Top Plate with Chris Winikka

What happens when the anger showing up in your classroom has nothing to do with your students — and everything to do with a kid who never felt heard?

This week Jamie and Blake welcome Chris Winikka for a Top Plate episode — a live coaching call where a real member of the Three Percent community brings his actual 3% to the table. Chris who is in his 26th year of teaching high school computer science found the podcast while processing his own story, and somewhere along the way started noticing something he couldn't ignore: after decades of keeping his cool in the classroom, he was snapping at students. The anger was back — and it was louder than it should have been for what was actually happening.

What follows is one of the most practical and quietly moving Top Plate episodes yet. Chris traces the anger back through anxious attachment, a childhood of being dismissed as "just Chris," the identity crisis that came when AI started threatening his sense of worth as a teacher, and the slow realization that what his students need most from him has nothing to do with what he knows about programming. If you're a teacher, a parent, or anyone who has ever let frustration loose on someone who didn't deserve the full weight of it — this one will find you.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Why anger that feels disproportionate is almost always pointing to something deeper underneath

How anxious attachment from childhood can show up decades later in the classroom — or anywhere you need to be received well

What the AI identity crisis reveals about where we've been quietly sourcing our self-worth

Why negativity bias means one bad student review encodes louder than ten great ones — and how your brain then lies to you about the ratio

The difference between rescuing a dysregulated student and helping them navigate discomfort

Why naming the process — not the content — is the most powerful tool in the room

What it means to be a regulated nervous system in a room full of kids who may never encounter one

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