OPINION:
I teach teachers for a living.
This means I spent much of my time learning about and learning from teachers and their students. One lesson that stands out is how fragile and collaborative the process of education is when done well.
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Summer can feel like a time to forget school for a while. And if we do manage to think ahead to the semester, we might think of summer reading lists or honing math skills. But I want to point to a different way in which parents, especially Christian parents, can help prepare their children for learning.
Most of us sense that education is about more than accumulating facts. If your child takes a class and doesn’t grow or change in some beneficial way, you should be concerned. If all they emerge with is a pile of notes, you should be dissatisfied. Education contributes to shaping who we become — not just intellectually, but morally, socially, spiritually. That kind of learning emerges amid the rich relationships built in good classrooms.
That’s why a good teacher’s preparation for a new year does not start with getting their resources in order. It starts with their heart, and with how they imagine the students they will serve. I can imagine my students as tasks, or nuisances or obligations. I can also imagine them as living images of God who, like the adults in their lives, need guides as they stumble their way toward truth, goodness, beauty, responsibility, service and love.
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At the start of a new semester, connections matter. I always arrange a one-on-one meeting with each student, inviting them to share their worries and goals for the new semester. I make time in class for them to constructively connect with other students. I invite explicit conversation about how we will commit to supporting one another’s learning.
I try to model the intentional, respectful connection I hope to foster in the classroom. When things go well, students start to build a sense of trust that will clear space in their minds and open them to learning. They also start to see their fellow learners as neighbors among whom they can give and receive care.
But none of this is something I or any other teacher can simply engineer. Building relationships with and among my students depends on teaching skills, but also on the preparation of my heart and the spirit with which I approach others. And the same is true for students.
If my students are not willing to take the risk of engaging, there will be severe limits to what we can learn together. If students are absorbed only in themselves, with little openness to investing in the well-being of those around them, the classroom will remain a lonely, sometimes fearful place. If students think that every moment of transformation in school must be engineered solely by their teacher, we will fall short of where we could have traveled.
So students too would do well to prepare their hearts for the school year. Students too can pray for their future teacher and classmates. Students too can begin to imagine contributing to things going well for everyone, and prepare to give as well as to receive.
This is where parents come in. How do you help orient your child to the next school year? How much of your talk about school is focused only on individual achievement or getting tasks done? Are comments about hard work and compliance balanced with talk of love of neighbor, the needs of other students, or how learning feeds into service?
Do you talk supportively about teachers and help your child to understand how much difference their own open-hearted engagement can make to how well their teachers can teach? Do you pray for and encourage your child’s teachers, who are engaged in difficult work that is essential, rewarding, but often stressful and sometimes maligned?
This brings us to your own heart.
Parents, pray for your student’s future educators. Try to meet them, either during the summer or immediately prior to the beginning of the semester. Assure them of your support. And offer your student the confidence, security and resources necessary for developing the trusting, respectful relationship that they and their teacher need to truly flourish together.
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Dr. David I. Smith is a Professor at Calvin University in Grand Rapids, MI, the founding Director of the Kuyers Institute for Christian Teaching and Learning as well as the inaugural coordinator of the De Vries Institute for Global Faculty Development.
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