Haim Ginott
Mar. 10th, 2012 12:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
valiant_queeneSo, this entry needs a little backstory.
Sometimes, when working at these schools, we have big empty classrooms to work in, which is nice. At other times, however, we are forced to work in tiny teacher prep areas which are rooms about five feet by ten feet. It's a little frustrating.
However, there are good parts to working in the small areas. Less chance of having other students distracting the student I'm trying to test, and the prep areas sometimes have inspirational messages for teachers taped to the walls. I mention this because there was one that I saw this week that really struck a chord with me and I wanted to share.
It's a quote from a book called Teacher and Child by an Israeli teacher named Haim Ginott:
"I have come to a frightening conclusion.
I am the decisive element in the classroom.
It is my personal approach that creates the climate.
It is my daily mood that makes the weather.
As a teacher I possess tremendous power to make a child's life miserable or joyous.
I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration.
I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal.
In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis
will be escalated or de-escalated, and a child humanized or de-humanized."
Sometimes, when working at these schools, we have big empty classrooms to work in, which is nice. At other times, however, we are forced to work in tiny teacher prep areas which are rooms about five feet by ten feet. It's a little frustrating.
However, there are good parts to working in the small areas. Less chance of having other students distracting the student I'm trying to test, and the prep areas sometimes have inspirational messages for teachers taped to the walls. I mention this because there was one that I saw this week that really struck a chord with me and I wanted to share.
It's a quote from a book called Teacher and Child by an Israeli teacher named Haim Ginott:
"I have come to a frightening conclusion.
I am the decisive element in the classroom.
It is my personal approach that creates the climate.
It is my daily mood that makes the weather.
As a teacher I possess tremendous power to make a child's life miserable or joyous.
I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration.
I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal.
In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis
will be escalated or de-escalated, and a child humanized or de-humanized."
