The Importance of Trust

“We teachers have the power to make magic happen in our classrooms. Once our students bond with us and trust us, anything is possible.”

The quote that I chose to discuss is on page 14 of Routman. She just finished explaining her story of entering a classroom of first graders who claimed that they couldn’t read. In the process she told them that she was a magician and promised by the end of the week on Friday that all of them would be able to read as they were going to write a book titled, “We Can.” The point of this story was to illustrate the importance of bonding with our students emphasizing on the issue of trust.

I chose this quote because I feel that I am in the same situation in my main placement. I am also in a first grade classroom where both first grade teachers decided on doing a reading switcharoo, where my main teacher is in charge of those students that need more help with reading. As this is their first year trying out this method, my master teacher has indicated to me several challenges, one of them being the lack of bonding with each student from the other classroom.

After reading this chapter I can see how it would be important for my teacher to have that trust and bondage with the other students. Just last week one of the students, from the other classroom, started to cry as he felt that my master teacher was being to hard on him, and shared his frustrations by stating that he would rather be with the other teacher, because “she isn’t mean.” As the class was over my master teacher shared with me that she wishes she could spend more time with them and getting to know them better. She knew that student had a difficult time with reading, but was not “in the bottom.”

I agreed with her, but at the same time I didn’t know what she exactly meant by that but I had some idea of what she was trying to say. After reading this chapter I have a better understanding of what she meant. She needs for him to trust her and know that she is not there to get him, wants him to fail, or to embarrass him. And that her main motive is to get him read and to learn the best of his ability. Without that trust factor, it will be more difficult for him to learn. As Routman says later on in the paragraph, “we learn more, and learning is easier, when we trust our mentors and colleagues.” The same goes for our students.