June 16, 2021 • 41 mins
Within this episode, we explore the topic of Emotional Pedagogy with Alan McLean. Alan draws upon his extensive experience in the education sector to unpick what is meant by the term emotional pedagogy and the impact that emotions can have on the learning experience, from both the perspective of lecturers and students. Alan explores different concepts such as the Compendium of Emotions and what is meant by the term Emotional Coaching. For further information and to find out more about the Emotional Ring and other resources Alan references in this episode, please visit the What Motivates Learning website.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:07):
Hello and welcome to the latest episode
of the Pedagogy Matters Podcast.
The purpose of this podcast is to bring to
the force and key topics of conversation
in relation to learning and teaching,
to discuss, to break down aspects
of practice and provide snippets,
advice and guidance as to how to
integrate these into our daily practice.
Today, I'm delighted to be joined
by Al McLean and we'll be exploring
(00:27):
a topic of emotional pedagogy.
So, Alan, good morning, how are you?
Good morning. I'm very well.
Thank you. Good.
You know it's nice to see what he's
talked before but kind of the weather
starting to turn which is a nice change
for the heading towards summer which is
great and I guess that ties in nicely
I guess with elements of of of emotion,
you know already but so yeah
so topic emotional pedagogy.
(00:48):
So people are thinking wow,
so I've never heard before.
So I guess you what do we mean by this
kind of what can be meant by this term?
Yeah well I think I think the
term emotional pedagogies.
Be kicking around.
It came into my mind when I was doing
the recent webinar with uh for the
college development network because
(01:09):
it was pretty obvious that um,
when I was explaining my whole emotion ring,
as I call it,
the model that helps us understand emotions,
it was pretty uh and that was we
were looking at how we can support
vulnerable students.
It was obvious to everyone there that
that model applied to staff well-being,
but also applied to this emotional pedagogy
(01:30):
and emotional pedagogy basically is just.
Emotionally,
it shouldn't.
Teaching that placed his feelings
at the forefront of learning and
learning and teaching.
It's kind of emotionally skilled teaching,
and it's.
It's been around forever basically,
and everyone knows about it.
It's just we're just trying to
make it a bit more explicit.
I love some, I love the quotes,
everyone knows the the Maya Angelou quote.
(01:52):
And people will forget what
you said and what you did,
but they never forget how you made them feel.
Uh, I mean,
everyone knows that looking
back in their own.
Education.
When you think of your favorite teacher,
you could remember.
The teacher should remember that the teachers
that made an emotional impact on you,
usually a positive one.
There's another nice one.
(02:12):
I like John Maxwell.
People will hear your words,
but they feel your attitudes.
I think that's quite powerful.
I think really, yeah,
you're absolutely right in terms of,
you know,
the impact that we as people in
education can have on our students,
you know, actually fundamental.
And that effect comes back
from relationships and that
(02:34):
emotion is at the heart.
And I think it's interesting one pick
us will go through a conversation
this morning obviously or maybe
even get it straight away.
Obviously the last 15 months has
really flipped elements on its head
in terms of education as we know it
in terms of face to face contact
and face to face relationships
as just flipped into a an online
or a hybrid world, you know.
(02:55):
Some colleagues and our support to
kind of struggled with that from a
lecturers or teachers perspective
and those students have as well, no.
But I think would it be fair to say
that the same principles apply whether
you're teaching face to face or online
around what's important going to be
in tune with your emotions with your
students and so on and so forth.
What are your thoughts on that?
(03:16):
That's a challenging one.
It's uh, it's, it's certainly is.
I think it probably it's the exact same.
It's exact same. The the, UM,
the principles of effective pedagogy are
the same no matter what the context.
But it's probably paradoxically
more important in a in a
(03:36):
kind of digital relationship.
But it's probably more difficult and the
immediate thing that comes to my mind is.
Nonverbal communication.
Nonverbal communication
is absolutely crucial.
Everyone knows that it's predominant,
uh, vehicle and but that's so difficult.
That's why I think people find find find
(03:58):
the digital relationship a bit frustrating.
I mean, the face is probably the most
important tool that lecturers got.
Uh, but how do you communicate?
Uh, facial expressions, uh, digitally.
So you probably have to exaggerate them,
which starts to starts to one,
don't you worry about authenticity and so on.
So I can understand why election
(04:20):
is a struggle,
and we also know about why it's so
draining because you're you're,
you're having to kind of force your,
your emotional communication and
that's probably what's what makes it
so exhausting and also trying to pick up.
My biggest challenge,
I think, would be to pick up.
His lectures are intuitively
tuned into students,
(04:42):
but they're tuned into students body
language and faces and latitude and so on.
So to pick that up digitally
is quite a challenge.
No,
you're actually right.
Throw it deep and straight
where that question.
But those issues that you mentioned
have been exactly issues that
lectures are fierce in terms of
the nonverbal cues straight away.
The triggers are even the the ad
(05:02):
hoc relationships that I built when
moving around the classroom talking to
students and that has been lost to a degree.
So I guess let's go back to basics.
So we're talking around education,
education approaches more broadly,
I guess lectures management you think, right.
I think I do this,
but I'm not sure so from your.
Perspective on.
(05:22):
When we're talking emotional pedagogy,
what are the principles or can how can
it be done or what should be considered?
Right.
Can I just preface what I'm gonna say?
But a few brief comments about
about emotions can I I'll be brief.
Uh, this is the technical side.
Obviously,
emotions are pretty central to our lives.
(05:42):
They underpin our relationships,
thinking and learning.
And there's no there's no better
way to understand ourselves.
And but they are,
they are mysterious and and complex.
But my premise is that we can actually
master them more than we realize.
And this is all about mastery.
And my master is basically,
um, you know,
(06:03):
I I define emotional well-being as as,
as not so much feeling good,
but it's been good at feeling.
And it comes to this.
Mastering emotions and essentially
mastering emotions comes down to making
sense of the purpose of emotions.
And the technical bridges for a
second is what, what are emotions?
We need to stop and think about
that. And emotions are basically
(06:25):
the cognitive interpretations
of of our physical sensations.
Sensations only become emotions.
Uh. When we go through something
called cognitive framing,
we frame it through our words and our
concepts and that's when we interpret
the cause and purpose and so on.
And how well we read our sensations depend
on our kind of emotional vocabulary.
(06:47):
It's our skills and comparing
emotions basically.
And give you a simple analogy if you think
if you're if you're an expert in birds.
Or trees or cars or football teams.
You can sort, you can sort them between,
you can compare them and contrast them,
you can sort them.
So whenever you go in nature well
you'll get much more out of it.
And it's exact same with them with emotions.
(07:08):
So my my big kind of premise is if my
lectures become more attuned to emotions,
they'll be able to kind of.
You know, understand what's going on better.
The emotion ring very, very briefly.
It's a visual model on my visual
person and I'm a kind of systematizer.
I like structure,
I like to organize things
and the emotion ring.
(07:29):
And it would be quite helpful if people
are listening to this podcast to have
a a copy of the Emotion ring to hand.
Basically it's a it's a comprehensive
and kind of coherent kind of organize it
as a template of all the main emotion
concepts organized by their purpose
and that that gives us a set of tools
(07:51):
to help develop emotional vocabulary,
also helps us self reflect.
Helps us reflect,
helps them to support students
through as a coaching tool and
as among a group of students.
We can maybe talk about that,
but the most important thing from a
pedagogical point of view is it gives
us a structure taking a reflect on.
(08:11):
How come that students responding?
Well, how come? What happened there?
Blew it there. What happened there?
What was wrong with him?
Uh, what did I do?
So it's that's a useful, it's a useful
structure to think about things.
Um, I've forgotten about you.
What's your first?
What was your question?
That's going to really good
(08:33):
introduction I guess around emotions
and it's purpose within education
because you're absolutely right
with the examples towards the end,
you know teaching and learning is not
black and white. I teach you learn.
You know we're dealing with people
you know both with our own emotions,
emotions of our colleagues,
but also the emotions of our students now,
right.
I'm hope I'm summarizing this
correctly here that's.
(08:56):
That greater awareness of emotions
will only enhance our practice
and kind of make more aware.
Now we might not be able to change emotions,
but it makes us more aware as
lecturers and practitioners.
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, a central point for me is when I
trace my work over the last 2324 years.
(09:16):
It's it's through behaviour management,
through anti bullying strategies,
through self motivation,
through developing identity,
through the the,
the latest uh working emotion.
It's all I've been, it's all,
it's all been about self-awareness.
I mean every election that I've ever met
in my career I've met thousands of them.
We all want to be as effective as
(09:38):
we can but I I'm I'm convinced.
