On this episode of the Innovative Schools Podcast, Joseph Cope is back, and we're talking to him about how to look past challenging behavior and build life skills in students. Come on. Let's learn together. Hey, educators. Jordan here, Innovative Schools Podcast.
Jordan:So glad that you could join us for another episode. One before we get into this episode, just wanted to to talk a couple things. One is you may have seen we've talked about it a good amount, but, maybe not seen or heard that, the Innovative Schools Summit is partnered with us, Innovative Schools Podcast. We're kind of all together. That's how we get the access to all these wonderful experts in education, everything like that.
Jordan:But wanted to make sure you guys knew that over the summer here, as we're nearing kind of the end of this season, season three, which is exciting, we have two summits coming up, one in Nashville and one in Vegas. We'd love to see you guys there. So hop on over to innovativeschoolssummit.com, to check that out and see some of the presenters and stuff that we have. But today, we have an old friend coming back by to join us. He was actually our guest on the very first episode of the Innovative Schools Podcast.
Jordan:We have Joseph Cope with us again. Hey, dude. What's up?
Joseph Cope:Jordan, it's great to be back. Always good to be back.
Jordan:Yeah. You got the first test run. You know, you were gracious enough to help us out with that first episode and make that a reality. And here we are, season three. I don't know the episode number, but somewhere deeper in season three, we said, you know what?
Jordan:We should bring Joseph back and give him another run at it because he was really rough. No. Joking. You were great.
Joseph Cope:No broke. No mirrors are broken. Everything is still intact. There's no burning embers.
Jordan:Yes. Yes. We made it through, and here we are. And I'm excited. I really am excited to have you back with us, for us to kind of loop back to this whole thing.
Jordan:Quick recap on things of who you are, because maybe some people didn't go listen to that first episode. Maybe you should pause and go listen to that one or check it out after this. But let's see if we can hit some of these highlights. You were in a school for how many years?
Joseph Cope:Boy. So I was in I was in the classroom for fifteen years at three different schools.
Jordan:Yeah. Mostly in Texas or at least some in Texas.
Joseph Cope:Ten in California, five in Texas.
Jordan:Wow. So you have your classroom experience. Did you do, anything at the administration level? I can't remember. I'm sorry.
Joseph Cope:I did, Jordan. So I started my career with ten years in elementary school in California. And then when my family moved to Texas, I made the big bold jump in the middle school classroom education where I taught. I was a middle school English teacher. I became an award winning middle school teacher in West Texas.
Joseph Cope:And then in 2020, I made the jump during COVID into leadership. And I, I ended up being in leadership for three years at two separate schools. All of the schools that I have worked at are title one schools with anywhere between 6090% free and reduced lunch. So educators who are out there who are going, who is this guy? Has he been there?
Joseph Cope:Every TED Talk that you've heard about an educator who's gone through it, I promise we've got stories to match.
Jordan:Yeah. Yeah. There is always that concern, I think, of some of our audience may think, this person that's on the podcast that we're talking to, I hope they have a classroom experience, and you definitely do have classroom experience, which we we think is very valuable to any of the conversations we have on the podcast. But for the last handful of years, you've been in responsibility responsibility centered discipline coach. You've gotten to kinda share your knowledge and your wisdom and all the things that you have come to know through your successes and your failures about educating kids across the country, maybe further?
Joseph Cope:Yeah. So, Jordan, the last three years have been a dream being a master trainer and implementation specialist for responsibility, set, and discipline. I've been able to work with teachers and administrators. Now I can say internationally around the world, fixing what feels like the same problems with behavior no matter where you are in the country and no matter where you are in the world. I mean, feels like, I mean, last year, Jordan, I was in Honduras.
Joseph Cope:And in Honduras, we were at an international school. And when we asked what are the things that are driving your teachers the most crazy, wouldn't you know it? They were the exact same things that I was hearing in Fredericksburg, Virginia. They were the exact same things that I was hearing in Florida. They were the exact same things that I was hearing on the West Coast in California.
Jordan:Problems here are problems there. All education in general is just in the same boat. We're all working together to try and raise up the next generation and teach them, and the same problems are are are all over the place.
Joseph Cope:Well, nobody, Jordan, is saying that, students' behavior is getting better these days, are they?
Jordan:True. Yeah.
Joseph Cope:Right. Like, nowhere in the world is there an educator that goes, you know, kids these days are so much better than they were when I was a kid. Like, it's all it's all there. It's all there for us to challenge ourselves to shift the model of how we're thinking about behavior. And to me to me, that's the most it's the most fulfilling element of what I get to do is when we can shift a mindset just a little bit around what is this behavior really trying to tell us?
Joseph Cope:What's underneath this behavior? And not just from a social emotional learning perspective, Because social emotional learning is as valuable as it's gonna be, and we're never gonna take away from the needs of the whole child. But what is it that is missing within this child that we have the opportunity to be able to reframe for the teacher? And what are the skills that we can grow within that student so that behavior doesn't keep repeating itself?
Jordan:Yeah. So you're already kind of you've done a fantastic job of just kinda, like, guiding us into our conversation today around behavior with students, which I love. You wanna get into it. You wanna talk about it. And we are.
Jordan:And you you mentioned a little bit of some of those misconceptions, but let's dig into as you go around the country, the world, and you're speaking to classrooms, you're in there trying to help teachers and trying to help them. Because as established through this podcast and many other places, classroom management isn't exactly a course you take during your education degree at whatever university you are. May there may be some now that are starting to come, but it's not from what I've gathered from talking to you, Joseph, and many others, it's not something that is taught with, consistency or with Intention. It's not taught a lot. Intention and stuff.
