Using student counseling...
Promotes student voice
Increases motivation
Diversifies perspective
Overview
Student consults are specific students that apply to "consult" teachers on the learning experience.
This can occur in a panel or conferencing format.
The student shares the responsibility to provide feedback and generate ideas on activities and classroom experience.
The consultant meets with the teacher weekly to reflect and discuss the following week's practices.
Consulting topics may include...
Engagement
Student Learning
Curriculum
Assessment
Consultation may also include specific dilemmas that a teacher is currently facing. The teacher may request a student or group of students to work their a dilemma from the lens of a learner.
Core Components
Student consultants must be trained
Are used consistently
Feedback is valued and utilized
Proactive Implementation
Proactively implementing student consultants may look like identifying students who would benefit from this role and teaching them the requirements.
Responsive Implementation
Responsively implementing a student consultant may stem from identifying a student, group, or class in need of pro-social modeling and an interest in the field they may consult in.
Connection
If the need is connection then the student may work with a younger set of students and a specific teacher. This may be combined with a strategy such as check in/check out.
Skills Training
If the need is skill building then the student may be put into a situation where they implement a specific skill during their consulting time.
Awareness
If the need is awareness then the student may be supporting the adult with an awareness of the student perspective.
Emotional Regulation
If the need is regulation then the student may be asked to consult at times of challenge throughout the day. This may be combined with scheduled breaks.
Consider Factors Prior to Start
Student factors-
Gender, race, function, topography, family dynamics, interpersonal relationships
Contextual factors -
Resource availability, classroom instruction, physical space, time, technology
Intensifying or Fading During
Duration
Frequency
Feedback
Reinforcement
Goals
REMINDER
Make a note to document when you're starting this intervention.
After 10 consecutive school days of implementation, use collected data to determine the intervention's effectiveness.