How to make students (and teachers) want to go to school | Michele Freitag | TEDxYorkBeach

Main ideas, concepts, and lessons

• The speaker’s lifelong perspective on school

  • Michele Freitag describes a long-standing personal routine of returning to school for 55 years (from childhood through adulthood), emphasizing that she has loved school, learning, and teachers.
  • Her positive experience is tied to feeling seen, valued, and supported, both by teachers and through school events like Awards Day.

• Why some people (students and teachers) don’t want to be at school

  • She contrasts her love of school with:
    • Her husband, who liked school but didn’t love it and disliked Awards Day because he consistently felt he couldn’t “earn” recognition due to a mismatch between how instruction was delivered and how he learned.
    • Her sons, who were curious and advanced early readers but sometimes struggled because the learning system didn’t “fit their box,” meaning instruction didn’t tap into their broader strengths.

• Core belief: teaching must begin with relationships

  • A major lesson is that teaching begins with relationship—knowing students well enough to understand what they need.
  • This is presented as a prerequisite to using engagement and learning strategies effectively.

• A strategy framework: “CRSSP”

  • After relationship-building, she introduces a set of strategies she calls CRSSP, each tied to student engagement and confidence:

CRSSP strategies

• C — Choice

  • Give students meaningful choice in learning (not unlimited choice), whenever possible.
  • Purpose: empowers students and increases engagement.

• R — Relevance

  • Make learning meaningful and purposeful for students.
  • Purpose: helps them connect, see value, and stay engaged.

• S — Strength-based learning (first S)

  • Focus on students’ strengths and talents and build from them.
  • Purpose: avoid discouragement that can come from overemphasizing deficits; strengthen readiness to face challenges.

• S — Specific, honest, and positive feedback (second S)

  • Catch and reinforce positives:
    • Notice when students are doing well,
    • Notice when they are working hard through difficult moments,
    • Use those moments to encourage confidence and enthusiasm.
  • Purpose: “success breeds success,” and then students can better receive constructive criticism.

• P — Passion

  • Know students well enough to understand their interests and hobbies.
  • Purpose: weave those interests into learning to create engagement and motivation.

Examples used to illustrate the ideas

• A story of a student “broken” by assessment

  • During a fourth-grade reading assessment, Freitag notices a boy with his head down, crying.
  • He says: “I can’t do this. It’s too hard. I’m just not good at this.”
  • She responds by pausing the assessment and talking with him.
  • Because she knows him from prior read-aloud time, she recognizes he understands the story and has the assessed skill—so she helps reframe the task.
  • Result: he realizes he “aced the assessment”, and tears are replaced by pride.
  • Lesson: a system focused on isolated skills and test scores can increase pressure; relational teaching reveals what a student can do.

• Applying CRSSP during a nonfiction unit (guided research)

  • Freitag sets aside the teacher manual and instead uses a guided research approach (from her gifted education experience).
  • Structured steps include:
    • Topic brainstorming + choice
      • Students brainstorm a variety of topics and choose one.
      • Link to CRSSP: choice, relevance, passion.
    • Curiosity-driven questioning
      • Students use prompts like: “I wonder how / wonder why / wonder if” to create research questions.
    • Research with ongoing support
      • She provides positive feedback during work.
      • She incorporates skills “from the manual” as just-in-time learning (teaching skills when they are relevant to what students need at that moment).
    • Strength-based roles
      • Students volunteer for tasks they’re good at (recognized expertise).
      • She positions herself as “guide on the side” rather than “sage on the stage.”
      • Additional effect: reduces waiting time (wait time).
    • Choice of presentation
      • Students choose how to present learning, including creative formats:
        • Videos, books, puppet shows, games, and even programming games.
      • Lesson: authentic, creative expression increases engagement—especially in fourth grade.

• A second example reinforcing CRSSP

  • After the earlier crying student scenario, he participates enthusiastically in research and presents with no tears—only pride.

• A third example: transforming a book into a stop-action film

  • In 2005, teaching third grade, Freitag reads “Gooseberry Park” aloud.
  • Students request turning it into a movie.
  • After agreeing, they spend about six months producing a 20-minute stop-action video, including:
    • Rereading the book,
    • Writing the script for scenes,
    • Creating claymation figures,
    • Taking over 6,000 pictures,
    • Doing voice work,
    • Editing everything into the final film.
  • Addressing concerns about time and standards:
    • Other teachers question how it fits.
    • Her principal asks how she ensures coverage of standards and skills.
    • Freitag reassures them that she mapped the activity to required skills across:
      • Reading,
      • Writing,
      • Performance skills,
      • Tech.
  • Lesson: integrating learning and aligning outcomes helps create “time” by making learning multi-skill rather than fragmented.

Critique of the education system and teacher “deprofessionalization”

Freitag argues that reforms and best practices have improved research-backed teaching methods (like hands-on learning, voice, and choice). However, she believes education has shifted too heavily toward test data collection.

• Critiques of the current approach

  • Teaching with fidelity (everyone follows the curriculum in the same way)
    • She argues this can become misaligned with desired outcomes for diverse learners.
  • Instead, she promotes teaching with integrity:
    • Identify desired outcomes,
    • Decide how to reach each student effectively,
    • Avoid teaching “just for the test.”

• Burnout and deprofessionalization

  • She claims teachers are experiencing burnout, and one reason is the deprofessionalizing of teachers:
    • Teachers are often not allowed to use their training and judgment to tailor motivation, meaning, and methods to students.
  • She argues teachers need permission and empowerment to:
    • Choose strategies,
    • Use experience and wisdom,
    • Focus on students’ needs, interests, and abilities.

• Enthusiasm as an educational lever

  • Empowered teachers bring enthusiasm and passion.
  • Enthusiasm is described as contagious, leading to more student engagement.
  • She contrasts this with the image of a student crying with their head down—predicting that empowerment and voice reduce that outcome.

Conclusion / takeaway

• She has loved teaching for 39 years and going to school for 55 years.
• Her closing hope: every student would love coming to school, achieved through relationships, CRSSP engagement strategies, and a system that empowers teachers to teach with integrity rather than rigid test-driven fidelity.

Speakers / Sources featured

• Speaker: Michele Freitag (TEDxYorkBeach)
• Named individuals referenced:
  • Mrs. Erga (Freitag’s third grade teacher; historical figure within her story)
  • Ana Carolina Bisinella (transcriber)
  • Zsófia Herczeg (reviewer)