Relationships, relationships, relationships. They are so important in every aspect of our lives! Think about this for a second, if you did not have a positive relationship with your friend, would you want to hang out with them? The same could be said for the student-teacher relationship. Why would you expect a student to want to be in your class and learn from you if they did not like you when you do not enjoy spending time with people whom you have relationship?

There are many great ideas in this chapter that give you ideas on how to build your relationships with your students. Some other ideas include attending their extracurricular events, such a a hockey, soccer or baseball game, going to a dance or skating recital, watching their play or music concert. I live in a small town so it may be easier for me to build and foster relationships with my students, I see them everywhere- the grocery store, the playground, the pool, the hockey arena- everywhere! It also helps that I have a school-aged child of my own who also attends the school in which I work. Building relationships with the students can be as simple as saying good morning, giving a smile and asking how their day is going when you see them for the first time at school. Addressing them by name is also so very important. As a Learning Assistance Teacher, I have the wonderful opportunity to get to work with all of the students in the school, and I make it a priority to learn each and every student’s name. Since there is a chance that I will be in their classroom or working with the directly at some point in the year, I want them to know that I value them.

Relationship building is not only reserved to the students. We also need to build relationships with the parents. Again coming at this from a small town, I know many of the parents of the students I work with. The difficulty I have had however, is keeping the majority of them in the loop more than just with our reporting periods. Some parents hear from me much too often due to difficulties with the behaviour of their children, so it is imperative that I am in contact with them regularly. This year, it is my goal to keep in touch with all of my parents, even if it is just a quick note to say what we are working on this week and how they can support their student, or a quick note to say how hard their child is working on their learning activities. This is my goal this year!

SD 27 put out a wonderful 12 minute video on how their district is working on building strong relationships and the benefits they are seeing from doing so.

How are you working on building relationships with your students? Your parents? Your colleagues?

What are some of the activities that you do at the beginning and throughout the year that help to build on these relationships?