On Teaching: "Ruling by Love"

Speak gently, it is better far
To rule by love than fear;
Speak gently, let no harsh word mar
The good we may do here.

Speak gently to the erring ones,
They must have toiled in vain;
Perchance unkindness made them so;
O win them back again.

Speak gently, ‘tis a little thing,
Dropped in the heart’s deep well;
The good, the joy that it may bring
Eternity shall tell.

Today (and everyday) I need to keep in my heart the words of this wonderful old hymn as I go about my work as a teacher of teenagers. In a sense, I am the “ruler” in my classroom, but I need to understand that “it is better...to rule by love than fear.” Ruling by fear is the easy, commonplace way to rule. Almost everyone does it, from presidents and dictators down to parents and teachers. All you need to do to be this kind of ruler is glare, frown, threaten, berate, frighten, and punish. I do not want to rule in this way in my classroom, primarily because it really doesn’t work. As the song suggests, all this kind of rule does is “mar the good [I] may do” as a teacher. It makes my students shrink away from my teaching and close themselves up even tighter than they were before. They may look like they’re responding, but actually they have probably tightened themselves inside an increasingly unresponsive and impassive shell. What I need to do today (especially with my 9th grade class, which was a bit rowdy for about five minutes yesterday) is drop some gentleness in the “deep well” of my students’ hearts. Like a magical elixer, this gentleness will have untold, infinite effects on the lives of the young ones whom I teach. After all, if my students occasionally misbehave (and fortunately they do it only in the most minor and harmless ways), perhaps it is because they “toiled in vain” and are discouraged about themselves. With gentleness, not meanness or anger, I can “win them back again” – help them see how good they really are.