The hardest thing I had to learn as a teacher? To sit down. And stay there.

The hardest thing I had to learn as a teacher? To sit down. And stay there.

Not because I didn’t care. But because I cared too much.

My instinct has always been to please, to solve, to help immediately. But I learned that my constant 'help' often got in the way of real learning. It created dependency and stole the beautiful struggle from my students. And it sucked all the energy out of me. The number of people who wanted my help went up instead of down.

Over the years, I've turned that personal struggle into a practical approach I now share with teachers and school leaders. It comes down to three steps:

👉 1. Start with the 'Why', not the 'How'. I ask educators to recall a moment where 'help' wasn't helpful at all. That shared feeling is the 'aha moment' that creates the motivation to change.

👉 2. Plan the Pause. Do something radical: after giving an instruction, deliberately do nothing but observe. Don't be afraid to explain why you are doing this to your students. Just watch. Let the room breathe. It’s uncomfortable at first. But it’s also magical.

👉 3. Create Distance. Place yourself far outside the center of the action. Make yourself take real steps before you intervene. With every step you choose not to take towards a struggling student, ask yourself: "Do they truly need me, or am I just uncomfortable watching them struggle?"

This shift in perspective reveals the crucial reframe: The problem isn't always the student who is stuck. It's that the community around them hasn't learned to offer help yet.

Try this: invite one of the other students to come and sit next to you. Ask: "What do you observe?" In my experience, they will see the same struggle you see. Then ask: "What are you going to do about it?"

When you empower the community like this, magic happens:

✅ The helper masters the content by explaining it ('Competence'). 🤝 A social bond is strengthened ('Relatedness'). 🚀 The student who was stuck feels safer asking a classmate next time ('Autonomy').

This is what I call ‘Just in Time Support’. It’s not about rescuing individuals. It’s about activating your entire learning community.