#i think i hit my stride midway through so yknow skim a bit

[whentherewerebicycles]

Hey! Obviously feel free to ignore this if you don’t have the time or energy for it, but do you have any advice for handling criticism in class? I’m in a language class this semester where I’m likely to be the only student in class a decent amount of the time (the only other person enrolled is auditing), and having a class that's a little over an hour long where I’m just translating out loud and having my mistakes pointed out/corrected is, as it turns out, a lot to handle. (1/4)

I’ve found myself having trouble doing my homework because I’m dreading the professor’s comments in class if I get something wrong or admit to being uncertain. It also doesn’t help that she asks me pointed questions to lead me to the right answer rather than just telling me (which I absolutely understand as a pedagogical choice, but it’s more intense in a way that’s unpleasant in this context). (2/4)

I can handle all of those things in a normal class, when the focus isn’t on me the entire time, but right now it’s too much (and I know objectively it’s fine and expected that I’ll make some mistakes because that’s how learning works). I’ve been working on taking constructive criticism and being less of a perfectionist for years, but I kind of need to find a way to speed up that process or a way to cope in the short term if I’m going to get through this semester. (3/4)

Thanks in advance for anything you can come up with (I know it's a weird situation and mostly tied up in my personal issues, and I'm sure it's hard for my professor too to find a productive way to run a class that's supposed to be discussion based when it's not possible to have a discussion), and I hope you're doing well! (4/4)

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ohhh god this is so tough. first of all, it sounds like a bit of a nightmare - big seminar classes can be socially stressful in different ways but i personally always found it so nervewracking to be in really tiny classes where there was so much attention on you always and nowhere to hide! and your situation sounds like an even more intensified version of that. so like, all of those feelings you are describing feel VERY real!!

here are some thoughts. i know nothing about the professor so you would have a much better read on this than i do -- but i can imagine that if i were in that position as an instructor i would probably be panicking a bit, because it’s such an unusual and not-ideal teaching situation and it’s probably not something she’s used to navigating. it sounds like she is still trying to run it like a class (the familiar version for her) when the reality of the class is more like a one-on-one tutoring situation? which yeah i can imagine must feel REALLY intense and not-great from your end.

(MUCH) MORE BEHIND THE CUT!

i’m also wondering about like.. is she a full professor / slightly older or a grad instructor/postdoc? because sometimes idk the very pointed questioning approach and the inability to adjust to what’s obviously an uncomfortable new situation can be a grad student/inexperienced teacher thing. like you wind up trying to seem more confident or more pointed to conceal your own insecurities or uncertainty about what teaching is supposed to look like in this environment you didn’t practice in. if she is older then idk maybe she’s just not a great teacher, lol. or if it’s over zoom, maybe she’s struggling to read the nonverbal cues that signal student discomfort or dread bc of the screens. and idk if this is a dead language you are studying or a living language but if she’s not a native english speaker there might just be some nuances of like, tone or expression that don’t translate as well. i feel like in the past i’ve had non-native English speaker students who are fully fluent but whose affect just felt very brusque to me at first (i am sure mine also felt VERY bewildering and difficult to read for them too), but it eventually became clear that it was just like, a mismatch of cultural/linguistic communication styles. again, no idea if that applies to your situation or not!

i guess what i’d recommend depends on your sense of her age, personality, openness to feedback, etc. if i were the teacher, i would really, really appreciate having the student share what they’re feeling, even just a tiny bit of it. i think it would help me break out of my own nerves around the situation and start thinking about what the class feels like from their perspective, which would help me move beyond just being trapped in that state of ‘this is so awkward this is so awkward help this is so awful.’ plus it might help break the ice a little and help you both feel a bit more relaxed with each other?

you could do this in writing, or you could approach her in a neutral setting, like in office hours or a private meeting. and obviously, i think you can do it in a way that doesn’t come off as critical of her teaching style (even if it maybe leaves something to be desired). if it were me, i would start with something positive about the setup - ideally something that feels genuine-ish even if not uh totaly true lol, like, “i really appreciate the opportunity to learn a language with so much support, and i’m hoping that i can make a lot of progress this semester with your help” or something like that. and then i think i would TAKE THE RISK of being just a little bit vulnerable and open with her. you could maybe say something like, “i tend to put a lot of pressure on myself to do well, and i can be pretty hard on myself when i make mistakes. usually in a larger class it’s easier to take a break and ease up on myself, or to remind myself that other people are learning too, but when it’s just one-on-one, i’m finding that i’m getting really nervous / making more mistakes than i usually would / being harder on myself than usual.”