Joseph Cope:Yeah.
Jordan:So thinking about that, that's what, you know, this classroom management, the dealing with behavior. Personally, I don't love saying dealing with behavior. I'm not sure what to put in there instead. But managing or, you know, whatever. What do you think as you've gone around?
Jordan:What are the misconceptions or the misplaced thoughts that you encounter the most as you're talking to educators about challenging behavior in their classroom?
Joseph Cope:Yeah. Well, maybe we can start by taking taking almost a 10,000 foot view of what behavior is. Right? Like, the reality is is the teachers in the classrooms are human.
Jordan:Mhmm.
Joseph Cope:And they're dealing with little humans. Right? And so when little humans and big humans don't feel like they're themselves for whatever reason, we fall into this place where everything becomes personal. And my first thing to think about when it comes to behavior is the behavior the number one thing that I I I'd like to tell teachers, it's always hard in the moment to hear these words, but teachers have all heard it. Don't take it personal.
Joseph Cope:But how do you do that? And so this is where we're gonna zoom in a little bit. How do you not take it personal? Because, I mean, for example, if you're a middle school teacher and a kid curses you out to your face in front of the class, how is that not personal? And how can I not take that personally?
Jordan:Yeah.
Joseph Cope:What what I've discovered, Jordan, is this. Is if we are if we are feeling like we're taking it personal, the first thing to identify, that's a red flag within me. Secondly, the question that I like to always ask myself is what is the story behind this behavior? Because if every behavior tells a story, right, no behavior, no kid walks into school on a day and decides, you know, the rest of this year, I'm gonna be a jerk. Now, teachers might think that that's the case because of some of the behaviors that are coming out.
Jordan:It definitely feels that way.
Joseph Cope:It may feel that way for sure. But the question then becomes, if the behave if the story of that behavior is when Jordan speaks up when it's not his turn, it drives me, the teacher, crazy, who did I just make that story about? Myself. Me, the teacher. Yeah.
Joseph Cope:Me, the teacher. So what if we could reframe the story and say, that student is misbehaving because they're missing a skill. Now we've completely eliminated the me part of it, and now I've put myself as the adult, the professional, the teacher into a reflective space that begins to ask what could be missing. And some of the basic skills that we talk about that are missing in school are some of the things that get overlooked the most in our conversations with kids. Okay.
Joseph Cope:For example, and I know we I know we're gonna get here in our conversation, Jordan, but every school has those five or six words that are on the wall that are supposed to be our mantra. They're supposed to be our mission, our vision, our whatever they are. Right? Like, what pro
Jordan:this is who an eagle is. This is who an eagle is.
Joseph Cope:E e stands for empathy. A stands for accountability. G stands for go get them. Right? Like
Jordan:Wow. This is great that you hit all of those so quickly like that. This was not planned. I just threw that out there as a
Joseph Cope:L stands for lean in and e stands for everyone is involved. Right? Yeah. Teachers love a good acronym. They love a good acronym.
Joseph Cope:Yeah. But how many times do those posters on the wall just get stuck on the wall and we never refer to them? Yeah. So here's the question that I wanna ask teachers. What if those words on the wall were the answer to the question, what skill is the child missing?
Joseph Cope:So for example, Jordan can't get his work done. He seems apathetic. He's distracting students in class, and he's in fifth grade. So rather than thinking, oh my goodness, Jordan is not doing his work again. I'm so frustrated with Jordan.
Joseph Cope:What if I walked up to Jordan with this mindset? Jordan looks like he's not getting his work done. I wonder if he's struggling with accountability today, and I wonder what's underneath that. Now I have a conversation with Jordan about accountability that comes from a place of skill, not a conversation with Jordan that says, get your work done from a place of hurt in my heart.
Jordan:Yeah. Using those those things that are on the wall, those, terms, those, you know,
Joseph Cope:it's who we are kind of things. Jordan, I like to I like to call those I like to call those foundational skills.
Jordan:Sure. Gotcha.
Joseph Cope:If you if you have them on the wall, why not make them your foundational skills that every conversation around behavior centers back towards?
Jordan:Yeah. So we said that a lot of schools have those. What about if a school may not maybe it's not a school wide thing. Mhmm. How can what can teachers do to kinda bring what you were just saying into their classroom if that's not something that is at their school?
Jordan:I don't I my high school and last time I was in school as a student, we didn't have anything like that. I think that's a a more recent thing of something like that. My daughter's school has has things like that. But maybe that's something that doesn't exist. What do those teachers do?
Joseph Cope:Yeah. So if you're an administrator who's listening to this, I'm gonna give you an activity for your next staff meeting. Teachers, if you are listening to this and you wanna implement it into your classroom, you can use the same activity at this level. It's a three part activity. Number one, give yourself the freedom and the permission to write down all of the behaviors that absolutely drive you crazy.
Joseph Cope:So if you're an administrator Everything. If you're an administrator, give your teachers the space to vent. It drives me it drives me crazy when my kids get up out of their seat. It drives me crazy when my kids blurred out in class. It drives me crazy when my kids can't keep their hands to themselves.
Joseph Cope:It drives me crazy the apathy that my kids show. It drives and fill up the list until your tank is empty. Let it all out. That's step one. Step two is ask yourself, if every behavior tells a story and I take myself out of the story, what is a skill that this behavior demonstrates is lacking?
