A Teaching Handbook for Wiccans and Pagans (21 page)

I asked T. Thorn Coyle, who frequently teaches online, if she ever found that she had to reconcile a love of nature and teaching on the web for herself, and if so, how she did it. I thought her comments could be illuminating for any Pagan who is considering teaching online:

Humans are part of nature, and therefore these technologies were made by animals. Some human activity helps support the health of nature, and some activity is detrimental. In this way, we are not dissimilar to termites or beavers, for example. I have more of an issue with my expenditure of jet fuel for my out-of-town workshops than I do with teaching via computer. Since I have chosen to teach in these ways, rather than teaching five people at a time in my home, I have to reconcile myself to the fact that I do harm. I simply work with the hope that the good my work provides outweighs the harm.

The other thing I do, however, is emphasize the importance of the physical in our practice, the importance of recognizing nature in all her forms, and honoring that with more than our words. By becoming more integrated, it becomes more and more difficult to not recognize when our choices are disconnected from our ideals. We learn to eat healthy food, to exercise and rest, to recycle, to compost, to not drive so much, to work for clean water, to lobby for better treatment for animals, and to save trees.

In addition to the environmental ways Thorn suggests for connecting our choices and ideals, your online class can also include assignments that involve meditating or exercising outside to tune in with the rhythms of nature. It's important to encourage online students to get out of their chairs and away from their screens and interact with the “real world” whenever you can, otherwise what you're teaching them online is purely theoretical. Wiccan and Pagan traditions tend to be very hands-on—we have physical and mental connections to our gods and nature's cycles—so make use of that to give students ways to balance screen time with other priorities and align with what you're teaching them in a physical way.

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C hapter 10

A Few Possible Pitfalls

There are some traps that even the best teachers are vulnerable to falling into, and many of them sneak up on us when we're distracted and looking the other way. Often, as teachers, we're so busy dealing with the little things—the details, the day-to-day issues that arise—that we don't look at the bigger picture, and we don't see problems brewing until they've taken a firm hold.

However, as grandmothers are fond of saying, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. If you know about some of the possible problems you might encounter, you are more likely to be able to avoid or minimize them. The point of this chapter isn't to frighten you away from teaching but rather to help you recognize and ward off problems before they get out of hand.

Your Best Defense:
Not Avoiding Conflict

The challenges you might encounter as a teacher might be simple, or they might be complex and complicated, but almost all of them will require you to communicate clearly with students about the problem and not avoid conflict. These situations usually require that most dreaded of teacher-student communications: the “difficult conversation,” otherwise known as calling them on their crap (or them calling you on yours) and coaching them to work through whatever the problem is. And it's your job as the teacher to make sure that the difficult conversation happens and things aren't left to fester.

For the record, I
hate
having this kind of conversation. I always figured that was a result of my personal baggage, because I'm a proper passive-aggressive Midwesterner who dislikes confrontation. But it didn't take me long to discover that a lot of teachers—maybe even most teachers—hate it as much as I do. However, we can't bury our heads in the sand and avoid confrontation with students. For their benefit, and for the sake of everyone else in the class, we as teachers have to get over our reticence in this kind of situation and be the leaders our students need and expect us to be. And that means having uncomfortable conversations.

Sarah Davies talked to me about the value of getting past your fear and initiating this kind of talk:

I'm the kind of person who doesn't like to have personal conversations and will avoid conflict, but I definitely see how if we end up with a difficult personality it's way better to have that difficult conversation early. It's easier for me to have that difficult conversation having been on the side of the dedicated student who would really do anything to make this work.

Anne Marie Forrester told me a story about getting past her own fears of confrontation in dealing with the problems caused by a student and stressed the importance of having the conversation with kindness and respect:

The trickiest part—and I think this is true whether it's the coven or workplace or personal relationships of any kind—is that you have to confront people and be very up front and honest with them, which is really hard. But at the same time you have to do it in a respectful way that's kind, if possible. We've had to do this with a couple of people now. It's important to take the time to talk with them in private, not in front of the whole group. Then we can say things like, “We've noticed that you're not always respectful to the other members of this group, and we would like you to work on that” or “We work by consensus here, and some of your behavior has caused hard feelings among some of our other members. We can't tell you who or why, and we're deeply sorry about that, but you have to go.” Not being afraid of confrontation has been a really difficult lesson for me to learn; however, it is the most honest and respectful way to be, and it saves a lot of unnecessary pain in the end.