Everyone's pretty self motivated,
they want to improve and everyone's,
everyone's got that commonality.
But we're very in our capacity
for self-awareness or the the
kind of the partner of that self
reflection and that's the challenge.
So all my works been about kind of self
(10:01):
reflection and we're really I'm into
giving people structures for self reflection.
Self reflection is really bloody hearts
because the language is really hard.
We're very aware of how.
Other people impact on us,
but we're not.
We're not so weird on how
we impact on other people.
That's the tricky but because we've
got lots of blind spots and self
(10:21):
delusions and self deceptions and so on.
And I'll give you a simple again,
a quick uh,
I like to give people thought
experiments or simple exercises,
but a nice exercise for a lecture
to do is just to take a class list.
And um.
Flip through it very quickly and
and write an emotion right beside
(10:42):
each student in terms of how how
they feel about that student.
And in the end of it have a quick
take away that the students names
and then look at the emotions and
then summarize them and then put
them into their structure and
then show it to our colleague.
That would be a marvelous exercise
just to put them in touch with.
(11:03):
And you certainly don't know
from your experience,
but I think students have emotional
relationships with their classes.
And that's a really interesting
thing to explore.
But um, so alright, I think it's interesting.
Yeah.
Because when you take time to pause
and reflect like you see and you have
a conversation with other colleagues,
you broaden that perspective in
(11:24):
relation to students and how they
behave and how they act and and
and how that works well for others.
And I know again,
just sitting back to my own past
experience of small towns and most
frustrating comment was no, no,
that learner works well for me.
They're absolutely fine for me.
Doesn't help.
Let's get on,
pick that and let's put it back.
And when you talk,
(11:44):
then I'll behavior management again.
From experience that I have had
like a key part of where behavior
management is effective is where
there's an effective relationship.
Now that's not as easy in practice
because there are a wide variety of
reasons why student behaviors are poor.
However, that I think what you're
seeing is the enhanced awareness of
(12:06):
the emotions of the individuals in
the situation will help practitioner.
Consider your approaches and how you manage
and how you interact with that student.
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I know.
You've done a lot of work in this space
and and yeah and it's it's kind of really
quite interesting and going back to kind
of the the question asked initially
is so kind of given two ideas so far
(12:28):
as how do lectures start with this.
You've mentioned the emotions ring.
You've mentioned kind of having a look
at learning to spend a bit of time and
thinking actually what what emotion
would I allocate to that learner.
How else would lecturers?
Build us in the process,
(12:49):
you know of their own practice,
all their practicing students because
it's it's a complex situation. Yeah.
So how would they go about that?
And everyone knows that there's no
such thing as an unmitigated good.
You know, everyone knows it's the
Aristotle concept of the golden mean.
Everything in moderation,
what that means is 1.
Good quality has to be balanced by
(13:11):
another good quality and support has
to be balanced with the challenge
if we have too much support.
And not enough challenge.
Uh, that becomes kind of problematic.
And I I think I think of the and again,
again, again.
I could give give people a a
nice simple thought experiment.
Think about your your typical
(13:32):
practice if you were to spend 20,
share 20 points between support
and challenge.
What would you, what would you give support?
What would you give challenge?
For example,
you might give support 12 and you might
so that means you give challenge 8.
Your son has always got to add up to 20.
That's quite interesting once
since soon as some I'd ask somebody
(13:53):
that I know a lot about them,
but I don't want you to add that up.
I want you to multiply these two figures.
OK,
so for example if you if you
said 12 and eight for support,
that gives you a score of 96.
Which is pretty good.
You could have been buying on.
You could have said I'm a 10 by 10
(14:14):
and it gives you a score of 100.
So that's sure.
I call that your pretentiously.
I call that your beneficence OK,
which is basically your positive
input now you might be a.
PET shirt or uh or a lecturer
and and you know electronics
and you're you're kind of match.
I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm stereotyping here
(14:37):
but you might be kind of mature.
I don't I don't go into all
this touchy feely rubbish.
I'll I'll leave support to other people.
I'm I'm 18 for challenge and
that leaves 2 for support.
Well,
the bad news for you is
your beneficence is 36.
And the interesting thing is you can't.
(14:58):
You can't.
Um, you may be brilliant at challenge,
you might be charismatic,
uh,
but you can't make up for your
lack of support through your
excellence and your challenge.
You need both.
So I I've, I've given nice,
simple terms I like to talk about.
You're either either a squeezer or a hugger.
(15:20):
Ideally, you're a swagger.
You're a squeezer, squeezer as a
lecturer who's very high profile,
charismatic, demanding,
challenging, dynamic, pushy.
Probably very popular.
Uh, sense of urgency, high demand and so on.
That's fantastic.
But if that person's not sensitive
(15:42):
to people's vulnerabilities,
then they slip into becoming a bruiser.
So the squeezer can become a bruiser
and the students are gonna fear you.
They might respect you,
but they fear you,
and they're probably gonna hate you.
Yeah. And that's devastating from a
emotional pedagogy point of view.
Equally, they're very nice, warm.
(16:04):
Invitational approach where people are
very empathic and sensitive and uh.
You're very caring and so on.
That's fantastic.
And people will love you.
And uh, you'll have fantastic relationships.
But if you slip into being over
helpful or or or over caring,
you slip into being a bit overprotective,
(16:24):
smothering.
You actually even start to intrude.
Yeah and students,
I don't want to tell you about my background.
Get lost.
And the challenge is to try and
get the challenge is to reflect
on yourself and students can,
staff can reflect on this very neatly.
If they go onto our website,
there's a profile,
a self reflection profile called
(16:46):
the inspiring profile and that
allows lecturers to take 20
minutes to stop and think.
The they evaluate themselves on
on the ring on the dynamics of
these teaching styles as I call it,
and that gives them a.
Gives them a benchmark to think
about and and to to share with other
colleagues and if they're really,
(17:06):
if they're courageous.
Um and are really into partnership.
They can actually get their students
to complete the profiles about them.
And we can actually helps colleges
to kind of collate all these
profiles together in a neat little
package that gives instant feedback
and then what what the lecture
(17:26):
then does is be grateful.
It's a fantastic way to build
partnership and mutuality and let
the sorry and the students the to
finish off the lecture just has a
discussion about it and has a good has
a good chat about what they learned from it.
Yeah no I think that's.
So I'm just going to jump back to,
(17:47):
you know,
you gave a couple of different
examples of lectures who may
have different approaches as in,
yeah, emotions aren't from me.
You're going to come in here that
these are the rules of the classroom.
Yeah.
And it's not necessarily about.
Everybody.
Um, really?
Change your account,
reopening their approach with students and
(18:09):
and kind of make the motions from the center.
But I think what we're trying to say is
it's really important to have that awareness.
You know everyone got one
stairs and lecture as a person,
as an individual.
But it's a really important different
approach to have within your your,
your teaching style to have an awareness.
I think there's a key bit.
The phrase that I've always used
(18:30):
in the past kind of know your
learners and that's exactly this
in terms of you don't want to
know everything about them,
but you need to be aware of anything
that's impact on their ability
to learn of which emotions are
a fundamental element of that.
And that comes through telling,
that comes through a port,
that comes through trust building.
And so it's about, it's not a quick fix.
It's pretty fair to see in terms
(18:51):
of the actually
one thing and this is fixed, but it's about.
Embedding some of these practices
within your approach as a lecturer,
increasing your awareness of emotions,
the impact of emotions that are
of your emotions on your learners,
but also of your learners on each other and
of your learners on their circumstance.
So I think to really simplify this,
(19:11):
it's just raising the awareness of
emotions and it's impact on learning.
But ourselves as lecturers or managers,
we play an absolutely key role within this,
absolutely. And you just reminded me of a.
A great quote I got from a 9
year old boy a few months ago,
Jamie, he said.
The best teachers know you from the inside.
(19:34):
And that's that's that's just us
classic uh no and so no your students.
So yeah again we're we're we're trying to
get lectures to introduce something else.
You know people are fed up more and
more initiatives all I'm suggesting
and I'm scared I need to be careful I
always introduce this as being a man.
I've I've genuinely come come to
(19:55):
the emotional late late in life I
have and I've genuinely bluffed my
way through a career in educational
psychology and not really understanding.
Motions.
But once I've once once this
structure helped me, um,
I find I find it really really useful.
So I'm just really saying to people.
Try and introduce us and use the
ring as a structure.
(20:16):
Show up in your wall and reflect on it
now and again and just start to start.
Start to move yourself,
you know can I be emotionally skilled
and what would my class be like
if I was more emotionally skilled?
I really good way to think about
this and again it's quite intuitive
and everyone will understand.
It is the notion of priming,
(20:38):
priming emotions, priming positive emotions,
PPE and.
