Respect

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0XAI-PFQcA

R-E-S-P-E-C-T find out what it means to me. R-E-S-P-E-C-T take care, TCB.
Ooooo a little respect

Just like the famous words by Aretha Franklin my educational psychology class also is exploring what the word respect means and whether or not it is something that can be effectively taught in the classroom. But how do I personally define respect? Well the first thing that pops into my head when I hear the word "respect" is that catchy song by Aretha Franklin, which then usually gets stuck in my head. But anyways when I sat down to answer the question "what does respect mean to me," I decided I would take a look at what my dictionary had to say.

Dictionary.com defines respect as:
1. a particular, detail, or point (usually prec. by in ): to differ in some respect.
2. relation or reference: inquiries with respect to a route.
3. esteem for or a sense of the worth or excellence of a person, a personal quality or ability, or something considered as a manifestation of a personal quality or ability: I have great respect for her judgment.

Ok so definitions 1 and 2 don’t exactly work for the context we are using respect in. But definition 3 is getting somewhere. I think this is a pretty good definition, however I personally think that there is much more to respect then just what is described in definition number 3. I believe that respect is something that goes both ways, you have to give to get. This is something that is very important in the classroom. Respect isn’t just something you can have a child look up in the dictionary and then so ok I want you to have this disposition, I want you to always show respect. I think it is something that must be modeled, discussed and explored in the classroom. I think what respect can be boiled down to in the simplest of definitions is “treat people the way you want to be treated.” You must treat the student in a way that you yourself want to be treated in return. I think it is also very important for the teacher to look at the classroom from the students prospective and to ask himself or herself, “ok if I am a student, how would I want to be treated and what ways are the best way for me to learn.” Respect has a huge impact on the classroom, I know that personally if I respected the teacher and they respected me, I was much more driven in that class to do well because I didn’t want to let that teacher down. I knew that they genuinely cared about me as a person and respected me as an individual. On the other hand if I felt that a teacher didn’t respect me personally then I was much less driven in the classroom and didn’t feel that they disserved or would appreciate my hard work or respect.

Just like in the song respect by Aretha Franklin, I believe everyone wants a little respect. And like it says in the song respect is a disposition that means something different to everyone. However I believe the most important thing to remember about respect is that you have to give respect to get it in return and so in turn the best way to teach respect is to demonstrate it as a quality and treat people the way you yourself would like to be treated.