Joseph Cope:For example, it drives me crazy when students get up out of their seat. Let's take the me out of there, and let's reframe it. When students are up out of their seat, it shows a lack of self control. It shows a lack of accountability.
Jordan:That's the
Joseph Cope:It shows a lack of perseverance. Those are the skills that we're talking about. And we're talking life skills. And go down your entire list that you've vented. We're gonna take the you part out of it, and we're gonna say, when a student demonstrates this, it shows a lack of this.
Joseph Cope:Once you have your entire list of all the skills that your students are missing, compile them together into the most four or five most commonly needed skills.
Jordan:Yeah. And not not behavior correction, but skills needed.
Joseph Cope:We are talking about skills needed. And sometimes, like, if if it helps to reframe, call those skills character traits, values, life skills. Right? Things that you want words like perseverance, respect, integrity, empathy, self control. These these big words that the kids of this generation generally are not getting exposed to outside of your classroom.
Joseph Cope:Once you come up with that list, narrow it down to no more than five, and then make your classroom poster.
Jordan:Is that the the third step is make the classroom poster?
Joseph Cope:Is make your classroom poster and then three a three a because there's a three a. Once you have to make your poster, but we have to define those words so that everyone's on the same page. Because if only the words are on that poster, then the person who reads the words defines the word. Sure. There's no common language that describes those words.
Joseph Cope:One of the schools that we that that that we worked with, they came up with the most beautiful definition of respect. Like respect oftentimes is subjective, right? But they came up with this definition of respect. Respect is be kind to myself and others in all I think, do and say. Be kind to myself and others in all I think, do, and say.
Joseph Cope:And any time that teachers recognize that there was a level of disrespect, whether it was student to student or student to teacher or student to environment, the conversation was not around being disrespectful because it hurt my feelings. It was the last action that you took, what you just did there, does that match up with how we are respectful at school? Be kind to myself and others in all I think, do, and say. And it became a talking point rather than a correctional opportunity.
Jordan:Right. Yeah. That whole I really like that step two, which I think might be kind of the I don't know. I could see it being difficult. I'll say for my own, dealing with my own kids and my own thoughts is kinda separating and saying, feel this way when you do that, which I I believe that feelings are valid.
Jordan:If you have a feeling, like, it's a valid feelings are okay. But changing it to I I can see where if I stay on the feeling side, say, I feel I I feel mad when you just get up without asking. And but changing it into that skill of well, it's a self control or it's a or communication or whatever it is. That's what's really kinda getting at me. But then it opens it up beyond just correcting the one behavior of getting up when you're not supposed to.
Jordan:Right? The self control leads into being able to do your work or not saying something that you really wanted to say or because it you know, if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say it at all. But it it makes takes it from correcting an action to building character. I think I probably just said exactly what you said, but shorter. But
Joseph Cope:No. What what you did, Jordan, was you honed in on why these conversations are as important as they are. Because if anybody in this audience has ever been to therapy or has talked to a counselor, you know this phrase, the problem is not the problem. Right? The behavior itself, it's in that moment.
Joseph Cope:But it's not the big problem. Right? When a kid when two kids can't keep them hands their hands to themselves, and they keep bucking up against each other. The problem isn't that they're bucking up against each other. The problem is neither of them know how to communicate their feelings in a respectful way so that they can have the other person see their perspective.
Jordan:Right.
Joseph Cope:And so the coachable moments, when we take the emotion piece out of the conversation, we don't give room for it to be personal. We just become those who are facilitating the growth of the skill that is missing. Like, Jordan, you even said, I love that you said our feelings are valid because our feelings are always valid. It's who we are and where we are. However, if our conversation with a student is this, when you do that, it makes me feel disrespected.
Joseph Cope:Who did we make it about? Ourselves. Yeah. So when you can say those things, you might say, you know, when you did that, it made me feel disrespected, but I'm wondering if there's something else because this isn't about me. This isn't even about you.
Joseph Cope:This is about something bigger. You see, when you said that to me, I wanna make sure that I hear your side of the story, but my brain kinda turned off when I felt disrespected. So I'm gonna give you another chance to say what you mean to say, and I promise I'm gonna be here to listen to your side. If you're ready for that, let me know. I'm all ears.
Joseph Cope:But what you just modeled there, right, you modeled and mirrored respect, and you even acknowledged your feelings, but you didn't make yourself the focus. You didn't make you feeling better the focus. You made it about the skill of the student growing in that moment, the skill of respectful conversation.
Jordan:Yeah. And I was I was about to to chime in there with the whole modeling because that's what just happened. And you you got there without any prompting. But which is great. Like, I my daughter, a few months ago, she was something I don't know exactly what happened, but she was getting very she'd respond to us very not aggressive, but angrily with unkind tones and and things.
Jordan:And I'll say it I made it about me for a while there of, like, hey. This is hurting me. Like, what's, you know, what's going on? But I shifted. At one point, I kinda got to a breaking point and I said, okay.
Jordan:This isn't working. And I said, who talks to you like this? Like, is there someone at school who is talking to you in this way? And at first, she said no. And I was like, okay.
Jordan:Well, I I'm just trying to understand how you've kind of learned, like, there's been a change. And I'm concerned that something's going on at school that we might need to know about. And eventually, she told us that there was a girl who gets angry at her about some other situation, and that's how she talks to my daughter. And that just opened up the whole conversation for us to then we were able to make connections of saying, well, when you talk to us that way, like or sorry. Let me start just when this girl at school talks to her, it's like, how does that make you feel?