i also think that, one thing i find really helpful, is to enlist the other person in finding a solution instead of saying “and this is what i want you to do” or “this is what i want you to stop doing.” trying to think about what that might look like here... like, maybe you could ask her if she has any thoughts on how to kinda mentally reframe the situation for yourself? or you could ask her if you could talk through some ideas with her for working through your nervousness/tendency to self-criticize, and to see if she has feedback or has her own ideas. maybe you could also slip in that like, you want to be able to practice conversations too (assuming it’s not a dead language lol), and you’re wondering if that’s something you could try together sometimes - since it sounds like just translating and having to find your own errors is maybe not the best way to get really comfortable using the language? 

there’s a chance that she will not really grasp what you’re trying to do, or will not be especially receptive to it -- and if that’s the case, it will suck, but it probably will not in the long run make things significantly more awkward (given how awkward and stressful the situation seems already!). but there’s also a chance that she just genuinely doesn’t know how you feel, or feels frozen in those really rigid professor/student roles and isn’t comfortable initiating a more relaxed classroom environment herself. in that case, taking a little bit of a risk and letting her glimpse your own inner life/emotional state might wind up making a really big difference - or at least like, it might start a conversation that you could continue to build on over the course of the semester.

another small way that you might begin to shift the dynamic of the class is to come with some questions or ideas of your own, either in class or in office hours - not like, grammar questions that she will ask you pointed questions to lead you to the correct answer, but questions about the culture, or about her own research/work, or about some aspect of something you’ve been reading related to the language. asking those questions and then maybe like, drawing her out by asking follow-up questions and engaging in a conversation with her about it could be one way of sort of breaking out of that rigid pattern the class seems to have fallen into. and it might also be another way of sort of sneakily giving her a glimpse into your inner life and helping her see you not just as a student whose errors need to be corrected but as a person who has interests and thoughts and feelings of your own. at the very least, it could buy you some time and a little bit of an emotional reprieve from the hour of translating and having your errors corrected!

lastly: one thing i often advise students to do when they are in a difficult or intimidating class is to set one small personal or interpersonal goal per week -- just one tiny thing they’re going to try to do to shift their perception of the class or change their experience a little bit or establish a different kind of connection with a peer or the professor. i suggest doing this not because i think it’s the student’s responsibility to singlehandedly change the culture of a learning environment (it’s not) -- but because setting little concrete goals and achieving them can boost our own sense of confidence and agency in a learning environment where we might otherwise feel totally helpless or at the mercy of the instructor. it’s just a way of shifting your understanding of what you’re doing from “i’m just coping” or “i’m just surviving/enduring” to more of a, “i’m creatively finding a way to make this experience useful/better for myself” mentality. also i find that the goal-setting thing can also feel playful, in a way -- a little secret mission you’re undertaking! and it also gives you something to focus on that isn’t just fixating on how unpleasant that hour is or how much you’re dreading the next class.

so like, maybe one goal could be to ask her a small talk type question about her own life -- and then ask a follow-up question to see if she’ll share a little more. or you could resolve to share one piece of personal information about your life outside the classroom, as part of that larger goal of helping her see you as a whole person. or you could resolve that in one of those pointed questioning sessions, instead of just letting her guide you to the right answer, you could turn the question back on her or ask her to talk you through it in a different way -- “I think it’s this, but I’m actually wondering, why is that? i keep getting x and y mixed up, and i’m wondering if it’s because...” like, see if you can think about the kind of pedagogical experience you’d rather be having in this class, and then look for tiny creative little ways to nudge her towards it.

i also think that, if you want to get real sneaky about it, you could use basic positive reinforcement to signal to her when she does a teaching thing you really appreciate. this is the most secret mission-y of all haha because you’re basically seeing if you can condition her into teaching in a way that feels better/more useful for you. body language and nonverbal cues like smiling, leaning forward, nodding, looking attentive, etc., can be a good way of doing that (esp if you are usually a little more disengaged bc you are busy experiencing your own inner dread!!). and then you could gradually ramp it up -- for instance, you could make a point of really earnestly thanking her for something, in class or in a follow-up email after (being as specific as possible about what you appreciated and why). or if you get her talking about something related to culture or literature or whatever, you could send her something you found that reminded you of that conversation, to show that you are listening to the things she’s said and are engaged/curious about them. humans are social creatures and most of us (not all!) are pretty hyper-attuned to that kind of positive social feedback, even just at an unconscious level. so getting those cues is probably going to be helpful to her as a teacher, and will also make her feel better too, and might eventually help her sort of warm up/relax a bit in a way that is conducive to a better teaching/learning experience. 

(this is basically like when you think you’re training your dog to do something, and then one day you wake up and realize that your dog has 100% trained you to do exactly the thing they want, exactly when they want it, and they were just letting you think that you were the one calling the shots lol. be the dog!)

i have no idea if any of this will be helpful, but i hope that it will at least spark some ideas for you for ways of approaching this class! good luck -- YOU GOT THIS!!!! -- and i would really love to hear how it goes or what ends up working for you.