What Should You Do If a Student Says 'My Hand Hurts'?

What should you do if a student says, my hand hurts while they're writing?

You give an assignment, the student works for a minute, they're supposed to be working for several minutes, but they stop working early and they say, my hand hurts.

What should you do as a teacher?

Well, there are a lot of people on the internet who seem to think that you should treat that as a serious medical emergency immediately.

Like, oh, this student must have carpal tunnel syndrome.

This student must have juvenile rheumatoid arthritis and you better listen to them because if they say my hand hurts, you're basically torturing them if you ask them to continue working.

And I was really pleased to see this handout from Teach Like a Champion on like what to say to a student when they say my hand hurts or I can't keep working.

Like usually, Here's the thing we have to realize.

Usually, it's not even true that their hand hurts, right?

Most of the time, what we're seeing is work avoidance.

Oh, I don't feel like it.

I don't feel like writing two sentences, so I only wrote two words, and then I said my hand hurts.

As a teacher, you recognize that a lot of the time what students say to you can't be taken at face value, right?

It's true that sometimes students' hands hurt and sometimes there is a serious medical issue, but we have to use Occam's razor.

What is the simplest and most likely explanation?

Is it that this child has a rare undiagnosed skeletal issue or muscular issue or joint issue and you are the one to discover it on a Tuesday morning when you ask the student to do a writing assignment?

Is that the most likely thing?

I don't think so.

Or is it more likely that the student needs to be encouraged to continue working?

And that's really what this handout from Teach Like a Champion is.

It's language to encourage the student to keep working.

And none of that prevents the student from saying, no, really, my hand hurts.

Something is wrong.

I need to go to the nurse.

Like, obviously, if the student needs to go to the nurse, let him go to the nurse.

But what a lot of people on Twitter seem to be saying is you shouldn't Dismiss that concern you should take it as seriously as possible the very first time the student says that and like again Obviously, they're probably trying to get out of work.

But this this movement to see Everything in the most serious light possible to see every attempt to get out of work as evidence incontrovertible evidence of a serious medical condition to me is just disordered thinking right it's Catastrophizing to take students at their word on what is obviously something very minor.

And I think we have to be careful not to amp up students when they feel like not working or when they, you know, like if they're feeling just a little bit not great.

I don't think we should send every kid to the office over every little things.

Sometimes kids just need a little bit of attention.

They need a little bit of encouragement.

They need us to pay attention, like listen a little bit and make sure that it's not serious.

But not everything is a medical emergency.

And certainly handwriting is going to make your hand tired sometimes.

It's going to make your brain tired sometimes.

But it's not necessarily a medical emergency.

Let me know what you think.