Debbie Silver: Be who you are, raise the bar — and don't be a grump

  If you sing, sing with your kids.

  If you dance, dance with your kids. 

  And sure, it’s important to know how to align curriculum, scaffold objectives and create anticipatory sets.

  But that’s not what makes a good teacher.

  “Until you connect with kids, nothing else matters,” said Debbie Silver, an award-winning educator and the keynote speaker of the Tuesday morning general session of the National Dropout Prevention Network annual conference, which is being held near Chicago this week. 

  It has been more than 40 years since Silver first walked into a classroom. She had been told she would be teaching fourth grade; when a gang of tiny first graders walked in, she didn’t know what to do. 

  After confirming with the school office that she was indeed where she was supposed to be, Silver began to cry. 

  “I want to be your teacher, but I don’t know how,” she admitted.

  That’s when a child stepped forward from the group and said, “we’ll show you.”

  “From that day on,” Silver said, “I knew I was in the best profession in the world.”

  Silver pleaded with educators to combat the cynicism that permeates the profession. 

  “Here’s what I will not put up with — not one more day, not one more moment: I am done with mean-spirited educators,” she said. 

  Donning a pair of horned-rimmed glasses, held together with a safety pin, Silver took on the identity of a veteran educator, contemptuous of change and condescending of those who still face each student with hope and optimism. 

  Those sorts of teachers, she said, are the type who argue they don’t need to change their approach because “I’ve got 30 years of experience.”

  “No you don’t,” Silver shot back at her dreadful doppelgänger. “You’ve got one year of experience that you’ve repeated for the last 30 years.” 

  Those types, Silver quickly pointed out, are a minority in the profession — and she noted that there were likely none of the sort among the hundreds of educators in the room, reasoning that they are not the type to travel long distances to take advantage of opportunities to be better teachers.

  “We can talk about them, can’t we?” she asked. “They’re not here, are they?”

  The majority of teachers who remain passionate and truly interested in serving students carry an added burden, Silver said.   Legislative leaders across the country are attempting to determine public priorities during a time of dwindling resources. And so teachers must advocate for themselves and their colleagues, which in turn is advocacy for America’s students, Silver said. 

  Meanwhile, she said, educators must not fall into the trap of thinking that it is their job to praise students for whatever work they complete.

  “I think we’ve self-esteemed ourselves to death,” she said. “It’s time we got real about what motivates kids.”

  They don’t need stickers and stars for mediocre efforts. “Anything easily obtained is cheaply held,” she said. 

  What students need to succeed, she argued, is for teachers to continue to raise the bar.  

  “They need us to pay attention,” she said. “They need us to give them feedback.”

  Beyond that, all students need is for their teachers to be genuine. 

  “Be who you are,” she said.

 For more information, visit www.debbiesilver.com