In my mind, student conferences will now be called “Please Don’t Shoot Up Me and the Class Conferences.” The previous forum used to focus primarily on student drafts, getting to know them, improvements they can make, what they’re doing right, etc. Now the focus will be on acting super sweet, eye contact (nonthreatening/non challenging), brushing the forearm, finding common ground, in-depth discussion of my favorite violent video games, etc. The purpose will be to keep potential shooters from acting out in my class. My hope is that all students will continue to believe that the conferences are about their essays.
Until my schools develop a strategy, this will be mine.
I think it’s a good one.