A good place to start on that
as sport mean what is framing?
Well, luckily golf and uh,
every golfer will no speech play.
And what speech play does is it
puts it primes people.
So if you're standing standing
up there and you see,
(20:58):
you better watch that bunker on
your left and your partner says
I didn't even notice that.
So it's not the sort of thing I would do,
but what it does is it primes,
it primes anxiety and your opponent.
That puts an idea into your mind.
It's the same with Kevin Keegan,
the famous Kevin Keegan mind games.
(21:20):
Where was Alex Ferguson playing games?
Yeah, Ferguson's typical Glaswegian smart,
smart as attack.
He knew all about effective pedagogy.
Uh, he was intuitive genius.
And he he just warned them up.
And they. Was put doubts into his mind.
Yeah that's what priming is.
No I guess other terms I've heard
(21:42):
obviously at the sports psychology
world I'm trying to make this too
sporty but it's obviously self talk
which is exactly the same as that in
terms of you give yourself positive cues
but also imagery you know so in a in
a really simple sporting world you
know you've got your your goal kick.
In rugby they visualize where the ball is
going to go away they go when it comes
to priming is what you're seeing here.
Then it's going to lecturers up working
(22:04):
with young people we we promote.
Well, the positive behaviors,
is that what you're saying?
And in terms of framing those positions
with our students and, you know,
raising awareness but also raising
awareness of how it could be done,
kind of how it should be done.
But but what, what to feel,
how they feel, is that what you mean?
Yeah. Well, you just,
you just give me a lovely link to the
(22:24):
next point you mentioned the word should.
That's that's that's an interesting word.
Should what should you be doing?
What should you be what should
you be doing immediately?
That's that's a drag isn't it?
It triggers defensive emotions, resentment.
Puffiness. Try could instead.
What could you be doing?
Like uh introduces possibility, hope.
(22:46):
So there's that lovely example of priming
are you should lecturer or could lecturer uh,
that's and that's that's what,
that's what this is all about.
So advertising,
we're getting primed all the time
to make purchases.
So we just need to stop and let
us be in the driving seat.
I'll give you another nice example,
lovely simple example.
(23:07):
The order in which we make requests
is really really important.
And I'll I'll talk about the the famous the,
the two monks and and uh talking
to the Abbott.
And the first monk says to the Abbot,
is it OK if I smoke while I pray and the
Abbot gives them a clip round the ear.
And then the second monk who's
(23:28):
smarter comes back comes up and says
is it OK if I pray while I smoke?
And the Abbott says Ohh yes my son go ahead.
So both requests have been exact same,
the only difference is the sequence.
And what's happening is the
first part of the order.
The first part of the request
(23:49):
primes the emotional response.
So for example, instead of um.
Instead of saying I want you,
instead of saying when I explain these
instructions I want you to listen,
you, you really should could be saying,
well wait to listen when I'm explaining
these complicated instructions.
So that's a nice simple one.
And a primes primes people to look at.
(24:12):
Again, a simple setup we're priming.
We're using queues all the time.
For example, I'll be looking out for.
Are you gonna really fight,
you're gonna find this really interesting
or this is gonna be cracking or
you're gonna love this, you know,
and people do that all the time.
That's what you're, you're,
you're very successful lecturers
are doing all the time.
(24:33):
Yeah, I think that's interesting.
Especially because often issues may arise,
you know, from challenging behavior.
And I think what we're trying
to say here is
that absolutely we challenge that behavior.
What we have higher expectations our
rules are giving from their classroom,
but in this context is actually
think about how you deliver that.
Message in terms of behaviour,
you know, some stuff.
Seeing, um, will you be quiet and sit down?
(24:56):
Can you please sit down and be quiet?
No. It's in terms of the order of
instruction that you would like.
For example, does that type
of thing as opposed to. Yeah.
Remove the the negative on the threatening
side towards the end of the stand. Yeah.
Yeah. Samples. Interesting as well.
Of what pleases interesting.
You know, people are being polite.
(25:17):
Please, please sit down on that.
That's without being too cynical.
That's that's too soft. Yes. Bleeding.
You don't, you know, don't bother.
Please just say I want you to do this.
Thanks very much.
Yeah, that's much more assertive,
but it's also very polite.
So.
No interesting concept timelines and
(25:38):
walk us all day but obviously some
folks and some key bits we've touched
upon emotional courting a little
bit and I think that's can I just
before you go into course you can.
I just we're talking about primary
but it's also useful to use emotions
to priming is all about going going
forward-looking for looking at
but all my emotions are all also
(25:58):
good to take stock and look back.
And I'll give you a nice a simple example
would be I don't think uh lectures.
I don't think we use enough in college.
You know the power of emotions as
a kind of evaluation tool for the
for the students themselves because
students intuitively know through
their emotions how they feel about
(26:20):
the project they just handed in.
So I mean that's too late.
So before you so and you shouldn't
be you could be encouraged students
to say right last thing you do with
your project. Before you hand it in.
I know before you hand anywhere ever.
How do you feel about that?
Talk to somebody and how do you
feel about it and then explore your
(26:41):
feelings and then so can that give
you some insight into how good it is
and can you then make some changes?
Because the emotions are gonna
help you evaluate.
So the whole concept of emotions is,
is a valuation tools that are really,
really useful.
And I don't mean I don't know
anyone who's been doing that.
It'd be great to get some practice
(27:02):
on that and get some share,
some practice on that.
I'll be interested.
But I think just to touch
upon that and a bit,
you said earlier on around
something else for lectures to do.
Absolutely not.
This is just the main set shift in
terms of how we learn, you know.
So yeah, I've dealt with some.
Yeah,
the selection of different views in the past,
my former welder as in yeah,
it's something else for me to do,
(27:23):
but actually it's just part
of your practice in terms
of. What we said is wrong in terms of
modeling behaviors and model expectations
and modelling emotions are all those
elements that is part of good practice,
you know, and as you've said
just probably a minute 2 ago,
a lot of lectures are doing this,
but they're either doing it sometimes
explicitly realizing or just doing
the without realizing. Yeah.
(27:44):
Like I think what my practice actually,
as you said, took you 24 years
to to realize this on the same
probably soon for a lot of other
lecturers in terms of you are shaped
by your life experiences, yeah.
And when you younger and you're in the role,
you're quite naive,
but you don't know you naive.
Was that was that the more time you
spend in education on a role or in
(28:05):
life of life experience or whatever,
your your perspective broadens?
So no, I would totally agree
with that and that's it.
A useful point for for listeners
to consider is just to yeah,
probably use that emotions kind of ring to
reflect and sit back and actually not great.
I do do this fantastic.
Or how could I raise the profile this
more with my students or how would
(28:25):
this enhance my learning experience
whether that be that assessment
example you just give or when
challenging behavior or whatever,
it's not really interesting.
Yeah.
So emotional coaching.
So we touched upon this before
as a as a useful strategy,
I think it's probably fair to say.
So I guess what we found is
what is meant by this?
(28:46):
How would people go about doing this?
Or is that not the right tack to take?
No, no, no, I think I'm not.
Coaching is, again, it can be,
can be anything you want it to be,
but it's basically.
I like, I like the concept of coaching.
I there's a lot of vulnerable people around.
There's a lot of people that
can go through difficult times.
And I'm a great believer in
(29:08):
therapy without therapists.
I'm a great believer and,
you know,
taking,
taking full advantage of the
phenomenal sensitivity and empathy
of so many staff in colleges.
I mean,
I've met thousands of college lecturers
and I've always been impressed by their
empathy and their commitment to students.
It's been incredible.
(29:28):
And so I,
I see so many,
I see so many therapists basically they
might not and you don't need to be trained,
you know,
you just need to be a very caring
sort of empathic sort of person
that's that's interested in people
and if you give them the structure.
So if you give people a bit of
training on the emotion ring and
and we can use that to kind of
(29:50):
have groups of individual sessions
or groups with small groups of
students just meeting regularly.
Talking about what's happening in
their lives, who the you know this.
Just talking about their stories.
People need to understand and develop
their identity through stories
and sharing stories and about what's
been happening and how they're feeling.
(30:11):
So we can use the ring in quite
formally and quite informally.
Have the Rolls Royce approach is
to is to invite students to use
the what's called the reflector,
which is a self profiling tool.
It's freely available on our website.
Takes about 20 minutes.
Students enjoy it.
(30:32):
They get a nice fancy chart but
they only have to sit down and and
ideally talk to somebody about it,
explain it to them and it cuts to the chase.
And as to as to what's happening
more informally,
you can take from the coaching
tools we've got on our website,
we've got our well-being ring and
that's quite a nice simple simple thing.
