There are certain kinds of pressures that contribute to success at Choate and others to failure. Living in such a highly competitive environment, the academic, social, and athletic stress is often too much. Boarding school is an emotional roller-coaster. Even the most stable people find themselves overwhelmed. For the luckier students, Choate teaches people how to perform under pressure. These individuals learn to respond to stress and demands; however, most teachers and adults at Choate do not foster positive attitudes and ways to deal with stress.
Teachers do not understand that while school and an education is paramount for most students, the time management, organization, and overall effort demanded for assignments is extraordinarily exhausting. The ability for a teacher to recognize and student’s workload and have a sense of her abilities to try to work to improve the weaker academic aspects is the difference between a ‘good’ and ‘bad’ teacher. In addition, a teacher must give constructive criticism. A teacher needs to be able to push her students to produce their best work by offering well-reasoned opinions both positive and negative. The nit-picky way teachers at Choate evaluate their students is discouraging. The overly critical approach does not motivate the student to do better next time, but instead, it breaks the students confidence for subsequent assignments.
A similar optimism is crucial in a coaching staff. Without positive encouragement, athletes take the game too seriously. They put the pressure of success on their own shoulders and start defining their self-worth by the outcome of the game. Players need their coaches support to alleviate the stress. An effective coach does not exploit the flaws of one athlete’s game to try and toughen her players. She pushes her athletes to the limit in a way that inspires and makes them believe in themselves. She does not pick on certain players or incessantly express her disapproval of the team dynamic or performance. She observes and gets to know each player individually to try to come up with the best method for the team to reach peak performance. While the most successful players are less likely to crack under pressure, they still need the same encouragement and advice. Ultimately, all teachers and coaches must use an optimistic approach to ease academic stress or motivate their trainees.
I have always wondered what makes a "good" or "bad" teacher but I have never thought about it in this way. All teachers and coaches at Choate must be able to understand the workload of each student. It proves to be very stressful when multiple teachers give loads of work; however, in the long run, Choate and its difficulties will pay off.
ReplyDelete