How can I stop this?

Hi there everyone!

This week, the associate dean visited one of my classes for an evaluation. His written evaluation form is perfect, in every category!

I am never at my best when I am being evaluated. To top it off, the associate dean has physical characteristics and habits that resemble that of my ex-husband, a very powerful personality in my life.

My class was unusually silent and uncooperative. Part of the lesson was on the self-serving bias. I used an example of a teacher who is evaluated poorly by her students and says the students' opinions are stupid (poor language choice), but if students evaluate the professor positively, she attributes it to being a good teacher.

Obviously the fact that I was being evaluated at that very moment influenced my choice of example!

After the presentation, I was disappointed about how the class turned out. The dean was reassuring, saying that my teaching methodologies were sound. He suggested that our commuter students are thinking about lunch, not lessons, during an 11-12:15 class. Moreover, it is early the semester, so they are not yet comfortable with me. He completely attributed everything that went wrong to outside factors and not to me.

He relayed through another professor that he had "enjoyed" the class. I have mastered a lot of research in my field, and I have good recall, so I often can impress my peers with the breadth of my knowledge.

My office-mate said that he thought the dean was more interested in how I handled the quiet-class situation than in how my class responded, which is often out of our control.

So, okay, I understand self-serving bias. Attributing our failures and defects to outside factors can be a de-motivating influence that makes us irresponsible and hinders self-growth.

I also am familiar with Martin Seligman's learned optimism research suggests that those of us who beat ourselves up can be happier if we add a little bit of self-serving bias to our formula, especially if those outside factors are realistic attributions, as they are in this case.

Now it's 72-hours after the evaluation, and I still flashback to that ONE EXAMPLE that had a poor language choice and was maybe just a tad too personal -- out of an hour-plus class, 6.5 classroom hours a week, plus the prep time etc. Then I remind myself of the good strokes, but it sounds like equivocation and excuse-making to me, honestly.

How do I stop this?

I know it's not funny, Wants2fly, but I had to laugh when I finished reading your post because I couldn't, right off the bat, remember "the" wrong word/situation! I think the students themselves and the associate dean and everyone else except you probably has my same problem. It's probably along the line of "don't think about pink elephants" where you immediately have to think about pink elephants. The example choice was only obvious, stood out, to you.

If something gets "stuck" like that I remember what I read once about how profession jingle/song writers get a tune out of their head? They either sing the song all the way through (completion) or they "replace" it with another song (and hope that one doesn't get stuck :-) Give up on the evaluation and work on the "next" thing is what I'd suggest.

Get involved/thinking about something more interesting to you or, pretend the situation was like a dream story and replace the offending part with an example you prefer, telling yourself the whole experience start to finish with the better example/word? Evaluated poorly the student's opinions would be dyslogistic, pejorative or derogatory to the teacher :-)

"I am proud of my good exam results except for the failure in one subject where I was unfortunately rather ill on the day of the examination." (even other people use a school example so not so uncommon for you to, despite being a teacher?)

http://changingminds.org/explanation...rving_bias.htm

i giggled also.......i've slapped my hand now!

change your subject in your head........the dean liked what he saw. (don't be like me, for goodness sake!!) i just know, cause i know, that you're a very good teacher. college kids are just that.....kids..........moving right along now........xoxoxo pat

I'm glad you laughed, Perna. It reminds me that my obsessions are pretty funny, once I step outside of them!

Example: I went to the dentist today because my gum was bleeding. There was a good chance that my night-time toothgrinding had pushed a temporary crown down too far. But did I fixate on that? Oooooo, noooooo. I obsessed about maybe having contracted a flesh-eating virus. Two elderly women of my acquaintance, each of whom became infected with a flesh-eating bacteria (or virus, who cares) that does not respond to antibiotics, died shortly after.

I guess an out of place crown is not exotic enough for my fixations. At least I was laughing at myself even as I sat down in the chair and my dental student confirmed it was the crown.

Thanks for making me take myself less seriously.

Old habits die hard?
Depression tells us lies?

I do like the research that Seligman has regarding what we LEARN to attribute various results "to."

When ppl who have poor self image tend to load on the negative for themself, but not for others, it doesn't hurt to attribute some of any failings to outside sources!

Plus, by taking credit for good and dissing the situation for any bad, it helps us become better.

I'll hang with Seligman anyday

Wants2Fly:

My response to the internal self-criticism or worry, like yours, would usually be to use the anxiety and self-concerns to fuel extra effort to improve my preparation for class and increase my awareness of the content I'm trying to teach in my classes. Granted too much self-criticism could be a concern in some cases but I would feel better after working on my class activities--my confidence would go up as I prepared more.

I wonder if other people would find this to be a poor solution?

drclay

Thank you for the suggestion. I am constantly working to improve my teaching, and I think that's a plus.

i believe that in anything that i tackle, the more prepared i am the better job i do. it allows me to stand up there and say to myself "i know more about this subject than any of you do and i'm ready to share".........and that is very empowering. and the more frightened i am of failing, the harder i work to be sure that i KNOW my stuff. whether it's photography, writing or healthcare.