We're just ask students to kind
(30:53):
of look at the 8 dimensions and
plot where you are on these rings.
You just put a pot,
a spot and then you say to them,
right, change that dot into an
arrow to tell us what.
Direction you're going in,
CKR's basically on these 8
dimensions and you ask the students,
what do you think this is all about?
Uh. So it cuts to the chase
and and seems a lot of time.
(31:14):
But and and it lets let students kind of
reflect on on what's happening to them.
The most important thing is
I love Parker Palmer.
He's an American educationist
philosopher and he summed it up.
He says the human soul doesn't want
to be advised, solved or fixed.
It just wants to be witnessed.
Well, I think that's a really nice thing.
(31:34):
So people don't want,
they don't want to come to the one that
come to their mentor or their their coach.
They don't want they, they don't.
They're realistic.
They don't want to come to be fixed.
They just want to come to be witnessed.
A crucial thing.
I've crucial point,
the most basic principle for me,
which is so important is about.
Having, uh, it's just giving that,
(31:56):
you know, time and space for students to
explain how they feel in their own words.
Without being fixed,
without being judged,
without being criticised.
And once we we understand and
attune into their own words,
we can then maybe help them
with earth and stewards.
You know the lectures you've you've had.
(32:16):
What's your favorite one?
And I'll and I'll say, so what's up?
But what? So what?
What about them?
The first thing is they said
because I've got a sense of humour,
and the second thing they'll
say is because they get me.
So what does that mean?
They get me,
it means they understand me and it means
they've tuned into making a non judgmentally.
And they've asked me,
(32:37):
they've asked me questions and they've
asked me really quick questions,
you know,
even busy lecturers.
Would really encourage them to
stop for a few seconds and every
now and again try and find out
about students what's the what,
what the end to what's that big thing,
what makes them tick.
Because once you've got that in your mind,
you can have a conversation with them and
(32:59):
that's they've got me, I've got them.
How do you get students? You get them.
So it's an interesting point.
I mean, obviously my background is as
a sports teacher and often, you know,
the perception is you can allude
to before they're the fun teacher.
Let people fit their people's fit.
So students, favorite teachers,
typically at times because
they're fun or whatever.
(33:20):
And I saw the tweet the other
day on Twitter around, actually.
Ohh peachers not don't it's not
that they have a good relationship
students because actually they care
about students ask about their their
weekends and and how they've gone
on a sport and they've got that too
you know so it's not about it's a
difficult world being lecture because
it's professional boundaries left
right and center you know and and
(33:40):
absolutely rightly sure but as you've
just said that it's really important
to know your students and to build
that relationship with students and
whether that's how was your weekend
you know it's not Brian but we're
dealing with people here deal with
emotion and where we're taking students
on a journey for themselves and.
You know, with us over a period of time,
it's important for us to know
them and kind of what's working,
what's not working.
Without prying in any way shape or form.
(34:02):
Yeah that relationship to understand
to really yes developments and
support that learning relationship.
Yeah yeah I like to just throw
in questions and people.
People like questions again slightly
off tangent but a great question I
found with with students as you know
catch them off guard but give them a
(34:24):
post it what percentage of your ability
are you using in this class right now.
That gives you a real,
a really good starter conversation.
So it's 75%.
So.
So how come?
So how, how come it's 75?
So that's pretty good.
What about the what about the other 25%?
You know, that gets you, it gets you.
You're just trying to get inside the head.
And students like that.
(34:45):
As long as it's not intrusive.
And the boundaries are crucial,
obviously,
but they're the crucial thing about
emotional coaching has regular
contact with people that you know.
Build that trust and all the rest of it,
and you're talking to them regularly.
And I think that's a phenomenal model.
And there's so many people in
(35:08):
college that would be so good at
that given given the structure.
And I push the emotion ring as a useful
structure and I probably agree with that.
And I think now more than ever is
a really important thing for you
discussing about moments like this.
And the reason I say that is now
15 months has been very much a
transitional time for students
and lecturers and managers,
(35:29):
obviously for the next three months.
Depending on how restrictions go you know
come over September saying there might
be that greater return to College in
opportunities to to work with students
who not set foot on campus or 15 months.
You know against quite prevalent in
in the media and the narrative in
the media is around mental health and
rightly so and it's it's it's quite
(35:50):
simply got a greater awareness and a
lot more people are talking around you
know mental health and some importance
and obviously emotional mental element
of that and I guess my view on the world.
You know, for for college, for actresses.
There's never enough time for anything
that we want to do, but we are thankful
of things that are important. Yeah.
Changing our practices, our ways of working.
(36:12):
And if this is something,
then that would enhance their practice,
enhance us.
Unexperienced, fantastic do.
It should be part of our practice, yeah.
Yeah. Can I just mention the
compendium of emotions to finish off,
you just mentioned we make things
that are important and and that's
what emotions are all about.
They tell us what's important, right?
(36:34):
They tell us what matters to us.
That's that's why emotions are so
central and everyone's conscious
of mental health and so on.
I mean, I like to see mental health
just as emotional well-being.
We've got so many terms for
these things that resilience,
resilience is just well-being.
When it's challenged, it's all the same.
I think so. I think emotional,
well-being being good at feelings quite
(36:56):
a nice, a nice way to think about it.
And uh, when I was,
when I was writing knowing and
growing the my last book, uh,
the most interesting chapter
that came out of it was was was
about the ring of emotions.
And because it helped me
as I say organize emotions,
it helped me sort emotions to
help me compare them and and and
and basically tell the difference
(37:17):
between them because that's why
emotions get incredibly complicated.
And it was.
Challenging emotions get complicated
not because they're bad,
they're wrong with them.
It's just they,
they they get tangled up together and
it's trying to untangle them that's that.
That's the challenge.
Once we untangle them,
it's their perceptions of the of the
different emotions that get us into border,
(37:39):
for example, where we we don't,
we're not away.
We're envious and we're envious.
We think the rules against us.
We get a bit paranoid.
We think people are deliberately
trying to wind us up and be be be,
you know, be.
Because or when we're lonely,
we don't get in touch with
people because we're worried.
We think we're gonna they're gonna reject us.
It's the perceptions.
(37:59):
So I'm really interested in
just giving people tools to
to think through the emotion.
So they're companion emotions is
basically an it's an illustrated guide.
It's a resource for for schools
and colleges details 40 major
emotions but also 48 linked to
emotions and explores the their
purpose and their causes and so on.
(38:22):
It's gonna put dictionary,
part of thesaurus,
part reflection tool encyclopedia.
It's just a complete primer and.
It's got a set of um reflection
questions and uh it's got lots
of nice quotes and that that kind
of just kind of few words give a
lot of kind of insight and um and
(38:42):
it's just a matter it's just that
there's a set of resources to help
help people explore the purpose of
the motions and it's got it's got
nice ways to to help help us store
with the uplifting emotions and
it's got wasted risk challenging
emotions and an example I use.
Because I've always been plugged,
basil plugged myself. Doubt.
(39:03):
If you've got self doubt about giving a talk,
don't focus on yourself. Doubt.
And so how do you get self-confidence?
You don't get self-confidence
about being conscious of yourself.
You just zoom in and your enthusiasm,
your passion for the topic,
that takes care of it and then you
just you just battle through the
(39:23):
presentation with your enthusiasm and
that takes care of your confidence.
No, I think that's really interesting.
It's been a really quick.
Fascinating conversation,
and I think in two sides. One is.
This shouldn't be such a big deal if
you know it shouldn't be anything
radical or anything different,
but it's often colleagues that
I've worked on in the past
I've worked with in the past.
(39:44):
For some this would be.
Was it quite right in terms of talking
about they probably do it naturally,
but it's just an awareness raising type
approach whereas for some aspects of
total emotions are building that space
where students is quite foreign and
that's just my personal experience.
So I think it's it's really useful
topic for for people to be aware of to
(40:06):
consider to reflect on using resources
from your website and obviously within
the link to the podcast we'll put a
link to that website there as well.
Yeah, have a look at some of the
things that we're talking about here,
but I think that's most important bit is.
And kind of my lasting thing as
required property is build time.
You know, make this important as part of
your your daily practice with your students.
(40:26):
That doesn't mean talk about every day
with your students in the forced way,
but build this into your approach as a
practitioner. Yeah, yeah, about yourself.
Any kind of key lasting thought to finish
off with. Improve the entire rituals.
That's a very nice emotional term.
Rituals.
Everyone can do rituals and we can create
(40:47):
our own rituals by making it a ritual,
which is a nice way to end.
Fantastic. Alan, thank you very much.
Been really, really interesting conversation.
I really appreciate your time.
Thank you. I've enjoyed it.
Thank you.
