Live it to Give it

The following stories all took place very recently, before the summer. The teaching they all have in common, is how far our best teachers and principals of prestigious girls schools are from understanding the way real education is transmitted to children. As Rabbi Shalom Arush explains in The Garden of Education, the essence of educating children is parents and teachers fixing their own bad habits or negative character traits. Once that happens, their children and students are automatically uplifted.

Rivka is a 16 year old girl who gets more than a 100 on every test she takes. Rivka excels at singing, dancing, acting, is artistic, tri-lingual, popular, funny, and much smarter and happier than any of her teachers are. Rivka needs to learn humility and respect for authority; the school needs to learn the true meaning of what Rav Shalom Arush teaches: “You’ve got to live it to give it. This is a match made in Heaven. Rivka needs to have more patience for people that don’t grasp things as quickly as she does. The principle, Mrs. Timebomb needs to stop gossiping about people in her life…

Principal Timebomb (about Rivka): Listen to this! She came in this morning to tell me that she was sorry for wearing make-up again, but what I don’t understand is how she could stand there and apologize to me when her nails were so obviously long. (Rivka’s mother said that her nails were not long because she was trying to be glamorous but because she needs brushing up on her personal hygiene), yet old TimeBomb didn’t buy it.

Rivka also desperately needs to feel that her teacher does not judge her to be morally lacking. Even if a teacher will never verbalize such a thought, simply having the thought often enough will send an unspoken message to Rivka that she is lacking and deficient in some way.

Teacher Mrs. OnYourNeck said:

Do you believe they actually cut school and went to the beach on Friday? Not only was it a school day but we made such a beautiful event for them. We brought them the best Rabbis to speak and they didn’t even say “Thank you.”

This teacher would do well to use the faults that she sees in her students as a reminder to examine her own character deficiencies more closely. She is overreacting to her students because she doesn’t see the situation as an opportunity for her to heal something in herself. She is also oblivious to the connection between how the Evil Inclination talks her into exaggerating how unappreciative her students are because she is being mistreated by her husband at home. She concludes that there is nothing so terribly wrong with her yelling at a girl who breaks the rules. The Evil Inclination tells her: “Does that obstinate girl actually deserve to be treated any better than you were at her age?” Score one more for the “yetzer” (the evil one).

Teacher Mrs. Apoplexy is a middle-aged teacher whose has been teaching for 25 years and probably never smiled once during that time – that is except when she meets with parents. Only then do her creaky old facial muscles move around enough to show that she still has a few teeth. Grim, depressed, overweight, critical, and sometimes downright nasty – Mrs. A. gives apoplexy to everyone she meets. Of course the girls can’t stand her. Some of the girls feel very sorry for Mrs. A; their pity causes them to treat her with fake respect. Other girls have already lost it for Mrs. A.; they don’t even try to hide their outwardly defiant stance toward their teacher. They naturally want her to feel what it’s like to be devalued and disrespected. G-d also wants her to feel this so that she can correct it in herself. When kids experience an adult who will give them every possible leniency in order that they can teach them an important value or lesson, they will instinctively love and trust that grownup.  

Teacher Mrs. Grimace was the very picture of what a modest woman should look like. Her taste was impeccably correct in length, color, and style; her blouse was buttoned half way up her neck. In the following story, Mrs. Grimace is speaking with Teacher Mrs. SadMarriage and Teacher Mrs. Childless. Teacher Emeritus Mrs. WhatsWrongWithYelling is the elder matriarch of the group; she is also proud to be the school’s founder almost 40 years ago.

Mrs. SadMarriage says to her colleagues:  “I’m sure that Esti (a student) has OCD. Why don’t her parents take her for therapy? She must check her mirror every ten minutes. Her dress is always too short. She is still wearing makeup.”

Esti tried to explain that she wasn’t wearing makeup but that she had been out in the sun that day, but SadMarriage didn’t believe her. SadMarriage has no clue about how jealous she is of Esti who is much prettier than she is and who is more popular than she was at that age. The teacher also didn’t know that she is obligated to strengthen her emuna so that she can fix these bad parts of her character.

On another occasion.  Mrs. Childless was assigned to go on a trip with the girls up north. The bus pulled off the road to make a pit stop and a few of the girls went inside to buy a few drinks. Rebbetzin Childless was red with rage; with her eyes popping out of her head she yelled, “You can’t buy anything now!” As the girls left the store they looked at each other as if to say, “Why was she yelling about something like that? We just wanted to buy some water.” Mrs. Childless became a teacher to punish children because G-d never gave her any of her own  – we can easily see why.

Nobody says it like Rav Arush:

“The foundation of child-education is parental (and teacher) education…Parental and teacher “actors” will never succeed…both must understand that his or her primary task on earth is to rectify himself or herself. As such, whatever the educator finds at fault in the child should arouse within them a process of self-evaluation and soul searching, because the child is the mirror of the educator.”