ARE WE STILL TALKING ABOUT NONVIOLENT COMMUNICATION? WE SURE ARE!

To start this text, I have to take you on a trip down memory lane. So please, get your favorite cup of tea, sit comfortably, and let me share a bit of my story.

I was a teacher in a big EFL school, and as part of our job description, we had to talk to different stakeholders around us. Being an ambivert, there were several situations that I did not feel comfortable with, and communicating in confrontational situations was one of them, to the point that it gave me terrible migraines, for example.

Not long after, teacher Carol Romano introduced me to the world of Nonviolent Communication through her talk “Giraffe Hearts—Using Nonviolent Communication in the Classroom.” Listening to her, I quickly took note of everything I could read later. This talk has been the source of my research ever since, allied with elements of Visible Learning and Positive Discipline.

Therefore, this article aims to show three practical ways to apply Nonviolent Communication in your classroom— from teachers to students, among students, and from coordination to teachers. Firstly, the core definition of Nonviolent Communication is an approach to enhanced communication, understanding, and connection based on the principles of nonviolence and humanistic psychology. It is not an attempt to end disagreements but rather a way to increase empathy and understanding to improve overall quality of life. It consists of four steps: observation, feelings, needs, and request.

• When observing, remember to use non-judgmental, clear, and specific language. Avoid using words that trigger negative emotions or criticism;
• Listen actively to the other person with an open mind, trying to understand their perspective. Avoid interrupting or judging their words;
• Be aware of your feelings and needs, and communicate them honestly and respectfully;
• Practice empathy: Put yourself in the other person’s shoes and try to understand their perspective. Use phrases like “I hear you” or “I understand how you feel.”

With that in mind, let’s move on to the practical applications.

FROM TEACHERS TO STUDENTS

Although the importance of feedback is indisputable, it can be problematic. Feedback can be strongly connected to emotions, and according to Tyng, Amin, Saad, and Malik (2017), “emotion has a powerful influence on attention, especially modulating the selectivity of attention as well as motivating action and behavior.” What if one of your students has a consistently negative self-perception, and their feelings and emotions get in the way of their cognitive processes when learning in one of your lessons? That is when Nonviolent Communication can come to the rescue.

Returning to the four steps of NVC, we can plan the feedback moments we will give during our lessons. It is not about the content or the behavior you direct but the structure you use at these points. Check out the phases below:

• Observation: I noticed that you _________ (include here what you have observed, using descriptive language);
• Feelings: I feel _____________________________(worried, anxious, upset – include here words that are real feelings. For a more complete list, access https://www.nycnvc.org/feelings);
• Needs: I need you to ______________________(describe here what you need or value exactly);
• Request: Can you _________________________(in here, you can include a tool you would like your student to use, a kind of tip you know could help your student, or even a conversation leading to learner training).
• There are possible variations to the steps above, but these chunks can be very helpful.

As I implemented these four steps with my students, they have:

• Become more open and willing to receive feedback;
• They started showing signs of learner autonomy since they began to discuss different strategies and tools during feedback moments;
• Spontaneously given peer feedback using the same frame.

Establishing an empathic connection with your students gradually breaks down mental blocks. Students feel more confident and safe, seeing their mistakes as something positive and consequently learning from them.

FROM STUDENTS TO STUDENTS (especially the little ones)

In this part of my article, I am going to focus on younger learners—and for this article in particular, students between 3 and 8 years old—especially because, from what I have observed, working with teenagers and adults tends to be easier, even with their own singular cognitive and socioemotional traits. Make no mistake, however: each age range requires its own set of activities to work fully. Students struggle to acknowledge their emotions at this age, and it isn’t easy to name their feelings in certain situations. Still, in a study out of UCLA, Dr. Matthew D. Lieberman found that “subjects who put feelings into words make sadness, anger, and pain less intense. When we experience fear and anger, for example, the amygdala part of the brain shows increased activity. Still, by naming these feelings and emotions, activity moves from the amygdala to the prefrontal cortex. This part of the brain inhibits irrational behavior and helps us make better decisions”. Therefore, our mission as teachers in this matter would be to help our students understand and name their emotions.

THE FIRST LOW-PREP ACTIVITY TO HELP YOUR STUDENTS ON THIS PATH IS THE FOLLOWING ONE:

• Create a spinning wheel with different emotions. You can use a digital device to do it on or even write them on pieces of paper to be randomly picked out. Since we are dealing with younger kids, write down some core emotions (sadness, fear, anger, joy, disgust, and even anxiety);
• Spin the wheel or pick an emotion;
• Ask them what situations might trigger the feelings and how they deal with these big emotions.

Another effective way to work with emotions is to ask students to create emotion puppets. For that, you can ask students to use paper plates or even toilet rolls where they can draw different faces for each emotion. This can be very fun because they can use their creativity to depict the physical traits of each feeling. When they have finished, you can allow students to role-play situations when these emotions show up. What comes from this activity is pure gold! I have seen students confiding in their friends and sharing some brutal realities they experience on a daily basis in their homes.

FROM COORDINATION TO TEACHERS

I have had my fair share of great leaders throughout my career as a teacher, and I must say that one trait that all of them had in common was open communication and their ability to truly listen to our needs and incorporate them to the best of their ability into the day-to-day working of the school.

So to all coordinators that are reading this article, coming from an NVC specialist, here are three reflections I would consider making when working with your team:

• Listen to your team with an open heart, and ask practical questions to investigate the roots of their observations and needs;
• Remember your team consists of very different human beings, and that means that they have various strengths that can be used positively in the group;
• Be firm whenever necessary, but also be gentle;

A team whose work and purpose can be trusted is solid gold, but it can quickly become mud if the work environment is a hostile one.

CONCLUSION

Over the last few years, I have witnessed the power of the Nonviolent Communication in developing truly empathic and effective environments. It has helped me with teaching all age ranges, especially to create an environment of trust and growth.

I hope this article will help shed some light on this topic and encourage teachers to apply this approach in their classrooms.

REFERENCES

• “The Role of Constructive Feedback in the EFL Classroom.” The Art of TEFL, 21 Dec. 2020, ioannanifli.wordpress.com/2020/12/21/the-role-of-constructive-feedback-in-the-efl-classroom/.
• Aug 18, and 2020 | Emotional. Science of Naming Emotions | NWI Journal. nwijournal.com/science-of-naming-emotions/#:~:text=By%20naming%20these%20feelings%20and. Accessed 19 July 2024.
• Rosenberg, Marshall. Vivendo a Comunicação Não Violenta. Sextante, 15 July 2019.
• Eigenmann, Maya. A Raiva Não Educa. A Calma Educa. Astral Cultural, 5 Sept. 2022.