About.
Hello and welcome to the latest episode
of the Pedagogy Matters Podcast.
The purpose of this podcast is to bring to
the force and key topics of conversation
in relation to learning and teaching,
to discuss, to break down aspects
of practice and provide snippets,
advice and guidance as to how to
integrate these into our daily practice.
Today, I'm delighted to be joined
by Al McLean and we'll be exploring
(00:27):
a topic of emotional pedagogy.
So, Alan, good morning, how are you?
Good morning. I'm very well.
Thank you. Good.
You know it's nice to see what he's
talked before but kind of the weather
starting to turn which is a nice change
for the heading towards summer which is
great and I guess that ties in nicely
I guess with elements of of of emotion,
you know already but so yeah
so topic emotional pedagogy.
(00:48):
So people are thinking wow,
so I've never heard before.
So I guess you what do we mean by this
kind of what can be meant by this term?
Yeah well I think I think the
term emotional pedagogies.
Be kicking around.
It came into my mind when I was doing
the recent webinar with uh for the
college development network because
(01:09):
it was pretty obvious that um,
when I was explaining my whole emotion ring,
as I call it,
the model that helps us understand emotions,
it was pretty uh and that was we
were looking at how we can support
vulnerable students.
It was obvious to everyone there that
that model applied to staff well-being,
but also applied to this emotional pedagogy
(01:30):
and emotional pedagogy basically is just.
Emotionally,
it shouldn't.
Teaching that placed his feelings
at the forefront of learning and
learning and teaching.
It's kind of emotionally skilled teaching,
and it's.
It's been around forever basically,
and everyone knows about it.
It's just we're just trying to
make it a bit more explicit.
I love some, I love the quotes,
everyone knows the the Maya Angelou quote.
(01:52):
And people will forget what
you said and what you did,
but they never forget how you made them feel.
Uh, I mean,
everyone knows that looking
back in their own.
Education.
When you think of your favorite teacher,
you could remember.
The teacher should remember that the teachers
that made an emotional impact on you,
usually a positive one.
There's another nice one.
(02:12):
I like John Maxwell.
People will hear your words,
but they feel your attitudes.
I think that's quite powerful.
I think really, yeah,
you're absolutely right in terms of,
you know,
the impact that we as people in
education can have on our students,
you know, actually fundamental.
And that effect comes back
from relationships and that
(02:34):
emotion is at the heart.
And I think it's interesting one pick
us will go through a conversation
this morning obviously or maybe
even get it straight away.
Obviously the last 15 months has
really flipped elements on its head
in terms of education as we know it
in terms of face to face contact
and face to face relationships
as just flipped into a an online
or a hybrid world, you know.
(02:55):
Some colleagues and our support to
kind of struggled with that from a
lecturers or teachers perspective
and those students have as well, no.
But I think would it be fair to say
that the same principles apply whether
you're teaching face to face or online
around what's important going to be
in tune with your emotions with your
students and so on and so forth.
What are your thoughts on that?
(03:16):
That's a challenging one.
It's uh, it's, it's certainly is.
I think it probably it's the exact same.
It's exact same. The the, UM,
the principles of effective pedagogy are
the same no matter what the context.
But it's probably paradoxically
more important in a in a
(03:36):
kind of digital relationship.
But it's probably more difficult and the
immediate thing that comes to my mind is.
Nonverbal communication.
Nonverbal communication
is absolutely crucial.
Everyone knows that it's predominant,
uh, vehicle and but that's so difficult.
That's why I think people find find find
(03:58):
the digital relationship a bit frustrating.
I mean, the face is probably the most
important tool that lecturers got.
Uh, but how do you communicate?
Uh, facial expressions, uh, digitally.
So you probably have to exaggerate them,
which starts to starts to one,
don't you worry about authenticity and so on.
So I can understand why election
(04:20):
is a struggle,
and we also know about why it's so
draining because you're you're,
you're having to kind of force your,
your emotional communication and
that's probably what's what makes it
so exhausting and also trying to pick up.
My biggest challenge,
I think, would be to pick up.
His lectures are intuitively
tuned into students,
(04:42):
but they're tuned into students body
language and faces and latitude and so on.
So to pick that up digitally
is quite a challenge.
No,
you're actually right.
Throw it deep and straight
where that question.
But those issues that you mentioned
have been exactly issues that
lectures are fierce in terms of
the nonverbal cues straight away.
The triggers are even the the ad
(05:02):
hoc relationships that I built when
moving around the classroom talking to
students and that has been lost to a degree.
So I guess let's go back to basics.
So we're talking around education,
education approaches more broadly,
I guess lectures management you think, right.
I think I do this,
but I'm not sure so from your.
Perspective on.
(05:22):
When we're talking emotional pedagogy,
what are the principles or can how can
it be done or what should be considered?
Right.
Can I just preface what I'm gonna say?
But a few brief comments about
about emotions can I I'll be brief.
Uh, this is the technical side.
Obviously,
emotions are pretty central to our lives.
(05:42):
They underpin our relationships,
thinking and learning.
And there's no there's no better
way to understand ourselves.
And but they are,
they are mysterious and and complex.
But my premise is that we can actually
master them more than we realize.
And this is all about mastery.
And my master is basically,
um, you know,
(06:03):
I I define emotional well-being as as,
as not so much feeling good,
but it's been good at feeling.
And it comes to this.
Mastering emotions and essentially
mastering emotions comes down to making
sense of the purpose of emotions.
And the technical bridges for a
second is what, what are emotions?
We need to stop and think about
that. And emotions are basically
(06:25):
the cognitive interpretations
of of our physical sensations.
Sensations only become emotions.
Uh. When we go through something
called cognitive framing,
we frame it through our words and our
concepts and that's when we interpret
the cause and purpose and so on.
And how well we read our sensations depend
on our kind of emotional vocabulary.
(06:47):
It's our skills and comparing
emotions basically.
And give you a simple analogy if you think
if you're if you're an expert in birds.
Or trees or cars or football teams.
You can sort, you can sort them between,
you can compare them and contrast them,
you can sort them.
So whenever you go in nature well
you'll get much more out of it.
And it's exact same with them with emotions.
(07:08):
So my my big kind of premise is if my
lectures become more attuned to emotions,
they'll be able to kind of.
You know, understand what's going on better.
The emotion ring very, very briefly.
It's a visual model on my visual
person and I'm a kind of systematizer.
I like structure,
I like to organize things
and the emotion ring.
(07:29):
And it would be quite helpful if people
are listening to this podcast to have
a a copy of the Emotion ring to hand.
Basically it's a it's a comprehensive
and kind of coherent kind of organize it
as a template of all the main emotion
concepts organized by their purpose
and that that gives us a set of tools
(07:51):
to help develop emotional vocabulary,
also helps us self reflect.
Helps us reflect,
helps them to support students
through as a coaching tool and
as among a group of students.
We can maybe talk about that,
but the most important thing from a
pedagogical point of view is it gives
us a structure taking a reflect on.
(08:11):
How come that students responding?
Well, how come? What happened there?
Blew it there. What happened there?
What was wrong with him?
Uh, what did I do?
So it's that's a useful, it's a useful
structure to think about things.
Um, I've forgotten about you.
What's your first?
What was your question?
That's going to really good
(08:33):
introduction I guess around emotions
and it's purpose within education
because you're absolutely right
with the examples towards the end,
you know teaching and learning is not
black and white. I teach you learn.
You know we're dealing with people
you know both with our own emotions,
emotions of our colleagues,
but also the emotions of our students now,
right.
I'm hope I'm summarizing this
correctly here that's.
(08:56):
That greater awareness of emotions
will only enhance our practice
and kind of make more aware.
Now we might not be able to change emotions,
but it makes us more aware as
lecturers and practitioners.
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, a central point for me is when I
trace my work over the last 2324 years.
(09:16):
It's it's through behaviour management,
through anti bullying strategies,
through self motivation,
through developing identity,
through the the,
the latest uh working emotion.
It's all I've been, it's all,
it's all been about self-awareness.
I mean every election that I've ever met
in my career I've met thousands of them.
We all want to be as effective as
(09:38):
we can but I I'm I'm convinced.
Everyone's pretty self motivated,
they want to improve and everyone's,
everyone's got that commonality.
But we're very in our capacity
for self-awareness or the the
kind of the partner of that self
reflection and that's the challenge.
So all my works been about kind of self
(10:01):
reflection and we're really I'm into
giving people structures for self reflection.
Self reflection is really bloody hearts
because the language is really hard.
We're very aware of how.
Other people impact on us,
but we're not.
We're not so weird on how
we impact on other people.
That's the tricky but because we've
got lots of blind spots and self
(10:21):
delusions and self deceptions and so on.
