22 English Journal 105.3 (2016): 22–28 Mary Amanda Stewart I his article details how one teacher-researcher developed a relationship with a refugee student through literacy activities. Nurturing Caring Relationships through Five Simple Rules to nurture relationships with all students in the ELA classroom. Importance of Relationships with English Learners Nel Noddings explains that caring relationships be- tween the student and teacher should be the prime goal of education. Students must feel that they are more important and valuable to the teacher than the subject matter. Establishing the relationship before teaching, the teacher assumes the position that “I am first and always one-caring” (175). Noddings further asserts that students cannot effectively learn until they feel cared for. Therefore, teachers should first care for the students, then teach them even in light of standards-based reforms. Surely all students benefit from caring rela- tionships with adults in educational environments, but much research illustrates the high importance for English Learners (ELs). High school ELs are navigating adolescence while negotiating multiple cultures and languages. Some high school ELs are new to the country, perhaps coping with trauma, and in the midst of learning a new language and adjusting to a new life. Others have lived in the United States many years yet struggle in the class- room due to years of schooling that ignores their language and culture. Moreover, ELs might be more likely than mainstream students to face legal issues, poverty, and academic struggles. Ironically, these students need relationships with teachers the most, yet due to language and culture differences n my office I have a picture that reminds me the priority is the peo- ple we teach—not content, assess- ments, or compliance. The picture is of high school multilingual refugee students holding our published anthology of writing. One of these students is Camille. Surrounded by stu- dents from Southeast Asia, she is the only one from Africa. What most people notice is her clothing, a traditional African dress and head covering of bright blues and greens. However, what I notice every time I look at the picture is her eyes—they are not looking down, but are looking right at me, the picture-taker, with pride as she holds the book she coauthored. During a summer program, the relationships I developed with these students became the central point of our learning, teaching, reading, and writ- ing. These relationships might have been unlikely given that we were separated by a chasm of cul- tural, linguistic, experiential, and socioeconomic differences. Yet, the relationships nurtured the stu- dents’ remarkable literacy improvement—even for Camille, an unlikely candidate. After seeing the final product of the program, the anthology, an administrator joked that I was a fairy who sprinkled magical dust on the students to get those results. But as I told him, I don’t have magic—I just play by the rules: five “simple rules” that set conditions for caring relationships to emerge (Tytel and Holladay). These simple rules, or guiding principles, mediated relationships with students, particularly Camille, and might be used Copyright © 2016 by the National Council of Teachers of English. All rights reserved.