At yesterday’s closing plenary at TESOL Spain, Stefania Balloto asked us to reflect on a teacher who made us feel seen and how that made us feel.
I immediately knew who that was. My mind was taken back to a conversation in my third year at university with a lecturer who told me that she had remembered me from my first year. We hadn’t spoken then. She hadn’t personally taught me. She had given a full-cohort lecture at the very beginning of my university course to a lecture theatre packed with first years. She told me that although as an experienced lecturer she had become accustomed to looking out at a sea of heads-down note-takers, it still wasn’t easy not seeing faces. She said that she remembered me because I was the only student who was actually looking at her while she was speaking. I guess I can say that she made me feel seen by telling me that I made her feel seen.
Who makes/made you feel seen? How do you make your students feel seen?
Chris Richards ELT 