I've personally found the compassionate approach to be very helpful. Sometimes when you point out a person's disruptive behavior to them, they appreciate being talked to because they didn't even know they were behaving that way. Sometimes your compassionate and calm handling of the issue defuses the behavior immediately; the disruptive person picks up on your calm energy and responds in kind. And sometimes the compassionate approach encourages them to behave when they see the contrast between their behavior and the way you are treating them when you are dealing with it. If you want them to change their behavior and not leave the class or group, the compassionate approach—rather than an angry or accusatory one—allows them some dignity and you the opportunity to coach them on what better or more acceptable behavior might be.

Being compassionate doesn't mean being a doormat, being passive-aggressive, or letting the student manipulate you if the problem you're having is with a student. It means standing your ground and handling the situation with respect and empathy, and getting tough if the compassion doesn't work. If you are teaching online, you can still use the compassionate approach via chat, email, phone, or however you communicate with students. Just remember to word what you're saying carefully, and keep in mind that email can be forwarded, so don't write anything in frustration that you don't want the world to see.

It's important to keep the upper hand. By this I don't mean “beat students into submission,” no matter how tempting that might be at times. I mean keeping things flowing smoothly and not letting students take control of your class. Melanie Henry talked to me about this:

One always has to keep the upper hand, but keeping the upper hand doesn't have to be just the main show of force.… It's energy perceptions and keeping a good idea on where your leverage point is; like the philosopher said, “I know I can move anything if I know where to stand.”

Good Pagan teachers use all of the tools at their disposal—both the “regular” senses like sight and hearing and energetic or psychic senses—to make sure they have their thumb on the pulse of what's going on in their class.

Some Specific
C
hallenges with Students

Students Who Don't Get Along

Nearly everyone has been in a class where another student drove them nuts—the person who won't shut up, the person who is rude, the person who demands the teacher's attention all the time, the person who won't do his or her share of a group project—and most people deal with it by gritting their teeth and bearing it or talking to the person they're having a problem with in order to try to solve the problem and get the most out of the course without detracting from anyone else's learning. Sometimes, however, one student's irritation or anger at another affects the whole class.

To me, the commonly used Wiccan phrase “perfect love and perfect trust” doesn't mean that you completely love and trust each person you're going to be in a circle or room with; it means that you have the perfect—or right—amount of “love” (or regard for) and trust for them so that you can put aside any beefs you might have with them at least long enough to do your circle or class, and keep your feelings from tempering the experience for yourself and others. Stating that perfect love and perfect trust (or just plain respect and good manners) are expected in your class is a very good ground rule. If students can't seem to get along anyway, you have several options:

• Encourage students to talk to each other if they have problems. Often they'll mediate their own problems.
  
• If they can't solve the problem themselves, take one or both parties aside privately—together or separately—and have one of those “difficult conversations” I mentioned earlier.
  
• If the conflict appears to be a no-fault situation, you can ask the people involved to go into a separate room and come back when they've sorted it out, with or without you mediating.
  

If you believe one of the parties in the dispute is being bullied by the other—adults can bully as well or better than kids can—try these steps:

• Take the two people aside separately. The person being bullied will be much more comfortable and up front about what's going on if the person who is bullying is not there.
  
• Reassure the person being bullied that you've heard what he or she has to say about the situation, you understand, and you are taking action.
  
• When you talk to the person who is bullying, try to find out why he or she is doing it.
  
• If there's a reason—he or she is upset or nervous or just doesn't have great social skills—you might be able to coach him or her through it.
  
• If there's no reason, or if the person is just a jerk, don't hesitate to boot him or her.
  

