Sometimes I nail it. Sometimes when a student snaps my head off in response to something I say I'm calm, finish what I'm doing, and ask the student to see me in my office for a few minutes. "You seem a little edgy today, what's up?" usually yields, in varying amounts of time, the real problem. Last week all of those students were very consistent: heads full of too many things, too many thoughts and feelings bouncing around in there. Talking helped, but also just writing it all down to get it out of the head and onto the page. I'm both surprised and not surprised at what students write for me to see. It makes sense for them to trust me because I'm trustworthy, but also: holy smokes.
And sometimes I don't nail it at all. Sometimes, after school, I catch myself thinking "so-and-so was probably not just trying to be annoying or trying to distract the class," and I'll wonder how I could talk to that student and then wonder how I can change my reaction to that student--why didn't I call that student into my office instead of just getting annoyed? Because I didn't recognize that the behavior, in that case, had an underlying cause.
Well of course it did. It always has an underlying cause. I feel dumb about only catching it sometimes--or only wanting to spend the extra energy trying to communicate about it to a certain student. I would like to improve at this, because I want all of my students to develop the skills to modify their behaviors if they want to.
It's funny to think about this because it carries over into the rest of my life: somebody says something and I'll think, "I bet s/he doesn't really mean that." But in most cases in my life outside of school, I have to assume people are saying what they mean, because they're adults and it's not my role to question their behaviors. Sometimes I probe when I think it will be interesting or when it's someone I love or know well. Most times it's a good thing.