Why Don’t We Trust Students?

As someone who regularly works with teachers on topics like blended learning, Universal Design for Learning (UDL), and student-led learning, one recurring theme I encounter is control. There’s a pervasive fear among educators when it comes to releasing control and allowing students to take more ownership and responsibility for their learning. This begs the question: Why don’t we trust our students? What is it that we really fear?

If we maintain all the control, we hinder our students’ ability to develop the essential skills they will need in the future. The rapidly changing demands of the workplace and life require individuals who are self-motivated, adaptable, and capable of critical thinking and problem-solving. By not allowing students to take more responsibility for their learning, we risk leaving them unprepared for these future challenges.

The Control Conundrum

The pushback I receive from teachers when I facilitate workshops designed to move away from whole group, teacher-led, teacher-paced lessons often revolves around the idea of control. Teachers are scared to release it, fearing chaos, a lack of learning, or students who won’t comply with expectations, complete work, or meet the required standards. This fear is understandable but can be shortsighted and robs students of valuable opportunities to learn and grow.

When teachers maintain strict control over every aspect of the classroom, students are left powerless. Who wants to spend every day feeling like they do not have agency, independence, or choices? This hurts their motivation and creates an unsustainable work imbalance, with teachers doing the lion’s share of the work. The result is a classroom where students are passive recipients rather than active agents in the learning process.

The Impact of Teacher Control

When teachers exert total control over the curriculum, pacing, and behavior in a classroom, they stifle student autonomy—a fundamental psychological need essential for motivation. This power dynamic can lead to a host of issues. Students become dependent on teachers for direction and approval, hindering their ability to develop crucial problem-solving and critical-thinking skills. This dynamic also robs students of opportunities to pursue their interests or take ownership of their learning journey. Too often, students are given answers to questions they did not ask and solutions to problems they’ve never encountered. It’s no surprise that by high school, nearly 75% of students report negative feelings – tired, stressed, and bored– about school (Moeller, Brackett, Ivcevic & White, 2020).

This power dynamic also places an enormous burden on teachers, who find themselves doing all of the planning, teaching, reviewing, reflecting, assessing, and communicating with families. With classrooms overloaded with students, this is a recipe for burnout.

Checking Our Biases and Assumptions

So, what is the solution? It begins with us, the educators. We must check our biases and assumptions and identify what we value. Is our goal simply to cover the content, or do we aim to develop capable, confident, curious learners? Why did we get into teaching in the first place? What were we hoping to achieve or create in our classrooms? Do we feel like we are accomplishing those goals, or are there obstacles making it challenging to align our hopes for this profession and our values as educators with our day-to-day practice?

Over time, many educators have been asked to do so much, cover so much, and manage so much that their practice may have gradually drifted away from their initial hopes and goals. In this demanding environment, it’s easy to lose sight of why we became teachers and what we wanted to create in our classrooms. We need to get comfortable with releasing control to reconnect with our original aspirations. Trusting students means giving them the space to explore, fail, and learn from their mistakes. It means valuing their input and ideas and recognizing that learning is a collaborative process. By doing so, we can create a classroom environment that truly fosters the development of capable, confident, and curious learners.

Preparing Students for the Future: Aligning Classroom Learning with Workforce Skills

This reflection is not just about improving classroom dynamics but also about preparing students for the future. The World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs report highlights the rapidly changing landscape of the workforce. With skills like analytical thinking, creative problem-solving, and technological literacy in high demand, our traditional methods of teaching from the front of the classroom are inadequate. We cannot prepare students for this reality if we do not help them develop the skills needed to drive their own learning.

In his Forbes article, “From Jobs To Skills: What The Future Of Work Will Look Like,” Dan Tynan discusses how the workplace is evolving faster than ever. “In the last three years, workplaces have changed more rapidly than in the previous three decades — and the rate of change is only going to accelerate.” Labor shortages, shifts in employee expectations, and new technologies are changing the types of positions organizations need to fill and the skills required for those roles. Companies are prioritizing skills and competencies over traditional qualifications, creating a more diverse and adaptable workforce. To align our educational practices with these future needs, we must empower our students to take charge of their learning, fostering the very skills that will be essential in the years to come.

Reflecting and Strategizing for The Future

To transform these ideas into actionable steps, I’ve created a worksheet and activity for teachers to use this summer. This exercise is designed to help you reflect on your current practices and strategize for the new school year. Consider the following questions as you plan:

• What aspects of control am I willing to release in my classroom?
• How can I create opportunities for students to take more responsibility for their learning?
• What biases or assumptions might be influencing my teaching practices?
• How can I align my classroom practices with the skills students will need in the future?

Reflecting on these questions can help you identify the changes needed to create a more student-centered learning environment. Consider specific strategies you can implement, such as incorporating more project-based learning, allowing students to choose their own topics for certain assignments, or using technology to facilitate more self-directed learning.

Educators can access a free resource below to guide them in reflecting on their current practice and plan for the year ahead!

Wrap Up

Trusting our students is not about relinquishing control but about redefining what control looks like in the classroom. It’s about creating a partnership where students feel empowered to take ownership of their learning, where they are motivated to explore and grow, and where they develop the skills necessary to thrive in an ever-changing world.

As we end one school year and transition into a new school year, let’s commit to reflecting on our practices, challenging our assumptions, and elevating the potential of our students. Together, we can create a learning environment that truly prepares them for the future.

Moeller, J., Brackett, M. A., Ivcevic, Z., & White, A. E. (2020). High school students’ feelings: Discoveries from a large national survey and an experience sampling study. Learning and Instruction, 66, 101301.