A fellow teacher once gave me the following advice: "You want your students to be a little afraid of you." She went on to explain how to establish and maintain this little bit of fear: find an excuse to discipline one of your students in front of the entire class. At our school that meant sending them to the “white chair,” a a cushioned armchair right outside the headmaster’s office where a contrary student sits, exposed to others and waiting for a “talking to.”
I had only intermittently and briefly considered that my students might be, or might not at all be, afraid of me. I did notice that, on those rare occasions when I threatened them with discomfort or humiliation, they were quieter and easier to handle. Fear worked to quiet them and they complied with whatever I asked them to do. That was pleasant and convenient for me. But how was it for them?
Quite bad, I'm afraid. The whole range of fear-based emotions (including low-grade, persistent anxiety) is neither conducive to learning nor pleasant. The following Saturday morning, sitting at my desk writing out some lecture notes and thinking about what school is like for my students, I decided to reject her advice. To the extent possible in a school setting, none of my students will be afraid of me (I aim to earn their respect instead). But what extent is that? As this mother points out, citing John Holt, fear and low-grade anxiety are pervasive in schools. And chronic anxiety is (obviously) bad for health, especially in childhood.
Instilling fear or anxiety in students is a short-cut, a temptation, a trap. As a pervasive instrument of control, the use of fear places schools among institutions that are (at least in part) coercive or serve the purpose of shaping behavior through force: among others, these institutions include the police, prisons, the military, and modern workplaces, institutions you are likely to find in any nation state or empire.
Fear is not the only trap: there is another that I fall into more easily. A group of my students asked me more than once who among them was my favorite: even when they weren't afraid of me, they were motivated by my approval. And threatened, I suppose, by its withdrawal or absence.
Rewards and threats extrinsic to learning permeate schools: tacked on rewards like gold stars, high grades, and teacher approval (and eventually money in a modern economy) that are not in any sense a natural result or culmination of learning a body of knowledge and developing a skill – they are in no way intrinsic to developing excellence in any field (the joys of understanding, engagement in informed and intelligent conversation, pleasure in using well-developed skills towards playful or meaningful ends, are natural consequences); and tacked on penalties like low grades, being held back, and teacher disapproval are not in any sense natural consequences of failing to learn (ignorance, an inability to engage in informed and intelligent conversation, deficiency in skill, and whatever these might lead to in a given situation, if anything, are the natural consequences).
Eschewing fear as well as extrinsic rewards and penalties (as best I can), I aim to create relationships with students that facilitate relaxed, playful learning. That, for starters. My teaching style and methods continue to evolve as I learn, yes learn, from experience and study how best to forge bonds with young people that will catalyze their natural growth in character and mind and body. In the end, I want my classes and sessions to be celebrations of learning. I teach because I love to learn and share what I learn. And I hope I can share a life-long love of learning as well.
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