A teacher has problems. She is in charge of a group of 20 students who constantly complain about their work. Complaints basically demand a change in your attitude and work demands. All attempts at a solution have been in vain. This situation has been blocking the participation of students. It is reflected in low grades and lack of commitment to carry out tasks and work. They are stuck in the problem.
How can we move the group from a demanding attitude, where “the problem is the teacher” and the solution depends on her change, towards a perspective where the students also position themselves as responsible for the future of this event and pay more attention to it? in the possibilities of solution?
I shared some questions with the group of students, which guided the conversation:
1. What is the problem at this moment?
2. What have you tried to do to solve it?
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3. What you have tried, has it been useful?
4. Are there times when the problem with the teacher does not occur or is less intense?
5. What do you do at that moment?
The person is not the problem, the problem is the problem
6. And what does the teacher do?
7. How do they make that happen?
8. What would the teacher say that you are doing at that moment that allows her to treat you very well?
9. If the teacher were here with us, and she had to recognize that there is a key for her to do things better with you, what would she say?
10. If you appreciated what the teacher was pointing out, how would you make things continue to improve?
eleven. What would be the first thing the next class would start doing to make things better?
12. On a scale of 0 to 10, how confident are you that this will happen?
13. How could they ensure this happens?
14. How would you handle the situation to make this happen?
The purpose is to orient ourselves towards solutions to abandon the conversation saturated with problems
All of these questions have an intention and are moved by particular ethics and principles: the person is not the problem, the problem is the problem. All people have the necessary resources for change and this is inevitable when we discover the skills and attitudes that guide us there.
The purpose is to orient ourselves towards solutions to abandon the conversation saturated with problems and generate possibilities by focusing on the future. These questions were also an invitation so that the group could feel responsible for what was happening and not just complain about the teacher.
A week later the students began to report the first changes. Not only had different things occurred, but they had also changed their perception of the teacher, and her role in the problem positioned them as active agents of change.
If we approach problems from this particular way, we have to forget about individualizing these phenomena and begin to see them rather as social constructions in whose configuration and creation we all participate.
Article previously published on the blog specialized in solution-focused therapy: by the renowned psychologist Jorge Ayala Salinas.
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