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Very insightful post! It is so true that we often misunderstand others' motivations, and act in a way that creates more problems. This is true whether they are adults we work with or children in our classes. The time we take to get to know others and build relationship and alliance pays off to get the cooperation and hard work we seek. Thank you for sharing.

I think it is important to remember that we can be misinterpreting body language and oral language. It is so important to dialogue and clarify. We need to listen as teachers. Spend less time telling and more time listening. It's possible that school reformers could be contributing to the problem as you say and they should be listening to teachers and educators. Again, dialogue is essential.

On the other hand, I think that people can not make us something that we are not. We have a choice to be who we want to be, to act as we want to act and to feel what we want to feel.

I posted a blog entry today that included, among other points for business management, the idea of eliminating fear. Many teachers these days are afraid - I hardly need explain why. But those who could do the most to help us are the ones hurting us, and your analysis might explain in part why some of us manage to hurt ourselves in the process. Take a look at other wise advice we should hear more often but don't from the self-styled business/education punditry. http://shar.es/mx77i

Joan and Greg--

Thank you for your comments. Teachers are in the business of understanding what motivates people--so discussions of incentives--carrots and sticks--should really be up our alley. It's tough stuff, but I sure got a lesson in what not to do.

David--It does get dicey when people, oddly enough, live up to the monstrous caricatures others use to portray them. It's a perverse cycle, and no one comes out a hero. I look forward to reading your post.

Claus,

While I understand your reaction to the presenter (I would certainly have reacted in the same way), I don't agree with the conclusions you draw from it: that if the teacher can somehow get his "vibe" right, sending out "I trust you" energy, that the kids will behave and work hard (or at least not rebel en masse). First of all, the guy you describe sounds like a bit of a jerk, not merely someone with a jaundiced view of human nature. If you're saying, "Don't be a jerk", then I agree. But humans (and especially 13 year olds) do often lie, belittle, torment, show insolence, break rules, etc. You seem to be saying, pretend that you don't see that side of them and that side will disappear. This is exactly the implicit message of so many principals. That this kind of psychological voodoo will cure (or at least greatly mitigate) the perverse impulses of human nature. So talking about kids' wretched behavior is frowned upon. Build a peppy, kid-centric, supportive school culture --focus on the positive and downplay the negative --and a mystical fix for kids' badness will result. Don't wax indignant about little Kayla's brazen lie or Devon's shoving a teacher in the hall --hush --you'll break the magic spell.

I don't buy it. Machiavelli and Hobbes make a lot of sense. Of course we shouldn't snarl and alienate. But we should be realists, and I think ultimately kids respect that, not the make-believe that's currently prescribed.

Ben--Thank you for your thoughtful comment. I do see where you're coming from. It's always important to maintain some Hobbesian caution when we deal with students. (I'll stop short of Machiavelli on this one.) I certainly don't believe that students' error and misbehavior is always--or even most often--a product of adults' attitudes. And I don't believe a sunny view of students' inner motivations will create a magically create order and virtue.

But I do think we're talking about a question of degree here. The leader of my seminar was indeed a jerk (are you reading this, "Nathan?"), but his behavior was instructive. Some school reform rhetoric is so over the top these days that great teachers with principled concerns about those reforms (whether warranted or not) can feel the same shock and outrage I felt when I was so unfairly labeled in that classroom. In what way, then, can those teachers become "part of the solution," as the idiom goes?

This is not to argue that we assume all teachers' motives are always unquestionably pure--or that all students will naturally do the right thing in a world free from restraint and punishment. (Believe me, I don't subscribe to that view.) But there has to be a balance between trust and constraint in all cases, and that balance, it seems to me, is not always in place.

Nice post.

Teachers or leaders maybe, have their own way of motivating their subordinates and that is a given fact. However I would like to emphasize as well that each one of us as well has its own way of interpreting other people. In some scenarios, those students who are prejudged negative judgments would normally treat them as a challenge and get motivated to prove that its wrong. On my part, I don't worry too much if people judged me negatively, because I cant wait for the part where, they will find out that they were wrong.