Jordan:Sad and, not respected, you know, like they don't like me. So how do you think mom and dad feel when you talk to us that way? Probably the same way. You're right. And so just shifting that, but us kinda changing our conversation from don't talk that way to is there, you know, is there someone who talks to you like this?
Jordan:It changed how we were able to kinda get more into get beyond the the yelling at mom and dad into the why is this happening. And so I I that's how I can relate to kinda what you're saying about in the classroom with a teacher talking to the students of taking it out of me and me, the the adult, the grown up, the teacher, whoever that is, and trying to figure out what's going on with that that kid to diffuse these moments or, you know, this the behavior?
Joseph Cope:You know, we we have in our brain mirroring neurons that respond to the stronger emotion or feeling that is in the room. And when teachers let students' emotions become the mirror Mhmm. A teacher who reacts to a student's emotions turns themself in their brain into the same age as that child.
Jordan:Yeah.
Joseph Cope:Right? Like, there are times where your four year old daughter has said something to you and you said, no, you didn't. You just turned back into a four year old girl. Yep. Yep.
Joseph Cope:Throwing sand at each other in the sandbox. So the the skill then becomes the skill then becomes recognizing that this is this problem is not the problem. I am gonna be gonna become the mirror in this moment. And and not I'm not gonna become the mirror by gritting my teeth. I'm gonna become the mirror by using those four to five words that are on the wall as my anchor and asking myself, which one of these skills is this child missing?
Joseph Cope:And which one of these skills can I model? Can I coach? Can I move towards? Can I even loan some emotional control to this student related to this skill? And that makes the that makes our conversations with students so intentional.
Joseph Cope:And I'm not saying don't use your heart. Teachers, don't hear me wrong. Don't don't get me wrong. All of these conversations come directly from the heart, but they have to come from the heart with this deep level of intention so that our heart can be protected and we don't have those behaviors continue to drive us crazy.
Jordan:I think what we're gonna do, because we we've packed we a bunch in to hear this first segment here of all of these different things. So we're gonna take a a break for a second. But I'm gonna give a challenge to our our educators. You heard the three steps that Joseph kinda said, the three things of trying to build what he calls the foundations for your classroom or for for your school. During our break, our short little break here, do a little pondering about what kind of what are those behaviors that poke you, that push your buttons a little bit?
Jordan:Then take it to the next step of moving yourself out and thinking about the skills. I guess if you have time, you can go ahead and print the poster number three. But let's focus on those first two right now. Take some time while we're in our break real quick to ponder some of those things. And when we come back, Joseph and I will continue our conversation about, you know, behavior challenging moments, building the skills into students.
Jordan:So hang out, listeners, and we'll see you in just a minute. Hey, everybody. Educators, welcome back to Innovative Schools Podcast. We have Joseph Cope. Jordan here with you talking about behavior in schools and, well, classrooms.
Jordan:Just really just people behavior, honestly. In this line of work, it is specifically students. But, as we were talking about before of just, like, building the skills into students, changing the mindset from how it makes me feel to what is the skill that I can build into that student, which ultimately just creates more or just it create helps correct behavior beyond the one situation into several situations. You guys had some homework during our little break. I hope you did that.
Jordan:You can do some more later if you need to. But trying to just help you guys get into that mindset of that that mindset shift. While you guys were on break doing homework, Joseph and I were talking and doing our own little homework in the break. And where we're gonna go into next is I thought that maybe there's some of our listeners who are listening to all this different stuff, and they're saying, yeah. That's great.
Jordan:I still have to teach this stuff in math. I still have to do this stuff in social studies. I have to do this in science. I have I have to plan this. I have to do that.
Jordan:I don't have time. I got 30 kids. This sounds great, but I don't have time to emotionally support all of my kids. And let me tell you what. When Joseph heard me say, I think that's where we need to go.
Jordan:He his emotion went through the roof because he hears this a lot. You kinda run into this as you're helping people. You had a nice little soapbox. Can you recreate your soapbox now? Well,
Joseph Cope:I don't know if I can recreate it, but I I will tell Let's talk about this. I will tell you this. There everybody loves the idea of being connected with your students because nobody gets into education to be a jerk. We all get into education to connect with people and if at least make an impact on the future. So when something comes in the way, of course, it drives us crazy.
Joseph Cope:When and then there's all the other variables that are on top, right? I don't have parent support. My administration isn't giving me the help that I need. I've got lesson plans. I'm prepping for four periods.
Joseph Cope:I I have I have an over I have more students in my class than I know what to do with. How am I supposed to have a conversation with one student when all of these other students can't hold themselves accountable? And now I'm having one conversation, now there's six dumpster fires that take place while I'm having one conversation. What am I gonna do around that? And so let's just let's just start by breaking it down, because I I heard something a long time ago that has helped me a lot, which is this.
Joseph Cope:Clarity comes from elimination. And what I mean by that is this. If every student in your class feels like a burden, then you'll never have clarity on who you can target. But if you take a step back and ask yourselves, okay, let's put our students into three tiers. Okay?
Joseph Cope:Your your 75 your your 60 to 75% of your students are generally quite compliant. Right? Like, they come to school, they play the game, they know how to do it, and they're succeeding. In most classes across America and around the world, it's between 5080% of your students that are willing to do the work and are happy to be there. And if they're not happy, they put on a smile because they know that that's where they should be.
