A Teaching Ritual

Image ID: three yellow Post-its lay horizontally on a white surface between two markers - a red-capped Sharpie to the left and a blue-capped Sharpie marker to the right.

I have written about engaging ritual work in teaching here, but I wanted to post a simpler ritual exercise here. I also discuss ritual in my scholarly research—rituals are simply habits. Because we all perform rote tasks everyday, we all have access to ritual—it isn’t a skill one needs to learn. We just need to pay more attention to the rituals (habits) we perform regularly to appreciate their importance. I think that rituals can help us to establish a sense of security. Because we perform certain habits regularly, our bodies and minds get used to them—so much that if we miss a regular ritual, sometimes we feel it. Now that I’ve established a preliminary rationale for the centering of ritual in our lives (see post linked above for a more comprehensive examination of ritual-work), why don’t we think through what practices we can perform with our students to establish sensations of security / comfort (although these things will not always be accessible at every moment in the classroom, and that’s okay) in the classroom?

Pre-Lecture:

  • A “check-in” activity: what practice can you establish at the top of your class to connect with your students? I’ve discussed “Draw Your Feelings” and reflection essays in another post (the activities are also available here), but perhaps you can think of something else. Perhaps you can ask your students to choose a word that describes their mood that day, or choose a color that captures their emotional state. I should say here that not everyone wants to examine their emotions with their college instructor / professor in a classroom setting. Take a temperature of the class somehow to gauge interest, or choose another activity altogether. Maybe you could ask your students to measure their information retention rate for the day—for example, you might ask “On a scale from one to ten, how much room do you feel you have to retain information about the midterm essay today?” Based on the responses, perhaps you break the discussion up into two parts or more—or maybe most seem game and you dive right in. What’s most important about this “check-in” exercise is that you do a version of it with your students consistently (as regularly as you can).

Post-Lecture:

  • A “close-out” activity: what can you do at the end of class with your students to establish clarity or to highlight concerns regarding the class agenda / theme? I often do reflection essays at the end of a class, but perhaps your close-out is asking students to choose a quote from the text you discussed that really resonated with them or to ask them what song best describes a character from a novel you’ve assigned.

With Students:

  • You might ask your students to describe rituals that bring them clarity, security or joy in their lives—this prompt would of course be optional, but if this question did receive a lot of engagement, perhaps you could re-create some of these rituals in the classroom—or try to capture the sense of joy or security your students describe in an activity you co-create with your students. You could also have your students describe their rituals simply so they can more formally recognize the practices that bring them comfort.

  • Related to above: you could do a talisman activity with your students (this activity was introduced to me by poet and teacher Steven Willis at a pedagogy conference). After students describe the practice that brings them comfort, ask them if an object is involved in the practice. If so, it is possible to carry said object around? If not, it is possible to make a small model of the object or to write a small paragraph describing the object? The idea here is to carry around a physical representation of the practice as a charm of sorts. A small written note can act as a talisman too, if the ritual is perhaps a poem or quote.

Let me know if you try any of these suggestions, or if you develop something else!

Photo Credit: Kelly Sikkema. Free image via Unsplash.

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