Learning to Teach Like Don Bosco

Teaching grade 7 students how to knead bread

The point of teacher's college was, for the most part, to set aside a year to reflect upon the great task of being an educator. We sometimes grumbled and groaned over the seemingly endless journals we were forced to produce; the justifications for why we would assess a student in one way rather than another; the critiques of our own and our colleague's practices, etc. But, looking back, the art of reflection I learned during my one year of preparing to be a teacher was invaluable! I still find myself questioning my practice often. The weight of assuming to guide another person is a great responsibility. It requires constantly evaluating and re-evaluating what one is doing. I think every teacher must form his/her own "little mandate" (to borrow a term from the Madonna House apostolate). It should be a kind of "rule of life" which governs how that teacher wishes to conduct him/herself in the vocation of caring for the minds, hearts, and souls of students. Ultimately, being a teacher has nothing to do with the books and the tests and the essays. It has to do with unlocking and discovering, with your students, who and what they are: gifts in themselves and to each other. This is, at least, my goal as a teacher.

Today, I came across something which encapsulated the little mandate of a great teacher and saint, Don Bosco. I would like to share the passage because it contains a description of the things which were closest to his heart and should, I think, form part of every educator's heart. Of course, we may not all embrace the Catholic doctrines inherent in his mandate, but that shouldn't dissuade us from considering what lies behind what Don Bosco was trying to do: which was, I believe, to re-instill in the hearts of his students that they are of immense value! And, if you're a Catholic privileged enough to teach in a Catholic setting, then perhaps his focus on the sacraments will help raise the dignity of your own teaching practice up to heavenly heights. I hope you enjoy the excerpt below:

Don Bosco mending shoes

"Don Bosco's method of study knew nothing of punishment. Observance of rules was obtained by instilling a true sense of duty, by removing assiduously all occasions for disobedience, and by allowing no effort towards virtue, how trivial soever it might be, to pass unappreciated. He held that the teacher should be father, adviser, and friend, and he was the first to adopt the preventive method. Of punishment he said: "As far as possible avoid punishing . . . . try to gain love before inspiring fear." And in 1887 he wrote: "I do not remember to have used formal punishment; and with God's grace I have always obtained, and from apparently hopeless children, not alone what duty exacted, but what my wish simply expressed." In one of his books he has discussed the causes of weakness of character, and derives them largely from a misdirected kindness in the rearing of children. Parents make a parade of precocious talents: the child understands quickly, and his sensitiveness enraptures all who meet him, but the parents have only succeeded in producing an affectionate, perfected, intelligent animal. The chief object should be to form the will and to temper the character. In all his pupils Don Bosco tried to cultivate a taste for music, believing it to be a powerful and refining influence. "Instruction", he said, "is but an accessory, like a game; knowledge never makes a man because it does not directly touch the heart. It gives more power in the exercise of good or evil; but alone it is an indifferent weapon, wanting guidance." He always studied, too, the aptitudes and vocations of his pupils, and to an almost supernatural quickness and clearness of insight into the hearts of children must be ascribed no small part of his success. In his rules he wrote: "Frequent Confession, frequent Communion, daily Mass: these are the pillars which should sustain the whole edifice of education." Don Bosco was an indefatigable confessor, devoting days to the work among his children. He recognized that gentleness and persuasion alone were not enough to bring to the task of education. He thoroughly believed in play as a means of arousing childish curiosity — more than this, he places it among his first recommendations, and for the rest he adopted St. Philip Neri's words: "Do as you wish, I do not care so long as you do not sin" (Catholic Encyclopedia,  http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/02689d.htm)