Joseph Cope:Then you've got your next tier of kids, which is your the next maybe 10 to 15%. So we'll call it that group that they're your fence sitters. They're your ones who have the potential to go both ways. Right? They're the ones who, they do well when you're in class, but oftentimes when there's a sub, they tend to go the other way.
Joseph Cope:Right? They might be easily swayed. But they also you can tell they have they've got all the potential in the world to be part of the 50 to 80%. And then, you know, real real talk, you have your five to eight, sometimes 10%, right, of your class. It's usually not more than one or two.
Joseph Cope:And in some years, some tough years, some tough periods, three or four students, right, who feel like they suck up the emotional life of the room and they just take it out. And teachers say it all the time, I I'm I'm spending so much time on three or four students, I don't feel like I can give what I need to the rest of the students. And who ends up following in the path is that kind of middle group, right, that other group.
Jordan:Mhmm.
Joseph Cope:Okay. So here's how we can think about it. Don't bite the whole elephant off in one go. Like, you can't eat the whole elephant with one bite. So let's target who it is that we are going to do what I call collecting currency.
Joseph Cope:And when I say collecting currency, I mean, what is it that makes a child tick? If I want to if I want students to invest in themselves, I need to spend in a currency that has value to them. Does that make sense?
Jordan:You got an example? I need I think I need a little example here.
Joseph Cope:Absolutely. Let's think about our top tier kids. Okay? Let those tough, tough, tough kids. Now, I don't know if I'm gonna be able to I don't know if I'm gonna be able to get all of them at one time in one conversation.
Joseph Cope:So I'm gonna start focusing in on my middle tier of kids. So let's say I've got three boys and two girls and a class of 26. I've got three boys that I've identified and two girls who kind of on their that fence sitter group. What I would do is I would try to have conversations with them that are either on the way out of class, on the way into class, and I would have conversation with them about life. Now, here's what's different about the conversations I'm talking about and the conversations we've had in the past.
Joseph Cope:As I'm having my conversations with my students about life, in the back of my mind, I'm listening for where they demonstrate those foundational skills on the wall outside of class. Okay. So I find out, oh, Jordan's really into computer games. Okay. So I just locked that in.
Joseph Cope:Okay. So I asked Jordan on the week on Friday. Jordan, what you doing this weekend? And Jordan goes, oh, I can't wait to play whatever game all weekend long. I've got a whole like, we're gonna be I've got six or six or eight of us.
Joseph Cope:We're gonna get together, we're gonna do this whole gaming thing, it's gonna be all day Saturday. It's gonna be amazing. Okay. Think about Jordan gaming for six to eight hours. Now if our words are perseverance, respect, integrity, self discipline, and empathy, where are the areas in that experience where he's gonna demonstrate those?
Joseph Cope:He probably has a level of perseverance because it's something that he enjoys. He's probably gonna have to work on some of the respect things when he's saying things back and forth, especially to his team. Right? His integrity might be challenged when his mom says, Jordan, it's time to eat, and he says, I don't want to. Right?
Joseph Cope:Like Yeah. Those are things where now he's demonstrating. Okay. So that's Jordan. Now one of my girls, I found out that she's a competitive dancer.
Joseph Cope:And all weekend long, she's gonna be gone at a dance competition. She's traveling six hours to be in a a fourteen hour competition, and she's probably gonna come home late Sunday night and be tired Monday morning. That girl, perseverance, respect, integrity, self discipline, empathy, where is she showing those things? So I'm listening with a second layer of intentional listening to collect currency.
Jordan:Yeah.
Joseph Cope:Collect currency. So then Monday morning comes along, and Jordan doesn't want to get his work done. He gets in he gets in the class, and he's like, oh, mister Cope, I hate math. I'm not gonna do this. Oh.
Joseph Cope:Now I might have a conversation with Jordan, and I might say something like this. Listen. This whole weekend you spent gaming was the time of your life. You spent fourteen hours on one game. I'm wondering if you can conjure up enough perseverance to start with two questions.
Joseph Cope:That's all I'm asking. Just give me a start. That's all I'm looking for. And then my little girl, Megan, who's the who's the dancer, she's the one who she's having a hard time. She's having a hard time with another one of her friends, and she ends up being really, really bossy with one of her friends.
Joseph Cope:So you can probably assume she's one of the leaders on the dance team. She has the ability to be a leader. She just needs to figure out how to do it respectfully. And so I have a conversation with Megan, and I say, I know that you're one of the leaders on your dance team, and you killed it this weekend. Can't wait to hear more about what took place.
Joseph Cope:But in this conversation that's taking place right now, we're wondering what empathy looks like so you can hear their side of the story because life isn't always a dance competition. Sometimes life is about making sure that we're on the same page so that we're choreographed in the same way.
Jordan:Nice sneaking in the choreographed word.
Joseph Cope:You like
Jordan:what I
Joseph Cope:did there? You like what I did there? Currency. Currency.
Jordan:Yeah. That reminds me a lot of something that I heard once, because I I feel this is weaved into that is you can't withdraw from a relationship you haven't invested into. And so what you're just saying isn't com it's not complete. You're you're listening to what they're having to say to try and see how you can tie it into the skills and things that you want to see them grow in. But I also think simply just talking to them about what's going on in their life, they're they probably aren't gonna pick up that you're categorizing things to make to pair to that skill.
