Topics on Potential: Addressing Negative Emotions to Empower Learners in College

Learning is emotional. Think back to lessons that you remember the most or had the most impact on you. We’d be willing to bet that they were lessons that were very emotional. They were exciting, provoking, heartbreaking, exhilarating or inspiring.  Research tells us that emotion strongly affects the brain which in turn impacts memory and learning. Learners’ emotions toward  a class may be based on prior experiences, stories, self concept, and other factors that are outside of instructors’ abilities to control. Maybe your students come into your organic chemistry feeling deeply anxious about what they perceive to be a very hard subject. Perhaps they’re coming into your geology or ancient Greek Literature course with prejudicial boredom, just looking to get the general education requirement out of the way. When learners come into a course with negative emotions and expectations, it can absolutely affect not only their learning but also their capacity to learn. Negative emotions, like mold, grow in darkness. It isn’t enough to just design a learning experience that we hope will challenge preconceptions. We need to air them out! If you’re teaching a course which you know learners may have negative emotions about, make it part of your opening course routine to explicate, validate, and address those concerns. 

Brain Tip: If you teach in a college or university, provide a forum for students to discuss their feelings about the class with you. For example, Dr. Chemistry might open class by empathizing with the students that for many of them, there is the perception that Organic Chemistry is difficult and draining. Professors should be honest with students about what people find hard about the course and recognize that it’s okay, fair and normal to feel that way. Then, they could talk about what they are doing as the instructor and what learners can do to rise to the challenge. Dr. Greek Literature can validate that it may not feel particularly valuable to be studying texts from 3000 BC when there are a lot of current events that demand our attention. Again, the key is to explicate, validate, and address the feelings. Give these feelings space. Then, suggest the reason we study ancient works isn’t because those stories happened but because they happen. Make the content relevant. Show that the class will provide opportunities to put on critical lenses that will allow us to better see and understand the events of today. Emotions are central to learning, whether they are positive (driving forces!) or negative (serious barriers). By helping learners explicate and address their attitudes, feelings, and sense of efficacy, instructors may be able to channel positive emotions and temper or alter negative emotions to enhance and improve the learning experience for everyone.