How can we give them the keys to their resilience? How can we enable them to make sense of what is offered at school , and (re)discover the pleasure of learning?

We are not responsible for what we experience, but we are responsible for what we do with it. So let’s make sure we give them the keys to this responsibility to escape the emotional and the painful, to transform it into a force for change!

Tip 1: Support motivation

Even though we know that our students are not necessarily ready to learn during this chaotic period in terms of educational continuity, the fear of not doing our job remains. What if we used pedagogical tricks to dare a different approach? An approach that would encourage engagement and motivation to try (we say try) to get them back on the path to learning and the desire to learn together!

Tip 2: Make the task accessible

“I don’t know how to do it.”, “It’s too hard” … Lack of concentration, perseverance, there are many signs showing us the difficulty many students have in committing to the task and especially in overcoming the difficulty . An observation to work on, so that our students rediscover the desire to learn.

Adapting the proposed work to the students’ abilities makes it accessible. If we ensure that students, especially those with significant difficulties, see successes and feel capable of completing the task, they will be more likely to engage in the activity and persevere.

Tip 3: Develop autonomy

Students need to feel that they are actors in their learning (see the need for autonomy mentioned in the first part), which implies having a good understanding of the issues

Before getting started, clarifying the framework provides reassurance and encourages independent action. Children need a clear vision of the task to take ownership of it (time, place, objectives) and the means of assistance available to them if necessary during the activity.

Once the task is completed, comes the essential time for feedback. Errors are an integral part of the learning process , because it is by making mistakes that we learn. While this is a given for us teachers, it is not necessarily the case in the minds of our students, who can quickly associate error with failure . To help them grasp this in a constructive way, we must allow the student to make the link between their action (method used) and failures or successes in order to establish the relationship between the strategy and the result.

Tip 4: Establish an alliance with adults

In a period of general fatigue such as the one we are going through, let’s admit that communication (wherever it takes place) is suffering from the anger that everyone has been storing up for almost two years.

We may try to reason with ourselves, telling ourselves that this student’s father’s verbal aggression is not aimed at us and that he would be better off speaking to our institution, but the fact remains that we are the ones taking the hits. So how can we try to protect ourselves (parents, students, teachers) from these excesses? Perhaps through explicit safeguards that we can put in place?

Among the protective factors that frame the child’s schooling , there are adults (family, teacher, activity leaders): all have a role to play in their success. When the child perceives that adults have understood that he or she wants to succeed, but does not succeed despite his or her efforts, the alliance is created.

 A quality family-school relationship provides a reassuring environment for the student, who feels surrounded by adults who are working together, in the same direction, in their best interest. Each family has a different representation of the school and different expectations . It is important to take this into account in order to adapt the proposed project to the child.

Tip 5: Maintain the classroom climate

A classroom in which we feel good is a classroom in which we want to invest! The “classroom effect”, the “teacher effect”, having a pleasant space contributes to developing a feeling of security, motivation and self-confidence: positive reinforcement, encouragement, recognition of effort, cooperation, support, participation in projects , etc.