Keeping an unrepentant bully around is one of the best ways I can think of to sabotage your class by destroying morale, peace, and trust. Your students come to you for spiritual teaching, not to be traumatized. You're not their parent, and you're not running a nanny state, but it's your responsibility as a teacher to try to create an environment that is safe and conducive to learning. Trust me: if you notice there's something going on, students in your class who are not involved in the conflict have noticed it too—and probably before you did. The teacher is often the last to know.

Students Who Get Along Too Well

Naturally, you want your students to bond. These bonds make communication, energy flow, ritual, and magic smoother. But sometimes problems can arise when two or three students like each other so much that they form a group within your group, something like a high-school clique. If it's just a mini mutual-admiration society and the members are still doing their work and not disrupting the class, it's not necessarily a big deal. But sometimes cliques become a bit like black holes in the middle of your group: they focus inward rather than on whatever the greater group is doing and they pull people off track, first within the clique and then other members of the class.

There's also the issue of exclusion. If there's a tight-knit group within your group, the students who aren't members of the clique might feel alienated and left out. Of course there's no rule that says everyone has to like or be friends with everyone else. But when students come together to learn, things work better if each person can treat the others in the group relatively equally, at least during class.

The other potential danger of cliques is when and if they break up, the fallout can affect the whole group. Friendships that happen quickly and deeply sometimes blow up equally spectacularly. Two BFFs who suddenly decide they can't stand each other can disrupt and divide your group.

Here are some ways to reduce the impact of a clique or discourage cliques from forming:

• Encourage students to socialize as a whole group outside of class.
  
• Plan in-class activities that require working with a partner or small group, and keep mixing up the participants so everyone gets a chance to work with everyone else.
  
• Online you can encourage students to chat or email with everyone in class.
  

And of course if a clique does form and it's starting to disrupt your class, you can pull the members aside and have yet another one of those difficult conversations. Stress that you're glad they're friends, but that their relationship is a distraction to others, and ask them to leave it at the door when they come to class.

Students Who Don't Do Their Work

Having students who don't do their work regularly—whether it be assignments you give, at-home spiritual practice, or work on their personal issues—can be a big problem. At first it seems like they're only hurting themselves when they don't do their work, but if you have a couple of people who constantly refuse to do their work, it can reduce the morale of the overall group and hold everyone else back. Students not doing their work can really suck the energy out of a class, and it can also diminish the respect the other students have for you as their teacher, especially if you let the ones not doing their work get away with it.

If it's just one or two students who are not doing their work, take them aside privately and ask them why. It might be that they don't understand the assignments, or there could be other things going on that are preventing them from finding time. It might also be that they aren't getting what they wanted to out of the class or they are having a problem with your communication or teaching style. If that is the case, ask them what you could change that might help them get more out of the class, and incorporate their suggestions if you can. Adult learners often have a good sense of what they need in order to learn; it's possible that you can learn a teaching trick or two from them in these situations.

Some other options are:

• Be sure to give students reasonable assignments and enough time to do them. Adult learners have a lot of other things going on in their lives.
  
• Offer help. Sometimes students—even adult students—don't do their work because they're confused or overwhelmed and afraid to ask for assistance.
  
• Make it clear to students that you're not assigning busywork; the assignments you give are designed to help them on their spiritual path.
  

It's a good idea to make it clear up front that you expect people to do their work, and if they don't, that might hold the whole class back. It's especially frustrating if you give them an assignment and plan to have a group discussion about the work in the next class and some people don't do it. Sometimes just saying that out loud will encourage people to follow through, if only because they don't want to incur the wrath of everyone else in the class.

A few times when I've had students show up without doing their work I have asked them to do it orally in front of the class. Being put on the spot generally deters most people from not doing their work again, although some people actually seem to enjoy making an impromptu presentation more than doing whatever the assignment was.

Another option is not to base your lesson on students having done their previous assignment. The problem with this is that students generally learn more from doing follow-up or going over assignments in class with their peers. Just collecting the work from those who have done it and giving the eyebrow to those who haven't doesn't give students the chance for peer feedback and interaction.