Consider the humble lunch as one of your most powerful teaching tools.
From the first day of school, Ricky was one of my most difficult students. Defensive, angry, and sensitive, this 7-year-old was constantly putting up walls and “testing” the adults in charge to see if we would respond to his needs. With the lack of a guidance counselor or a full-time school psychologist in the school, I knew that I had to find a way to connect with him, or we were going to have a disastrous school year.
I wanted to meet with Ricky outside our normal class time. I wondered if he would respond to having lunch with me. When I invited him, he was surprised. “Am I in trouble?” he asked. I assured him that he was not—the invitation was optional, and I just wanted to get to know him better. Curiosity got the better of him and we had lunch the very next day.
During that lunch, which took place in the classroom at his table of choice (“I want to sit at your reading table!”), I asked him questions about himself, his likes and dislikes, his relationship with his brothers and other small chit-chat. More importantly, Ricky got my full attention. That made him feel special and less likely to seek out my attention through negative behaviors.
I made a point to have lunch with Ricky at least once every two weeks. Sometimes I would ask him to invite a friend. Sometimes another teacher would join us. We worked on conversational skills, practiced our reactions to things that made him angry and sometimes just hung out. During the lunches, he learned to trust me. So even when I had to discipline him, he’d be angry about it, but he wouldn’t push me away. I discovered how to get him to laugh, and taught him how get himself out of a tantrum. He taught me patience and who the best WWE wrestlers were.
Sharing mealtime with students in a relaxing environment can help you understand them as learners and help make you a better teacher. They might be more willing to tell you that they don’t understand something (better to discover that sooner rather than during an assessment). Or, they might reveal a hidden interest that you can weave into your lessons.
Some teachers do not like the idea of sharing “their time” (a.k.a. lunch) with pupils. We are a busy group, after all, often working through lunch. (Raise you hand if you’ve gotten crumbs on the copier.) But sitting down and sharing a meal with students, particularly ones that might be labeled as “difficult,” can reap large dividends down the line.
Ricky and I had our ups and downs that year, but I’d like to think that he ended the year on a good note. He was less likely to start fights and we actually made some academic progress. Hopefully, he will look back on his second-grade year and feel that he was listened to and respected.
Education experts Hugh Mehan and Deborah Stipek have advocated for connecting with students. Read what they have said here and here.
Barlow is an elementary school teacher in Connecticut.