And I'll give you a simple again,
a quick uh,
I like to give people thought
experiments or simple exercises,
but a nice exercise for a lecture
to do is just to take a class list.
And um.
Flip through it very quickly and
and write an emotion right beside
(10:42):
each student in terms of how how
they feel about that student.
And in the end of it have a quick
take away that the students names
and then look at the emotions and
then summarize them and then put
them into their structure and
then show it to our colleague.
That would be a marvelous exercise
just to put them in touch with.
(11:03):
And you certainly don't know
from your experience,
but I think students have emotional
relationships with their classes.
And that's a really interesting
thing to explore.
But um, so alright, I think it's interesting.
Yeah.
Because when you take time to pause
and reflect like you see and you have
a conversation with other colleagues,
you broaden that perspective in
(11:24):
relation to students and how they
behave and how they act and and
and how that works well for others.
And I know again,
just sitting back to my own past
experience of small towns and most
frustrating comment was no, no,
that learner works well for me.
They're absolutely fine for me.
Doesn't help.
Let's get on,
pick that and let's put it back.
And when you talk,
(11:44):
then I'll behavior management again.
From experience that I have had
like a key part of where behavior
management is effective is where
there's an effective relationship.
Now that's not as easy in practice
because there are a wide variety of
reasons why student behaviors are poor.
However, that I think what you're
seeing is the enhanced awareness of
(12:06):
the emotions of the individuals in
the situation will help practitioner.
Consider your approaches and how you manage
and how you interact with that student.
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I know.
You've done a lot of work in this space
and and yeah and it's it's kind of really
quite interesting and going back to kind
of the the question asked initially
is so kind of given two ideas so far
(12:28):
as how do lectures start with this.
You've mentioned the emotions ring.
You've mentioned kind of having a look
at learning to spend a bit of time and
thinking actually what what emotion
would I allocate to that learner.
How else would lecturers?
Build us in the process,
(12:49):
you know of their own practice,
all their practicing students because
it's it's a complex situation. Yeah.
So how would they go about that?
And everyone knows that there's no
such thing as an unmitigated good.
You know, everyone knows it's the
Aristotle concept of the golden mean.
Everything in moderation,
what that means is 1.
Good quality has to be balanced by
(13:11):
another good quality and support has
to be balanced with the challenge
if we have too much support.
And not enough challenge.
Uh, that becomes kind of problematic.
And I I think I think of the and again,
again, again.
I could give give people a a
nice simple thought experiment.
Think about your your typical
(13:32):
practice if you were to spend 20,
share 20 points between support
and challenge.
What would you, what would you give support?
What would you give challenge?
For example,
you might give support 12 and you might
so that means you give challenge 8.
Your son has always got to add up to 20.
That's quite interesting once
since soon as some I'd ask somebody
(13:53):
that I know a lot about them,
but I don't want you to add that up.
I want you to multiply these two figures.
OK,
so for example if you if you
said 12 and eight for support,
that gives you a score of 96.
Which is pretty good.
You could have been buying on.
You could have said I'm a 10 by 10
(14:14):
and it gives you a score of 100.
So that's sure.
I call that your pretentiously.
I call that your beneficence OK,
which is basically your positive
input now you might be a.
PET shirt or uh or a lecturer
and and you know electronics
and you're you're kind of match.
I'm I'm I'm I'm I'm stereotyping here
(14:37):
but you might be kind of mature.
I don't I don't go into all
this touchy feely rubbish.
I'll I'll leave support to other people.
I'm I'm 18 for challenge and
that leaves 2 for support.
Well,
the bad news for you is
your beneficence is 36.
And the interesting thing is you can't.
(14:58):
You can't.
Um, you may be brilliant at challenge,
you might be charismatic,
uh,
but you can't make up for your
lack of support through your
excellence and your challenge.
You need both.
So I I've, I've given nice,
simple terms I like to talk about.
You're either either a squeezer or a hugger.
(15:20):
Ideally, you're a swagger.
You're a squeezer, squeezer as a
lecturer who's very high profile,
charismatic, demanding,
challenging, dynamic, pushy.
Probably very popular.
Uh, sense of urgency, high demand and so on.
That's fantastic.
But if that person's not sensitive
(15:42):
to people's vulnerabilities,
then they slip into becoming a bruiser.
So the squeezer can become a bruiser
and the students are gonna fear you.
They might respect you,
but they fear you,
and they're probably gonna hate you.
Yeah. And that's devastating from a
emotional pedagogy point of view.
Equally, they're very nice, warm.
(16:04):
Invitational approach where people are
very empathic and sensitive and uh.
You're very caring and so on.
That's fantastic.
And people will love you.
And uh, you'll have fantastic relationships.
But if you slip into being over
helpful or or or over caring,
you slip into being a bit overprotective,
(16:24):
smothering.
You actually even start to intrude.
Yeah and students,
I don't want to tell you about my background.
Get lost.
And the challenge is to try and
get the challenge is to reflect
on yourself and students can,
staff can reflect on this very neatly.
If they go onto our website,
there's a profile,
a self reflection profile called
(16:46):
the inspiring profile and that
allows lecturers to take 20
minutes to stop and think.
The they evaluate themselves on
on the ring on the dynamics of
these teaching styles as I call it,
and that gives them a.
Gives them a benchmark to think
about and and to to share with other
colleagues and if they're really,
(17:06):
if they're courageous.
Um and are really into partnership.
They can actually get their students
to complete the profiles about them.
And we can actually helps colleges
to kind of collate all these
profiles together in a neat little
package that gives instant feedback
and then what what the lecture
(17:26):
then does is be grateful.
It's a fantastic way to build
partnership and mutuality and let
the sorry and the students the to
finish off the lecture just has a
discussion about it and has a good has
a good chat about what they learned from it.
Yeah no I think that's.
So I'm just going to jump back to,
(17:47):
you know,
you gave a couple of different
examples of lectures who may
have different approaches as in,
yeah, emotions aren't from me.
You're going to come in here that
these are the rules of the classroom.
Yeah.
And it's not necessarily about.
Everybody.
Um, really?
Change your account,
reopening their approach with students and
(18:09):
and kind of make the motions from the center.
But I think what we're trying to say is
it's really important to have that awareness.
You know everyone got one
stairs and lecture as a person,
as an individual.
But it's a really important different
approach to have within your your,
your teaching style to have an awareness.
I think there's a key bit.
The phrase that I've always used
(18:30):
in the past kind of know your
learners and that's exactly this
in terms of you don't want to
know everything about them,
but you need to be aware of anything
that's impact on their ability
to learn of which emotions are
a fundamental element of that.
And that comes through telling,
that comes through a port,
that comes through trust building.
And so it's about, it's not a quick fix.
It's pretty fair to see in terms
(18:51):
of the actually
one thing and this is fixed, but it's about.
Embedding some of these practices
within your approach as a lecturer,
increasing your awareness of emotions,
the impact of emotions that are
of your emotions on your learners,
but also of your learners on each other and
of your learners on their circumstance.
So I think to really simplify this,
(19:11):
it's just raising the awareness of
emotions and it's impact on learning.
But ourselves as lecturers or managers,
we play an absolutely key role within this,
absolutely. And you just reminded me of a.
A great quote I got from a 9
year old boy a few months ago,
Jamie, he said.
The best teachers know you from the inside.
(19:34):
And that's that's that's just us
classic uh no and so no your students.
So yeah again we're we're we're trying to
get lectures to introduce something else.
You know people are fed up more and
more initiatives all I'm suggesting
and I'm scared I need to be careful I
always introduce this as being a man.
I've I've genuinely come come to
(19:55):
the emotional late late in life I
have and I've genuinely bluffed my
way through a career in educational
psychology and not really understanding.
Motions.
But once I've once once this
structure helped me, um,
I find I find it really really useful.
So I'm just really saying to people.
Try and introduce us and use the
ring as a structure.
(20:16):
Show up in your wall and reflect on it
now and again and just start to start.
Start to move yourself,
you know can I be emotionally skilled
and what would my class be like
if I was more emotionally skilled?
I really good way to think about
this and again it's quite intuitive
and everyone will understand.
It is the notion of priming,
(20:38):
priming emotions, priming positive emotions,
PPE and.
A good place to start on that
as sport mean what is framing?
Well, luckily golf and uh,
every golfer will no speech play.
And what speech play does is it
puts it primes people.
So if you're standing standing
up there and you see,
(20:58):
you better watch that bunker on
your left and your partner says
I didn't even notice that.
So it's not the sort of thing I would do,
but what it does is it primes,
it primes anxiety and your opponent.
That puts an idea into your mind.
It's the same with Kevin Keegan,
the famous Kevin Keegan mind games.
