June 26 marked the last day of my friend Diane's career as an assistant principal of a k-6 elementary school. I was happy for her, but so sad for the children who will never experience her unique methods. I worked with Diane when I had the privilege of being the principal in a beautiful old school that was well maintained and filled with pride. She was my assistant principal.
Teaching is one of the most human of careers. It is really all about relationships. We have to build connections. It was our school's great fortune that this was Diane’s greatest strength.
One of Diane’s main responsibilities was discipline. Despite all of our combined efforts, some students in our neighborhood insisted on testing their limits. Diane had an interesting way with the students. She did not want to impose any random consequence. She always wanted to teach a lesson and build a child’s character. She wanted students to show remorse if they did something they shouldn’t have. Sometimes I really didn’t know how she did it. One day I walked into her office where she was holding after school detention. Instead of studying, she was feeding this fifth grader baked ziti. Somehow, I know her system worked.
One year we had a very challenging kindergarten class. The group did not like to follow rules and challenged us at every turn. While the teacher was working with a reading group, two boys painted each other blue. The next week one boy took off all his clothes on the bus. A week after that one child dropped his book bag while walking to the bus at afternoon dismissal. The bus driver got off the bus to help the student. No sooner had he stepped off the bus then a kindergartner who had already boarded jumped in his seat, and pulled the lever to close the bus. There he was ---a beaming six year old in the driver’s seat ready to put the bus in gear, with 10 of his buddies cheering him on. Two weeks after that, the kindergarten toilet overflowed. Someone had shoved some blocks down the bowl and a small flood was the result. This was the last straw for Diane. She marched into the kindergarten class snapping a new pair of latex gloves onto her hands. “Who here has ever watched CSI on TV?” she bellowed. A few hands went up. “Well,” she said, “those people taught me how to take fingerprints. I am going to get the fingerprints off those blocks and I’m going to find out who did this. Then I’m going to call CSI.” One boy jumped up and cried, “Please don’t send me to jail. It was me!” Diane quietly walked him out of the room into her office. I was worried that she would just give him a plate of ziti, so I left right after I watched him dial his mother’s phone number.
Diane’s methods remind me of the culture of a rural tribe in Africa:
When a woman in this tribe knows she is pregnant, she goes out into the wilderness with a few friends and together they pray and meditate until they hear the song of the unborn child. They recognize that every soul has its own vibration that expresses its unique flavor and purpose. When the women attune to the song, they sing it out loud. Then they return to the tribe and teach it to everyone else. When the child is born, the community gathers and sings the child's song to him or her. Later, when the child enters school, the village gathers and chants the child's song. When the child passes through the initiation to adulthood, the people again come together and sing. At the time of marriage, the person hears his or her song once again. Finally, when the soul is about to pass from this world, the family and friends gather at the person's bed, just as they did at their birth, and they sing the person to the next life. To the African tribe there is one other occasion upon which the villagers sing to the child. If at any time during his or her life, the person commits a crime or aberrant social act, the individual is called to the center of the village and the people in the community form a circle around them. Then they sing their song to them. The tribe recognizes that the correction for antisocial behavior is not punishment; it is love and the remembrance of identity. When you recognize your own song, you have no desire or need to do anything that would hurt another. Diane has always been able to help students recognize their own special song. A friend is someone who knows your song and sings it to you when you have forgotten it. Those who love you are not fooled by mistakes you have made or dark images you hold about yourself. They remember your beauty when you feel ugly; your wholeness when you are broken; your innocence when you feel guilty; and your purpose when you are confused. Sometimes when we meet with our students, including our very own sons and daughters, we tell them we are not their friends. We are their teachers and parents and we demand their attention. But we must remember, that when we discipline another soul, we must think with our head, but lead with our hearts. We must, as a true friend, remind our children of their songs.
You may not have grown up in an African tribe that sings your song to you at crucial life transitions, but life is always reminding you when you are in tune with yourself and when you are not. When you feel good, what you are doing matches your song, and when you feel awful, it doesn't. Once we believe in ourselves, we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight, and show our soft underbelly of our humanity. It is my hope that we shall all recognize our own song and sing it well.
