How to Intervene without Making it Worse by Rosalind Wiseman
E U R O P E A N L E A G U E F O R M I D D L E L E V E L E D U C A T I O N
How to Intervene without Making it Worse by Rosalind Wiseman
The subject I chose for this article is a topic I have struggled with myself: When you see a young person mistreated by their peers, how do you intervene without making things worse for the target?
What’ s great about this question is it shows how the educator realizes that the way they interact with the group impacts the target’ s ability to advocate( or not) for themselves.
Here’ s what I believe we always need to keep in mind: No matter what we teach, our credibility and effectiveness as educators is based on authentic, meaningful, respectful engagement with each and every student. It’ s easy to say, but in practice, it can be difficult to accomplish.
Let’ s admit that some of our students can be personally very challenging. For example, have you had a student that got on your last nerve because they were really good at being mean and negative to other students but refused to take ownership for their actions? Have you ever been frustrated with a young person because they kept going back to the same kids who treated them like dirt or covered up for them?
We are going to have feelings about the cruel social dynamics that can occur between our students. And those feelings are a gift and a liability. A gift when they fuel our passion to uphold our students’ dignity and motivate us to self-reflect about our own effectiveness. Or, a liability if our emotions blind us from seeing how we may make the problem worse. We have a responsibility to intervene appropriately and effectively. But, specifically, how do we do that?
We have to dig deep and get honest with ourselves. How did we grow up learning to speak truth to power? How did we learn to intervene in a conflict between people? Almost all of us learned to respond to aggression and anger in three ways: avoid, attack or acquiesce. These three responses have the potential to control our relationships in every aspect of our lives including family, friends, intimate partners and work colleagues.
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