(21:20):
Where was Alex Ferguson playing games?
Yeah, Ferguson's typical Glaswegian smart,
smart as attack.
He knew all about effective pedagogy.
Uh, he was intuitive genius.
And he he just warned them up.
And they. Was put doubts into his mind.
Yeah that's what priming is.
No I guess other terms I've heard
(21:42):
obviously at the sports psychology
world I'm trying to make this too
sporty but it's obviously self talk
which is exactly the same as that in
terms of you give yourself positive cues
but also imagery you know so in a in
a really simple sporting world you
know you've got your your goal kick.
In rugby they visualize where the ball is
going to go away they go when it comes
to priming is what you're seeing here.
Then it's going to lecturers up working
(22:04):
with young people we we promote.
Well, the positive behaviors,
is that what you're saying?
And in terms of framing those positions
with our students and, you know,
raising awareness but also raising
awareness of how it could be done,
kind of how it should be done.
But but what, what to feel,
how they feel, is that what you mean?
Yeah. Well, you just,
you just give me a lovely link to the
(22:24):
next point you mentioned the word should.
That's that's that's an interesting word.
Should what should you be doing?
What should you be what should
you be doing immediately?
That's that's a drag isn't it?
It triggers defensive emotions, resentment.
Puffiness. Try could instead.
What could you be doing?
Like uh introduces possibility, hope.
(22:46):
So there's that lovely example of priming
are you should lecturer or could lecturer uh,
that's and that's that's what,
that's what this is all about.
So advertising,
we're getting primed all the time
to make purchases.
So we just need to stop and let
us be in the driving seat.
I'll give you another nice example,
lovely simple example.
(23:07):
The order in which we make requests
is really really important.
And I'll I'll talk about the the famous the,
the two monks and and uh talking
to the Abbott.
And the first monk says to the Abbot,
is it OK if I smoke while I pray and the
Abbot gives them a clip round the ear.
And then the second monk who's
(23:28):
smarter comes back comes up and says
is it OK if I pray while I smoke?
And the Abbott says Ohh yes my son go ahead.
So both requests have been exact same,
the only difference is the sequence.
And what's happening is the
first part of the order.
The first part of the request
(23:49):
primes the emotional response.
So for example, instead of um.
Instead of saying I want you,
instead of saying when I explain these
instructions I want you to listen,
you, you really should could be saying,
well wait to listen when I'm explaining
these complicated instructions.
So that's a nice simple one.
And a primes primes people to look at.
(24:12):
Again, a simple setup we're priming.
We're using queues all the time.
For example, I'll be looking out for.
Are you gonna really fight,
you're gonna find this really interesting
or this is gonna be cracking or
you're gonna love this, you know,
and people do that all the time.
That's what you're, you're,
you're very successful lecturers
are doing all the time.
(24:33):
Yeah, I think that's interesting.
Especially because often issues may arise,
you know, from challenging behavior.
And I think what we're trying
to say here is
that absolutely we challenge that behavior.
What we have higher expectations our
rules are giving from their classroom,
but in this context is actually
think about how you deliver that.
Message in terms of behaviour,
you know, some stuff.
Seeing, um, will you be quiet and sit down?
(24:56):
Can you please sit down and be quiet?
No. It's in terms of the order of
instruction that you would like.
For example, does that type
of thing as opposed to. Yeah.
Remove the the negative on the threatening
side towards the end of the stand. Yeah.
Yeah. Samples. Interesting as well.
Of what pleases interesting.
You know, people are being polite.
(25:17):
Please, please sit down on that.
That's without being too cynical.
That's that's too soft. Yes. Bleeding.
You don't, you know, don't bother.
Please just say I want you to do this.
Thanks very much.
Yeah, that's much more assertive,
but it's also very polite.
So.
No interesting concept timelines and
(25:38):
walk us all day but obviously some
folks and some key bits we've touched
upon emotional courting a little
bit and I think that's can I just
before you go into course you can.
I just we're talking about primary
but it's also useful to use emotions
to priming is all about going going
forward-looking for looking at
but all my emotions are all also
(25:58):
good to take stock and look back.
And I'll give you a nice a simple example
would be I don't think uh lectures.
I don't think we use enough in college.
You know the power of emotions as
a kind of evaluation tool for the
for the students themselves because
students intuitively know through
their emotions how they feel about
(26:20):
the project they just handed in.
So I mean that's too late.
So before you so and you shouldn't
be you could be encouraged students
to say right last thing you do with
your project. Before you hand it in.
I know before you hand anywhere ever.
How do you feel about that?
Talk to somebody and how do you
feel about it and then explore your
(26:41):
feelings and then so can that give
you some insight into how good it is
and can you then make some changes?
Because the emotions are gonna
help you evaluate.
So the whole concept of emotions is,
is a valuation tools that are really,
really useful.
And I don't mean I don't know
anyone who's been doing that.
It'd be great to get some practice
(27:02):
on that and get some share,
some practice on that.
I'll be interested.
But I think just to touch
upon that and a bit,
you said earlier on around
something else for lectures to do.
Absolutely not.
This is just the main set shift in
terms of how we learn, you know.
So yeah, I've dealt with some.
Yeah,
the selection of different views in the past,
my former welder as in yeah,
it's something else for me to do,
(27:23):
but actually it's just part
of your practice in terms
of. What we said is wrong in terms of
modeling behaviors and model expectations
and modelling emotions are all those
elements that is part of good practice,
you know, and as you've said
just probably a minute 2 ago,
a lot of lectures are doing this,
but they're either doing it sometimes
explicitly realizing or just doing
the without realizing. Yeah.
(27:44):
Like I think what my practice actually,
as you said, took you 24 years
to to realize this on the same
probably soon for a lot of other
lecturers in terms of you are shaped
by your life experiences, yeah.
And when you younger and you're in the role,
you're quite naive,
but you don't know you naive.
Was that was that the more time you
spend in education on a role or in
(28:05):
life of life experience or whatever,
your your perspective broadens?
So no, I would totally agree
with that and that's it.
A useful point for for listeners
to consider is just to yeah,
probably use that emotions kind of ring to
reflect and sit back and actually not great.
I do do this fantastic.
Or how could I raise the profile this
more with my students or how would
(28:25):
this enhance my learning experience
whether that be that assessment
example you just give or when
challenging behavior or whatever,
it's not really interesting.
Yeah.
So emotional coaching.
So we touched upon this before
as a as a useful strategy,
I think it's probably fair to say.
So I guess what we found is
what is meant by this?
(28:46):
How would people go about doing this?
Or is that not the right tack to take?
No, no, no, I think I'm not.
Coaching is, again, it can be,
can be anything you want it to be,
but it's basically.
I like, I like the concept of coaching.
I there's a lot of vulnerable people around.
There's a lot of people that
can go through difficult times.
And I'm a great believer in
(29:08):
therapy without therapists.
I'm a great believer and,
you know,
taking,
taking full advantage of the
phenomenal sensitivity and empathy
of so many staff in colleges.
I mean,
I've met thousands of college lecturers
and I've always been impressed by their
empathy and their commitment to students.
It's been incredible.
(29:28):
And so I,
I see so many,
I see so many therapists basically they
might not and you don't need to be trained,
you know,
you just need to be a very caring
sort of empathic sort of person
that's that's interested in people
and if you give them the structure.
So if you give people a bit of
training on the emotion ring and
and we can use that to kind of
(29:50):
have groups of individual sessions
or groups with small groups of
students just meeting regularly.
Talking about what's happening in
their lives, who the you know this.
Just talking about their stories.
People need to understand and develop
their identity through stories
and sharing stories and about what's
been happening and how they're feeling.
(30:11):
So we can use the ring in quite
formally and quite informally.
Have the Rolls Royce approach is
to is to invite students to use
the what's called the reflector,
which is a self profiling tool.
It's freely available on our website.
Takes about 20 minutes.
Students enjoy it.
(30:32):
They get a nice fancy chart but
they only have to sit down and and
ideally talk to somebody about it,
explain it to them and it cuts to the chase.
And as to as to what's happening
more informally,
you can take from the coaching
tools we've got on our website,
we've got our well-being ring and
that's quite a nice simple simple thing.
We're just ask students to kind
(30:53):
of look at the 8 dimensions and
plot where you are on these rings.
You just put a pot,
a spot and then you say to them,
right, change that dot into an
arrow to tell us what.
Direction you're going in,
CKR's basically on these 8
dimensions and you ask the students,
what do you think this is all about?
Uh. So it cuts to the chase
and and seems a lot of time.
(31:14):
But and and it lets let students kind of
reflect on on what's happening to them.
The most important thing is
I love Parker Palmer.
