C78 (Intro): What Does it Mean to Empathize?

​This episode will focus on building empathy.  If you feel like you have a solid understanding of what this looks and feels like in the school context, consider popping over to episode 79 to participate in the empathy challenge.  

Empathy 101

To empathize means different things to different people.  It’s not a one size fits all, which is a huge lesson I learned being a PYP Coordinator.  The things that resonated with me did not for the majority of my staff due to cultural differences, learning experiences, and background knowledge.  So how do we build a culture of empathy within our schools, so we can move the work forward? 

​As you can see, empathy and sympathy are quite different, although many people mix them quite regularly.  When we empathize, we put ourselves into the experience by trying to understand the other person’s feelings and point of view.  We are doing it to lend support in times of struggle, but also success.  It teaches us how to operate within society with feeling and care. While sympathy is all about feeling sorry for someone else’s feelings and sorrows.  This paints a different picture entirely, because we only offer sympathy when something negative happens in someone else’s life.  We may feel bad, but it doesn’t permanently imprint on our behavior and thinking. 

To be honest, I didn’t realize the difference until I was a mature adult, emphasis on mature.  It takes great maturity, self-efficacy, and understanding to show true empathy.  We are letting go of our egos and focusing 100% of our energy on supporting another person who is going through their struggle.  We may have not experienced the same thing, but we can imagine how they are feeling.  We are present in our minds and hearts. 

How does this apply to school? You hear a lot about being more empathetic in schools, but what does that look like?  

I found a great resource from Harvard University called How to Build Empathy and Strengthen Your School Community that really helped to shape my mindset. 

Empathy helps learners to build the social skills required for life:  how to appropriately engage and work with others, build lasting relationships, problem-solve, and see situations from multiple perspectives.  Imagine if all of our learners knew how to empathize, there would be no bullying, cliques, or categories (popular, jocks, nerds, etc.) Instead, we would be just people who all have different ways to express themselves, which have similar struggles in life.  Imagine teaching a 5th grade class with that mindset.  Actually, there are schools with this particular model in place, because they have placed the value of building quality and sustainable relationships through empathy.  So, how do we do it? 

​Model empathy

​This sounds intuitive, but many teachers think emphatically, but it may not always be shared with their learners.  Consider it another way of thinking aloud.  When instances occur naturally during the day, consider pausing to think aloud about the situation and how a learner dealt with it appropriately.  As you continue to do this, learners will see it’s a natural way of being and not something that needs to be added to our day. 

Explicitly teaching empathy

As we model empathy, we explicitly show what empathy looks like through the language of the PYP.  To do this authentically, we need to understand what empathy looks and feels like in everyday life and how it can be demonstrated through the language of the PYP.  With time, you will be able to speak naturally about approaches to learning and learner profile attributes in connection to building empathy. This is going to be more meaningful than a stand alone lesson on being “knowledgeable” and “resilient.”

Example
A class is discussing the current conflict in the Ukraine and they want to understand the motivation for war in our modern world.  One learner connects to how all conflicts throughout history have been derived from the same causes: power, money, or control.  

Possible responses
​

• “How did you become so knowledgeable about conflict over time? What led you to make these connections?”

​

• “If you were in this situation, how would you remain resilient through these difficult times?”

Explicitly teaching empathy within context to our units of inquiry supports so many aspects of the PYP.  Even more important, it helps to create good humans who care about others within this world. 

Planning

The number one thing that teachers complain about is time.  So, how can we practice empathy within the context of our teaching time?  To be honest, I think an experienced teacher can weave in building empathy into the curriculum through relevant and significant connections.  This is building a unit planner that focuses on the whole child and not just the academics.  This also requires a team that is open-minded to looking at how to build empathy and character development as an aspect of the unit planning process.  For some ideas, you can look at relevant and significant inquiry thinking strategies. 

School culture

​You can determine the feeling of a school’s culture when you walk through the front door, which is shaped by how adults engage with each other, their learners, and other learners on the campus.  It’s also reflected on the walls.  The walls tell you what is valued, expressed, and shared within the community.  

We cannot make lasting changes within a school without empathy.  We need to look through the lens of great things that are already happening, the people who give their hearts and souls to educate the next generation, and how learners of all ages are engaging with the process.  Through this lens, we can take stock of what is in place and co-create a plan of things that need to be developed further to make the school an even better place to learn.  

Re-shaping school culture is a multi-year project, but it begins with the school leader and how they engage with everyone on the campus, because the rest of the community will follow.  An empathetic leader sets a tone that all are welcome and valued.  Egotistical leaders take umbrage when others succeed.  What are some strategies we can employ to support and grow our school leaders, so they set a tone of empathy? 

Learners struggling with empathy

​When people are raised in environments that are always fight or flight, the brain develops differently.  These learners are continuously navigating uncertain situations in order to survive.  How do we support the traumatized learners who have difficulty feeling empathy for others?  What conditions do we need to create to make them feel safe? 

Now that your brain is full, be sure to participate in our empathy challenge based on The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz.  Be sure to post your reflections on Twitter @thinkchat2020 or Linkedin at Lu Gerlach.