Our Students: Arrows to the Future

Note: This post inspired by Barry Saide's post: Another Brick in the Wall

Barry asks: "How can we, as adults and representatives of the school and district we work in, and the broader education community at large expect the children we're supposed to be training to collaborate, communicate, advocate, actively listen, and work as a member of a group, if we're not willing to do it regularly?"

In other words: How can we expect our students to become fully functioning when our learning environments exhibit so much dysfunction?

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Would that we were a culture that put the needs of others before our own. Understood that humility is a strength. That service to others is our greatest calling. That our mission is to build connection, lasting relationships, foster friendship and peace with all men. To learn together for good.

That we can do it for our students is a sign of hope. In our classrooms we understand that all children are equal. That they must learn to work together. That their mission is to "save the world"... or at least be useful, productive members of society.

And our students believe in this mission- at least in the beginning. They are inspired by serving an orphanage in Africa or helping Tsunami victims in the Philippines. Empathetic toward a blind classmate or a bullied friend. Incensed when they learn about the slave trade or that the older students "own" the playground. Wondrously, our students manifest all the nascent virtues needed to save the world… And we are often inspired by them and better teachers for it.

I wonder if our greatest gift to our students is this “mini-culture” we create in our classroom-- a small example of what the world can be. I love to hear that my students don’t want to miss school. When they don’t want to stay home sick. When they would rather be in my classroom than home watching TV. That’s a sign that something is going right.

I wonder if our greatest responsibility might not be how to manage these “good impulses” which students manifest. How to preserve them, orchestrate, and produce them. To show our students, within the confines of our classrooms, how the world could be. And encourage them to make it better than they find it today. As in Gibran’s Prophet, our students are the arrows we send to the future… and we are the bows which send them on their way. How we envision that world and how we manage our own classrooms has much to do with the trajectory of the arrow and what the future society will become.