He's an American educationist
philosopher and he summed it up.
He says the human soul doesn't want
to be advised, solved or fixed.
It just wants to be witnessed.
Well, I think that's a really nice thing.
(31:34):
So people don't want,
they don't want to come to the one that
come to their mentor or their their coach.
They don't want they, they don't.
They're realistic.
They don't want to come to be fixed.
They just want to come to be witnessed.
A crucial thing.
I've crucial point,
the most basic principle for me,
which is so important is about.
Having, uh, it's just giving that,
(31:56):
you know, time and space for students to
explain how they feel in their own words.
Without being fixed,
without being judged,
without being criticised.
And once we we understand and
attune into their own words,
we can then maybe help them
with earth and stewards.
You know the lectures you've you've had.
(32:16):
What's your favorite one?
And I'll and I'll say, so what's up?
But what? So what?
What about them?
The first thing is they said
because I've got a sense of humour,
and the second thing they'll
say is because they get me.
So what does that mean?
They get me,
it means they understand me and it means
they've tuned into making a non judgmentally.
And they've asked me,
(32:37):
they've asked me questions and they've
asked me really quick questions,
you know,
even busy lecturers.
Would really encourage them to
stop for a few seconds and every
now and again try and find out
about students what's the what,
what the end to what's that big thing,
what makes them tick.
Because once you've got that in your mind,
you can have a conversation with them and
(32:59):
that's they've got me, I've got them.
How do you get students? You get them.
So it's an interesting point.
I mean, obviously my background is as
a sports teacher and often, you know,
the perception is you can allude
to before they're the fun teacher.
Let people fit their people's fit.
So students, favorite teachers,
typically at times because
they're fun or whatever.
(33:20):
And I saw the tweet the other
day on Twitter around, actually.
Ohh peachers not don't it's not
that they have a good relationship
students because actually they care
about students ask about their their
weekends and and how they've gone
on a sport and they've got that too
you know so it's not about it's a
difficult world being lecture because
it's professional boundaries left
right and center you know and and
(33:40):
absolutely rightly sure but as you've
just said that it's really important
to know your students and to build
that relationship with students and
whether that's how was your weekend
you know it's not Brian but we're
dealing with people here deal with
emotion and where we're taking students
on a journey for themselves and.
You know, with us over a period of time,
it's important for us to know
them and kind of what's working,
what's not working.
Without prying in any way shape or form.
(34:02):
Yeah that relationship to understand
to really yes developments and
support that learning relationship.
Yeah yeah I like to just throw
in questions and people.
People like questions again slightly
off tangent but a great question I
found with with students as you know
catch them off guard but give them a
(34:24):
post it what percentage of your ability
are you using in this class right now.
That gives you a real,
a really good starter conversation.
So it's 75%.
So.
So how come?
So how, how come it's 75?
So that's pretty good.
What about the what about the other 25%?
You know, that gets you, it gets you.
You're just trying to get inside the head.
And students like that.
(34:45):
As long as it's not intrusive.
And the boundaries are crucial,
obviously,
but they're the crucial thing about
emotional coaching has regular
contact with people that you know.
Build that trust and all the rest of it,
and you're talking to them regularly.
And I think that's a phenomenal model.
And there's so many people in
(35:08):
college that would be so good at
that given given the structure.
And I push the emotion ring as a useful
structure and I probably agree with that.
And I think now more than ever is
a really important thing for you
discussing about moments like this.
And the reason I say that is now
15 months has been very much a
transitional time for students
and lecturers and managers,
(35:29):
obviously for the next three months.
Depending on how restrictions go you know
come over September saying there might
be that greater return to College in
opportunities to to work with students
who not set foot on campus or 15 months.
You know against quite prevalent in
in the media and the narrative in
the media is around mental health and
rightly so and it's it's it's quite
(35:50):
simply got a greater awareness and a
lot more people are talking around you
know mental health and some importance
and obviously emotional mental element
of that and I guess my view on the world.
You know, for for college, for actresses.
There's never enough time for anything
that we want to do, but we are thankful
of things that are important. Yeah.
Changing our practices, our ways of working.
(36:12):
And if this is something,
then that would enhance their practice,
enhance us.
Unexperienced, fantastic do.
It should be part of our practice, yeah.
Yeah. Can I just mention the
compendium of emotions to finish off,
you just mentioned we make things
that are important and and that's
what emotions are all about.
They tell us what's important, right?
(36:34):
They tell us what matters to us.
That's that's why emotions are so
central and everyone's conscious
of mental health and so on.
I mean, I like to see mental health
just as emotional well-being.
We've got so many terms for
these things that resilience,
resilience is just well-being.
When it's challenged, it's all the same.
I think so. I think emotional,
well-being being good at feelings quite
(36:56):
a nice, a nice way to think about it.
And uh, when I was,
when I was writing knowing and
growing the my last book, uh,
the most interesting chapter
that came out of it was was was
about the ring of emotions.
And because it helped me
as I say organize emotions,
it helped me sort emotions to
help me compare them and and and
and basically tell the difference
(37:17):
between them because that's why
emotions get incredibly complicated.
And it was.
Challenging emotions get complicated
not because they're bad,
they're wrong with them.
It's just they,
they they get tangled up together and
it's trying to untangle them that's that.
That's the challenge.
Once we untangle them,
it's their perceptions of the of the
different emotions that get us into border,
(37:39):
for example, where we we don't,
we're not away.
We're envious and we're envious.
We think the rules against us.
We get a bit paranoid.
We think people are deliberately
trying to wind us up and be be be,
you know, be.
Because or when we're lonely,
we don't get in touch with
people because we're worried.
We think we're gonna they're gonna reject us.
It's the perceptions.
(37:59):
So I'm really interested in
just giving people tools to
to think through the emotion.
So they're companion emotions is
basically an it's an illustrated guide.
It's a resource for for schools
and colleges details 40 major
emotions but also 48 linked to
emotions and explores the their
purpose and their causes and so on.
(38:22):
It's gonna put dictionary,
part of thesaurus,
part reflection tool encyclopedia.
It's just a complete primer and.
It's got a set of um reflection
questions and uh it's got lots
of nice quotes and that that kind
of just kind of few words give a
lot of kind of insight and um and
(38:42):
it's just a matter it's just that
there's a set of resources to help
help people explore the purpose of
the motions and it's got it's got
nice ways to to help help us store
with the uplifting emotions and
it's got wasted risk challenging
emotions and an example I use.
Because I've always been plugged,
basil plugged myself. Doubt.
(39:03):
If you've got self doubt about giving a talk,
don't focus on yourself. Doubt.
And so how do you get self-confidence?
You don't get self-confidence
about being conscious of yourself.
You just zoom in and your enthusiasm,
your passion for the topic,
that takes care of it and then you
just you just battle through the
(39:23):
presentation with your enthusiasm and
that takes care of your confidence.
No, I think that's really interesting.
It's been a really quick.
Fascinating conversation,
and I think in two sides. One is.
This shouldn't be such a big deal if
you know it shouldn't be anything
radical or anything different,
but it's often colleagues that
I've worked on in the past
I've worked with in the past.
(39:44):
For some this would be.
Was it quite right in terms of talking
about they probably do it naturally,
but it's just an awareness raising type
approach whereas for some aspects of
total emotions are building that space
where students is quite foreign and
that's just my personal experience.
So I think it's it's really useful
topic for for people to be aware of to
(40:06):
consider to reflect on using resources
from your website and obviously within
the link to the podcast we'll put a
link to that website there as well.
Yeah, have a look at some of the
things that we're talking about here,
but I think that's most important bit is.
And kind of my lasting thing as
required property is build time.
You know, make this important as part of
your your daily practice with your students.
(40:26):
That doesn't mean talk about every day
with your students in the forced way,
but build this into your approach as a
practitioner. Yeah, yeah, about yourself.
Any kind of key lasting thought to finish
off with. Improve the entire rituals.
That's a very nice emotional term.
Rituals.
Everyone can do rituals and we can create
(40:47):
our own rituals by making it a ritual,
which is a nice way to end.
Fantastic. Alan, thank you very much.
Been really, really interesting conversation.
I really appreciate your time.
Thank you. I've enjoyed it.
Thank you.
About.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Intentionally Disturbing
Join me on this podcast as I navigate the murky waters of human behavior, current events, and personal anecdotes through in-depth interviews with incredible people—all served with a generous helping of sarcasm and satire. After years as a forensic and clinical psychologist, I offer a unique interview style and a low tolerance for bullshit, quickly steering conversations toward depth and darkness. I honor the seriousness while also appreciating wit. I’m your guide through the twisted labyrinth of the human psyche, armed with dark humor and biting wit.