Jordan:But they say, oh, mister Cope, like, he kinda cares about what I'm I'm doing. This is really interesting. I I wanna talk to him about it. So when you come to them with that skill building intention of Mhmm. Kind of correcting that behavior, changing and helping them grow, they're more likely to to take that nudge, that correction, that help because you've invested into it.
Jordan:So currency on your side of you're getting that currency of what to use, but you're also investing into them so that you can withdraw that later into something that helps them accomplish, you know, what's on your wall or whatever schoolwork or whatever needs to be done.
Joseph Cope:Listen. If you go into a conversation that has a challenging in a challenging moment conversation, and you don't have currency invested, you haven't invested in the currency, it's too late, and you're gonna go into the red. The challenge to teachers is, can you collect currency with the students with whom you have to collect currency? So that when you need to have these conversations and challenging moments, it doesn't feel like you're dipping into the red. It doesn't feel like you're going into debt.
Joseph Cope:You really wanna have this moment where you've accumulated enough interest so that you're you're spending in interest with this student. Listen. Interest is a multiple meaning word. You're spending with their interest in mind, and you're spending in the interest of their currency.
Jordan:Yeah. Yeah. So we've talked a little bit. Most of our situations so far, I feel like, have been what I'm gonna kind of classify as somewhat not passive, but not getting the schoolwork. Hey.
Jordan:We need you to get started on your schoolwork or you're having a little interaction with a friend. Nothing that I would classify as huge, maybe kind of a bit smaller. But I I don't think I can leave this conversation without talking a little bit about maybe those bigger moments. It maybe it started small and it's escalated into yelling, cursing across the room, or, you know, something like that. When teachers are in those moments, is there a shift in the thinking?
Jordan:There may be some teachers like, I can't just some some kids, you know, being belligerent. I don't know if that's quite the right word. They're at least, you know, they're cussing at me. There's some bigger thing. And they're like, okay.
Jordan:I'm not sure just being like, what is something going on at home? What's what's hurting you right now? Like, I could see that as being a a teacher's not well, they're like, I don't see how these two things work together. But thinking about the we've talked about the mirror neurons and pointing back to the things. Let's talk about those big, huge emotion moments that sometimes happen in the classroom or in a in a school?
Joseph Cope:Yeah. Okay. So let's think about it. Let's let's let this one, we're gonna go from the the moment in, and then we're gonna take our way out to 10,000 feet.
Jordan:Okay.
Joseph Cope:In in the moment, if a student becomes belligerent, becomes loud, becomes the indicator in that moment within their brain is that they don't feel safe. Okay. So just remember that. And and brain and and listen, brain scientists, neuroscientists out there will tell you that when the amygdala kicks off, safety, security is the number one priority. And when security is the number one priority, control becomes the key variable in that moment.
Jordan:Yeah. So I mean, I just wanna pause for one second just just because I was thinking about this is as we're walking through what you're describing, I just wanna kinda press in and challenge our our listeners to think about maybe a moment. Maybe it's not your most dignified moment, but a moment that you've been in that place. You have a big emotion and try and think and and relate of Joseph just said that, you know, security and control. The moments that you've been in a a spot of big emotion concern, maybe kind of acting like these moments we're talking about, maybe not in the school, but somewhere else, Think about for yourself as we kind of walk through this, what you thought and how you've felt to validate kind of what you're saying, Joseph, of in those moments, I've gotten really angry or I've gotten really scared.
Jordan:What does it cause me to do? Let's just I wanna I wanna encourage a certain amount of self reflection as we talk about these these bigger moments. So sorry. Could please continue because it's great, but I just I don't know. I just felt like it's important for us to think that, not be thinking on the outside, but be active and walking through how people feel in these these bigger emotional challenging moments.
Joseph Cope:So Yeah. And Jordan, thank no. Thank you for jumping in on that, because because nobody's listening to this podcast just to get information. Right? We're we are you're listening to this podcast because you are investing the time to find out what can I do differently?
Joseph Cope:And this comes back to something that we said at the very beginning, which is we're not trained as teachers to deal with these big, big moments. Right? Teachers wear the hats, the psychologist, the therapist, the mom, the dad, the nurse, the and so in these big challenging moments, the the the few things that we can remember, number one is this behavior is telling a story. And in those big belligerent behaviors, if we can remember this is about safety and security for them, if we fall into the trap of the mirroring with them, then we fall into the safety and security, and now you've got two humans who are both in a safety and security space. Okay?
Joseph Cope:Yeah. So now we're going to take a step back. What are some of the preventative pieces that we can put in place so those belligerent behaviors become further and further apart and fewer and fewer so that we can create an environment and a culture where those those that safety and security doesn't feel like it's as much of an issue. Some of our teachers out there will know that there are certain kids who they don't have as many behavior issues in your class because of a relationship that you've built with them. And those same teachers will also say, yeah, there were some years where there was a kid who, it was just too much.
Joseph Cope:So let's take a step back and ask what are some of the things that we can do to create? One big challenge with teachers is we're so heart driven. We're so Yeah. Heart driven. We want to make an impact so these kids get onto our heart.
Joseph Cope:But what we forget is that if we don't approach behavior from a place of skill, then you've just turned yourself into one other parent. Yeah. And how many students do you have on your roster? It is biologically impossible for your heart to have enough room for all of the kids. So you can't.
Joseph Cope:Eventually, that's why you say things like, I can't do this anymore. I can't take it anymore. I can't with Jordan anymore because your heart has taken too much. So here's the here's the step out. Approach behavior culturally, like the culture of the behavior management, the the cult, the culture of the the of the skill growth as a skill that you are growing.
