcomes. They found students of compassionate or “high facilitative” teachers made “greater gains on academic achievement measures, including both math and reading scores, and present[ed] fewer disciplinary problems (McEwan 2002, 33-34).” Being a high facilitative teacher, doesn’t have to be highly complicated; sometimes it can be as simple as writing a note.
I’ve seen the simple importance of note writing with my own children. For example, when I pack my son’s lunch, I include a note. In her book, Other People’s Children, Lisa Delpit (2006) pointedly reminds us that effective teachers treat their students with the same compassion and expectations that they do their own children. As an educator, note writing is a familial practice I have extended to my classroom. Sometimes the notes I write to my students are just a general word of encouragement. Other times I cite the specific strengths they demonstrated on a recent paper or project. Still other times I clip a comic, recent photo of the class, or thought provoking poem to share with students. At the bottom of every note is my contact information. Open lines of communication are essential in developing compassionate relationships.
I have created systems to make note writing as efficient as possible. There is a stack of blank note cards prepared with my contact information on my teacher desk at school. I also have a stack of postcards on my file cabinet and a roll of stamps in my drawer to send out good news notes at a moment’s notice. There is a postcard template saved to my computer to type out a quick sentence and hand to a student. If I am away from my desk or computer, I pull out my phone and send a text message. My note writing practice is short, simple, and positive. The notes average less than two sentences: a line about hitting a home run in the softball game, a quick sentence about earning 100% on a math test, a note to say what a glowing confident smile my student has after getting her braces off. It takes only a moment. Yet, this simple practice has a significant impact across the diverse student populations in my personal teaching practice.
Although oral praise is powerful too, my students tell me they appreciate the written record these notes give them. In her book on effective feedback, Brookhart (2008) writes, “Writing…requires an understanding that language does more than describe our world; it helps us construct our world.” (31) My notes help students construct a positive, creative, and successful self-image This image becomes a source of pride. My notes show up in my high school students’ lockers or tacked to their bulletin boards at home. My elementary parents posted the notes on their refrigerators. I even see my quarter page notes tucked into the sleeves of my college students’ binders.
I set reminders to text my high school students before their science competitions or on their birthdays. In my elementary classroom I worked with a parent every week to translate my notes into Spanish. These small acts reframe the nature of the student-teacher relationship. Judy Willis (2006), a neurologist, studies the connection between the classroom environment and learning but through a medical lens, “as has been revealed through neuroimaging studies… students’ comfort level has a critical impact on information transmission and storage in the brain (58).” She lists “trust and positive feelings for teachers” as essential factors in students’ comfort levels saying these types of characteristics are “directly related to the state of mind that is compatible with the most successful, learning, remembering, and higher order thinking (58).” The trust and positive feelings created by my notes help my students know they matter and are cared for, which in turn, influences them to achieve at higher levels.
The utility of this pedagogical exercise cuts across the special education/gifted education learning continuum as well as over the K-20 learning arenas. Note writing is a simple teaching tool that empowers student-teacher relationships. The research (as well as my personal practice) supports that building these relationships is directly linked to learning. Compassion, whether it is expressed in a text message, post card, or a short paragraph helps students construct positive self-image, builds meaningful student-teacher relationships, and supports our efforts at increasing student achievement. In short, we would do well to pass a few more notes in class.
References
Brookhart, Susan M. 2008. “How to Give Effective Written Feedback .” In How to Give Effective Feedback to Your Students, by Susan M. Brookhart, 31–35. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
Delpit, Lisa. 2006. Other People’s Children: Cultural Conflict in the Classroom. New York: The New Press,
Erwin, Jonathan C. 2010. Inspiring the Best in Students. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
McEwan, Elaine K. 2002. “Personal Traits That Indicate Character.” In 10 Traights of Highly Effective Teachers: How to Hire, Coach, and Mentor Successful Teachers, by Elaine K. McEwan, 29–36. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press Inc.
Willis, Judy. 2006. “How Stress and Emotion Affect Learning.” In Research-Based Strategies to Ignite Student Learning, by Judy Willis, 56–74. Alexandria, VA: ASCD.
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Mrs. Weaver taught my daughter. She touched my child’s heart through many notes and postcards. My daughter just graduated from high school this May(2013), and she shared every note and postcard with me. I can tell you as a parent/educator that Mrs. Weaver’s practice helped my bright but lonely child feel that another adult beside her adoring mother cared about her.
I am very impressed by the idea of passing notes to students in class, since this simple practice would reinforce the student-teacher relationship in a humane way. As the author stressed, one essential way to promote students learning is to establish a compassionate and positive student-teacher relationship. Writing notes for students’ works as a confidence booster, which would be the “source of pride” for the students, as the author indicated. The more trust and positive feeling the students have for the teachers, the more comfortable environment the students in, and as a result, a more efficient learning process works among students.
I see teacher’s feedback for our academic work as an important piece to our further improvement. If writing notes would be counted as a type of written feedback from teachers, however, it is comparatively a smaller act and less formal than the assignment feedback. Yet it refreshes the students’ minds when they receive the sweet notes ranging from a short poem to a warm reminder, because they know their teachers do care about them.
In the article, the author mentioned that “this simple practice has a significant influence on the diverse students population,” and it makes me to think about this practice could be addressed more to the classrooms in low-income schools districts. Students from low-income backgrounds are more likely to suffer from lack of confidence. If teachers are able to write them notes constantly with encouragement such as “I really like you’re the question you asked in class today! Keep doing that”; the student would be motivated to ask more questions next time with the decreasing of non-confident feeling. In all, this practice of writing notes would work well in boosting students’ sense of confidence and also benefiting the student-teacher relationship, and in turn, influencing them to achieve to a higher level.
Every interaction we have with another person builds an additional connection, either positive, negative, or neutral. As technology increasingly saturates society, including education, the rarity of hand-written notes grows exponentially. Hand-written notes and letters from friends, families, mentors, and even teachers are cherished with higher values than an email or text message of encouragement. I find this very personal connection of a hand-written note from a teacher to a student to be a simple gesture with great impact.
As the author states, physical evidence supports her claims in favor of this practice, showing that a student’s ability and willingness to learn increases with this positive relationship. Students are receptive of knowledge and information, but as the relationship between student and teacher strengthens, the socio-emotional effect on the educational outcomes greatly improve.
From personal experience on the receiving end of notes from educators, they continuously act as guidance through the years. I find myself often referencing a post-it note from my fourth grade teacher with the simple, yet profound message of “everything will be ok.” This post-it, along with others from various mentors and teachers throughout my educational career act as building blocks to my confidence within and outside the classroom.