Get him or her to talk about him or herself --easy because everyone likes to talk about him or herself.

Oh for heaven's sake. This is the problem of youth, who have so little to say to each other when they aren't texting.

The students that are in my class don't always trust me from the first day and some may take weeks, even months, to open up. Then comes a day when this student is feeling down, and I pick up on that and I do my very best to get a smile on that sad face. Or the day that I break into song and dance on impulse to get a point across in a lesson will break down that wall of resistance. From that point on, my classroom becomes a team and we are all pulling together, and commiserating too. Four years go by and these students are joined at the hip; they are bound; they are brother and sister. Next month another batch of seniors will be booted out into the cold cruel world, and my classroom becomes empty, waiting for the next year and the new students.
My students sometimes confess to me that they don't want to graduate. My insulated classroom has become a cocoon, a warm inviting place where they know they will be accepted, respected, and celebrated. I don't blame them for wanting to stay; I remember the terrors of leaving all that was familiar to me. I tell them it gets worse when they graduate from college. I know it is inevitable and unavoidable. I am stricken at the thought of not seeing those faces each day anymore, not ever again.
So this is what teaching has always been for me: a kind of building up and then a tearing down and rebuilding again. Reshaping the pattern and rekindling the fire of enthusiasm, and striving to bring about better results by reflecting on how I can get it right this time. It takes some of the sting out of ending the relationship with those graduating students, this knowledge that others will need me as much or more.