Joseph Cope:So we've talked about ways to implement this skill today on the podcast. One, don't make it about yourself, make it about the skill on the wall. Two, give yourself a chance to take a breath and recognize where you are in this moment. Three, have the conversation about the skill. That gives you a chance to talk about the skill, not the behavior, because the problem isn't the problem, it's something that's underneath it.
Joseph Cope:And in a framework that I like to coach that that I coach around the country, it's a conversation that we call the give them five conversation. And it's a structured conversation that gives teachers an ability to reflect when conversations go poorly. And I'm not talking like, big conversation those big behaviors are gonna happen. But in a conversation that's called a give them five conversation, we're just asking. We're giving us some sort of statement or idea of support.
Joseph Cope:And it the the spirit of support is I'm here for you. I'm not against you. Right. The expect the expectation, it's about the skill on the wall. It's not about a rule.
Joseph Cope:We have to identify the breakdown. The breakdown becomes the behavior that we have. Then we've got the then we've got the benefit to the student. That's the currency that we're spending in so that we can get to closure. Now those five pieces, let me tell a story.
Joseph Cope:Okay? Sure. Do we have time for a story, Jordan? Absolutely.
Jordan:We always have times for good stories.
Joseph Cope:This is a story that I get to share on stage oftentimes. But one year, I got a I got a knock on the door in October, and this girl gets introduced to my class first day. She's got blue hair. She is she is like one of those outside the box kids, and I found out from the counselor that it was her second foster placement. And it was a tough, tough kid.
Joseph Cope:So when she went there was and she was the kind of kid who when when she got escalated, she got escalated. The hardest time of the day for her was during lunch hour in a middle school cafeteria at a Title One school with a 100% free and reduced lunch. You can imagine the chaos and I and I taught her right after lunch. So one day, she walks in and she is full of profanities coming in. I won't say them on the air, but the but but she comes in and she goes, mister Cope, I ain't doing shh today.
Joseph Cope:I'm not doing my effing work. One of those b's in there is gonna get their a whooped after school today. Okay. So now, I want you to think about the spirit of the conversation that I had with her. Okay?
Joseph Cope:Think about big, big behavior coming into the class.
Jordan:Real big. Real big. Big. Tsunami.
Joseph Cope:All of a sudden, now I've got a choice. I've got a choice. I can say, get yourself out of the classroom, go get yourself together, and come back when you're ready. I could. Or I could totally ignore it and hope it goes away.
Joseph Cope:Mhmm. Or I walked up to her, and at this level, I said, hey. That I got a question for you, number one. Is it an adult thing or is it a kid thing? Because I'm gonna go about this totally differently.
Joseph Cope:And she goes, it's those bees in there. They're gonna they just keep getting on my case. I can't handle it anymore. And I said, so I'm gonna assume that it's a child, right? She goes, yes.
Joseph Cope:And I said, oh, what's it gonna take for you to be the best version of you? Because the lesson plan that I created today is a writing plan that has you at the center. I thought about you as I was creating this, but you're not gonna be able to be a part of that for yourself if you're not your best self. So I'm asking, what's it gonna take for you to be the best version of yourself? And my voice got lower.
Joseph Cope:And she looks at me and she goes, why the hell are you whispering to me? Can you see her mirroring neurons kick in?
Jordan:Yeah.
Joseph Cope:She kicked in. And then I said, because it's all about you. It's just about you. So I'm gonna ask one more time, what does it take for you to be the best version of you when you come into this class? And she goes, three minutes.
Joseph Cope:And she power whispers, three minutes. Now can you see the mirroring neurons kick in? But in that moment, it was take yourself out of this, Joseph. This is not about you. This is about her.
Joseph Cope:Hence, the question, is this about an adult or a kid? Because I'm gonna go out this totally different. Put my brain in the space of I'm gonna engage in a skill, not from my heart. This isn't personal. This isn't with me.
Joseph Cope:It's about something that happened, and I'm gonna identify the skill that took place. And then by whispering, I offered support. By bringing my level down, I modeled respect. I had to identify some of the some of the breakdown that was in her, but the currency that I spent was in this writing is all about you. And if you're gonna be your best version, you're gonna get a chance to participate in this.
Joseph Cope:And then she gave me closure when she whispered back three minutes.
Jordan:Yeah.
Joseph Cope:In that moment, it became more about the skill that was being engaged in than my heart getting crushed because one of my favorite students was taking something out on me.
Jordan:How far into your career was that conversation in your education career? Do you remember?
Joseph Cope:About thirteen years in.
Jordan:Yeah. I was really hoping it was gonna be later in. How many failed conversations do you think you had before?
Joseph Cope:Jordan, my first week teaching fourth grade at Crosby Elementary in Garden Grove, California. Shout out, cougars. A student in my class, under his breath, after I asked him to do something, under his breath, first week, says, F you under his breath to me. And my response was not, well, it seems like you're having a tough day. What else could it be?
Joseph Cope:My first response was, did you have something to say to me? Did you wanna say that out loud? Like, that was the story of all of the failures that I had. But what I started to realize was every time that I reacted to their mirroring neurons, my energy levels drained so quickly, and it took so long for me to get back into being the best version of me that eventually, I stopped. I just let rule of thumb was if they're emotional, the first two or three things that come out of their mouth don't affect me.
