Resiliency and Achievement

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Meet Sam: Loud, sarcastic, and full of aggressive energy, Sam is the type of disruptive student many teachers just barely tolerate if they're unfortunate enough to have him in their classrooms. He wants to participate, but he can't sit still and he distracts others.

Meet Maria: Quiet, reserved, even docile, Maria is the type of low-key kid many teachers forget is even there. She's inconspicuous and doesn't contribute much in class, but at least she doesn't divert her peers' attention.

Despite their differences, these two students do share one troubling characteristic: they both come to school with low expectations about their potential for academic success and about their ability to form positive relationships with others.

Whatever the reasons for Sam's and Maria's disengagement—they live in poverty, come from troubled homes or neighborhoods, have indifferent or abusive parents, have been bullied, and so on—Bonnie Benard calls on teachers to resist the temptation to let these at-risk students slide through school and life. What these students don't need is for teachers to be pessimistic about their capacity to prevail over life's most challenging conditions, she says.

Let Resiliency Be Your Guide

Indeed, most children do overcome seemingly crippling obstacles, notes Benard, a senior program associate at WestEd who has spent more than 20 years studying what makes some children so resilient. Such children possess identifiable traits that other students can acquire, she affirms (see below). Teachers, therefore, must learn how to help their students develop those skills, attitudes, and values.

A first step is for teachers to honor the different ways that students learn, Benard says. Young people appreciate being respected. Interviews with students reveal that they want teachers to find out how they learn best and to create lessons that provide for those approaches. "It's such a gift to a student when a teacher doesn't write him off for not being able to learn like the other kids," says Benard.

In addition to respect, Benard identifies three ways teachers can nurture their students' resilient natures:

Establish caring relationships. Teachers must take time to connect with each of their students, says Benard. It's as simple as making eye contact at least once a day with each student, as simple as knowing each child's name, and as simple as noticing when a child is absent and saying the next day, "We missed you yesterday." These are actions that all adults who interact with children can take, asserts Benard.
Deliver high-expectation messages. Teachers can help their students realize that, as Benard puts it, "they do indeed have a power within themselves" to rise above difficult circumstances. To do so, teachers and other adults in schools need to convey that they truly believe in each student's capacity to learn and to be successful in life. "Showing that somebody believes in you when you don't believe in yourself is so big," Benard states. Use a "strengths-focused" approach, she advises: First, identify the strengths and interests that each young person has, and then use those strengths and interests to address any challenges.
Provide opportunities for active participation and contribution. Giving students a voice can be accomplished through classroom management approaches and instruction, Benard suggests. Students can help establish classroom rules that everybody can agree with, for example. Further, she adds, learning strategies such as cooperative learning provide opportunities for students to be resources for one another and convey to them that they can help one another learn. In terms of assessment, teachers can use strategies that invite students to reflect on their work. Benard recommends, for example, that teachers ask students to create portfolios and include items that represent their best work.

Giving students opportunities to contribute can also take them beyond the classroom. Service learning is a powerful approach for getting students "out in their communities ... working in libraries, creating school gardens," Benard notes. In short, teachers can involve kids in making their world a better place.

Taking Time to Make a Difference

Fostering resiliency in students requires that teachers shift their "intention," states Benard. "It's really about our way of being, more so than it is about doing anything," she explains. Rather than just tolerating the disruptive or overlooking the reticent students, teachers must be mindful about their interactions with all young people. "No matter what's going on in the classroom, we can take a little step back ... take a deep breath ... and realize that, here in this moment, ‘I can smile, I can make eye contact.’ And that is not going to take any more time. It happens instantaneously, in that moment."

And that moment can pay dividends. In surveying California school children about the risk factors in their lives, Benard found that when teachers respect the individuality of their learners and care about them, young people are less likely to engage in health-risk behaviors. What's more, their academic scores improve. Students in Benard's survey performed better on the California standardized tests when teachers and schools established caring relationships with them, conveyed that they expected them to achieve academically and socially, and gave them ways to contribute to their schools and communities. Says Benard, "This is what has really helped us make this case for what we call resilience or positive youth development approaches."

Did You Know?

Contrary to what we may reasonably conclude, most young people facing all kinds of risks and challenges actually do succeed—in school and in life. According to Bonnie Benard "around 70 percent of young people in life's most challenging conditions can overcome the odds." This astounding finding may have implications for funding, Benard suggests; rather than building more prisons, for example, state and federal governments might better spend their money finding ways to nurture resiliency in children.

Recognizing Resiliency

Socially competent. Resilient children are able to connect with healthy people in their lives. They have good communication skills. They demonstrate empathy and are caring.
Good problem solvers. Children who overcome the obstacles in their lives are able to identify alternate sources of support. They look critically at their home and school environments, determine what is lacking, and then identify a neighbor or teacher who can fill in the gaps.
Self-aware. Call it self-efficacy or individuality, but resilient children know themselves—their strengths and their weaknesses—and have a sense of self-worth.
Optimistic. Perhaps one of the most important traits resilient children share is a sense of purpose. This includes having hope for the future and being persistent in striving to achieve their goals.

Product Focus

Learn More About Resiliency

Bonnie Benard was interviewed for Breaking Through Barriers to Achievement, an ASCD video-based professional development program.

The three-tape program (also available on DVD) examines how administrators and teachers successfully work with students who are dealing with adversity but manage to succeed despite the odds. The program shows how educators can nurture this resiliency in their students by providing caring relationships, high-expectation messages, and opportunities to contribute to their communities in positive ways.

Price: $399 for ASCD members, $469 for nonmembers

Stock #405133 (VHS)

Stock #605133 (DVD)

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