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Two female high school students with short hair laugh together. One has a hand over her mouth indicating their laughter is mixed with embarrassment.

Successful Learning: Provide Students Opportunities to Be Comfortable with Discomfort

Inflexion January 30, 2021
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Education isn’t here to make you feel comfortable. A good education should, inherently, cause us discomfort. Part of the “enlightening experience” built into the definition of the word “education” itself is shining light into the darkness of our own ignorance. When has that ever felt good?

– Christina Torres

INTRO

Provide students with opportunities to become more comfortable with discomfort.

KNOW skills and behaviors include classic content knowledge and skills in core subject areas such as reading, writing, and math. It is not enough to have students learn high-quality content, they need to understand that success at learning content is a function of their effort much more than aptitude.

OBJECTIVES

  • Provide students with opportunities to become more comfortable with discomfort.

  • Provide students with brave spaces in which they feel safe experiencing discomfort.

  • Teach students how to deal with feelings of discomfort.

RESOURCE LINKS

ACTIVITY

  • Provide students with opportunities to become more comfortable with discomfort.

  • Use the provided article/blog post about teaching To Kill a Mockingbird as an example.

EXAMPLES OF INCORPORATING LEARNING DISCOMFORT INTO THE CLASSROOM

From: 3 Ways to Find Comfort With Discomfort

Find the Funny

  • Lean into awkward content/situations
    • Bonus: “Awkward” is a very relatable term for students, especially middle and high schoolers
  • Allow and encourage students to laugh when they feel uncomfortable

Own the Squirm

  • Make your own discomfort known to your students

Go Alone

  • Practice dealing with discomfort

  • Teach and encourage your students to practice experiencing and dealing with discomfort

TIPS

  • Little Things are smaller efforts you can do tomorrow, or within the next week or so.
    • While these quick and easy practices can produce big impacts, remember, this is not a quick fix: You’re establishing schoolwide changes that should better serve all students for years to come
  • Like this activity? Check out Inflexion’s full-page KNOW document for more ideas.
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