Jordan:I bring that up just to you know, I think anything that I enter into, listen to or read or watch, that's like, hey. Here's here's how to, like especially with people, like, here's a way that you can kinda work these situations or help or grow or, you know, this is what you need to change about, know, whatever, is I come out of it with a really high expectation and motivation of saying, oh, I can make all these changes right away. But I I knew I played you a little bit. I knew that the conversation with a girl was later in your career. And just as an encouragement that in the same way that it takes time for students to build the skills that we're trying to build into them, it us adults and educators, it takes time for us too.
Jordan:So just as an encouragement to all of our educators listening, if you listen to this podcast and you're like, these are some really good things and I wanna work these into what I'm doing. And you're eight minutes in and you fall on your face, it's okay. Let's get back up and try one more time. It takes time. It's a skill for us adults as well to be able to remove ourselves, to not just mirror back, you got something you wanna say to me, son?
Jordan:But to to work into, it takes it's a progression. It's a progress into being able to build skills into students. And so I don't know. I wanted to bring some some down to earth, some realism that as much as I admire you, Joseph, and know your knowledge and your wisdom and your experience is you can be on chapter 85 of working through this, and there can be some that are on chapter five, and we shouldn't be comparing our chapters. But part of this podcast is to just help everyone grow in whatever little bit it can be.
Jordan:I think about weightlifting. I never lifted weights, but I understand, you know, you're not gonna go out there and lift. I don't know what it'd be. I I never did any I picked a bad analogy for me personally, but, you know, you're gonna bench press some massive amount of weight. I don't know what it would be.
Jordan:You're not gonna do that the first day, but you'll work your way up to it. And so just a just a touch of encouragement.
Joseph Cope:And I'm gonna add on to that encouragement, Jordan, because there are there are literally millions of books out there that will tell you how to get better at something. Right? And that's just within the education space. Right? That's just there.
Joseph Cope:Right? But there is a difference between acknowledging a skill and becoming skilled. Right. And the difference between inspiration and acquisition is the amount of times that you practice. But but how you practice makes a difference.
Joseph Cope:Because if you practice and failure becomes something that you accept as I can't do it anymore. Right? Like, we tell our kids to have a growth mindset. We have kids. But how many times do we as teachers struggle in a growth mindset when it comes to our own skill acquisition, especially around this?
Joseph Cope:I said this little line to a friend of mine the other day, and I and I I it's one of those ones where I kinda surprise myself. When you say something, you're like, oh, that was good. And so she texted it. She texted it. I'm like, oh.
Joseph Cope:But but I I actually I have it written down to remind myself, which is I'm looking at it right now, which is how you speak your mind will determine your next state of mind. How you speak your mind will determine your next state of mind. And it's that gentle reminder that it's the practice of pause, the practice of remove myself from this, the practice of identify the skill that the kid is missing, identify and then practicing within myself, can I speak about that skill? And the first 60 times that I fail, practicing to go back and reflect and saying, was I really for the kid, not against them? Was I actually focused on the skill, or was I still feeling hurt?
Joseph Cope:Did I point out the behavior that they were missing? Did I spend in their currency, or was they spending in my currency? Those are four great reflective questions that we can ask when we have our fail moments. Right? Fail some of you are gonna roll your eyes out there, but failing is the first what is it?
Joseph Cope:F. S. T. F. I.
Joseph Cope:L. Is an acronym. F. R. S.
Jordan:Oh, I don't know.
Joseph Cope:I don't know this. First first first oh my goodness. Now now I'm on the spot. Whatever it
Jordan:is, sounds like you're failing
Joseph Cope:at No. The No. No. No. I didn't.
Joseph Cope:No. I didn't. I did not fall I did not fall to that failure. It's first attempt in learning.
Jordan:Ah, okay.
Joseph Cope:First attempt in learning.
Jordan:I had not heard
Joseph Cope:this. Yeah.
Jordan:But I like it.
Joseph Cope:Fail is your first attempt in learning.
Jordan:I do like it. Joseph, I listen. You bring so much to these conversations. I mean, it's it's really about you. I'm just here to I don't know, for you to look at while you talk because you don't really need me.
Jordan:You but I I I loved this conversation. I loved just getting to hear some of the stories that you have accumulated over the years, your failures and the successes, and your passion for trying to share that with our education community, to help them, just continue going because education's hard. It's difficult, and every little bit of support is welcome. And so I thank you so much for joining us today and sharing all of this, and all that stuff. It's it's it's been delightful.
Jordan:It's been wonderful.
Joseph Cope:Jordan, it's always a pleasure coming on so that you know you make conversation easy, and you're significantly more than someone to look at. So the the conversations that we have together, really, we're we want teachers to be in the best place that they can be to support the kids that we know need the most help, and teachers are struggling out there. Teachers are really struggling. So if today resonated with you, I'm glad that it did because our heart is for you. And administrators, when you're out there, our heart is for you to support your teachers as well.
Joseph Cope:So, Jordan, thank you for having me on.
Jordan:Absolutely. Thank you, Joseph. Well, we're gonna go ahead and wrap this episode up. I know Joseph already said it, but if this resonated with you, we're really thankful for that. And I encourage you to share it with someone else who you think it might resonate with as well.
Jordan:We say it all the time on the podcast. We're not here to just try and make this big podcast with lots of people listening to anything. We truly just wanna help educators, and we can't help more educators without your help. So this is the small little plug to ask you to follow and like, subscribe, whatever you do, share it so that, we can help and support more educators. So we thank you for listening.
Jordan:We'll see you on the next episode. And one last time, thank you, Joseph, for joining us.