Wonder if I can help students overcome test anxiety by having the first question be something that primes them to think well of themselves. But it's hard for me to think of a question that would be likely to work for everyone. (You can ask college students "hey, how do you feel about this tremendous privilege you have in attending an awesome school?" but it doesn't work so well for 13-year-olds who have neither the choice nor the perspective.)
My first impulse is to respond to you, "but you're teaching privileged white males anyway! They don't need any leg up!"
But then, you have talked about teaching minorities, too, so that isn't exactly true. And really, everyone should be given the opportunity to raise themselves to the highest level, regardless.
Maybe something like, "think of moment in the last year that made you feel accomplished," or "what's your favorite extracurricular activity?" or even "what do you want to be when you grow up?"
And yeah, (a) not everyone I'm teaching is a privileged white male (I mean, they are all privileged to some extent because they are going to my school, but they are not all rich and they are not all white, though I plead guilty on the male thing ;), and (b) some of them really do have horrible test anxiety and they shouldn't have to feel that way or be held back from their potential.
There was an interesting moment when we were commenting on white male privilege -- the health class has a panel of us female faculty in to talk about Woman Stuff and answer their questions on stuff like that, and somehow the good ol' boys' network came up, and people were talking about it without ever saying the obvious thing (which eventually I just had to point out) -- "we are talking about YOU here".
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2006-09-01 11:07 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-09-01 01:32 pm (UTC)But then, you have talked about teaching minorities, too, so that isn't exactly true. And really, everyone should be given the opportunity to raise themselves to the highest level, regardless.
Maybe something like, "think of moment in the last year that made you feel accomplished," or "what's your favorite extracurricular activity?" or even "what do you want to be when you grow up?"
no subject
Date: 2006-09-01 06:54 pm (UTC)And yeah, (a) not everyone I'm teaching is a privileged white male (I mean, they are all privileged to some extent because they are going to my school, but they are not all rich and they are not all white, though I plead guilty on the male thing ;), and (b) some of them really do have horrible test anxiety and they shouldn't have to feel that way or be held back from their potential.
There was an interesting moment when we were commenting on white male privilege -- the health class has a panel of us female faculty in to talk about Woman Stuff and answer their questions on stuff like that, and somehow the good ol' boys' network came up, and people were talking about it without ever saying the obvious thing (which eventually I just had to point out) -- "we are talking about YOU here".
Good questions.