Seize the Teaching Moment in Behalf of Goodness

School Administrator, March, 1995 by Karl V. Hertz

Maybe there's a common lost ingredient in society, families, and schools themselves. Maybe we forgot that goodness is taught and is not merely part of the gene pool of a given individual.

Why do certain individuals resonate a sense of goodness, kindness, and thoughtfulness to fellow human beings? We may attribute this characteristic to their early association with an exemplary model. However, that individual did teach, either through actions or words or by exposing the young person to exemplary ideas.

Possibly some individuals eventually conclude through thoughtful and insightful reasoning that goodness should be an integral part of their lives. However, my instincts suggest that this is not the usual way to arrive at a sense of goodness.

Let us stand back and look at our society for a moment. We have a proclivity for killing each other. We are actually killing our children in many cases. Sometimes it is with guns; we also do it by not immunizing them.

As we strive for economic security, we often abandon the rearing of our children and leave it in the hands of "professionals." Often parents are so tired when they come home from their daily work that their energy level is sapped before they spend limited time with their children.

In our schools we sometimes seem overwhelmed by the multiplicity of things that confront us. We find ourselves depressed by the bashing, overwhelmed by the societal expectations, and encumbered by the push and shove of a desire for less time with children on the one hand and more materials to cover on the other.

I would like to step into this setting with a strong message on behalf of teaching goodness. I am not referring to a new curriculum. I am not suggesting the latest social expectation such as teaching about AIDS, drugs, smoking, or global education.

What I ask is that we all put a note somewhere near our regular educational work station with the small message, "Remember the teaching moment--goodness." All around us each day, moments literally jump out at us and provide the opportunity to model, instill, and promote goodness. They come to us through the small unkindnesses that children visit upon each other. They come in the religious or racially insensitive comment. They jump from the pages of the literature and reading that the children use. They leap from the historical and political moments that we teach our children. They lunge from the extracurricular settings when we urge our young people to work together.

Kevin Ryan, an authority on moral education at Boston University, wrote in Educational Leadership, "As students read, they learn about themselves in the world." For example, students come face-to-face with raw courage in the exploits of Harriet Tubman. They further understand the danger of hate and racism through The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank. In Edward Arlington Robinson's poem, "Miniver Cheevy," they glimpse the folly of storing up earthly treasures. They see in Toni Cade Bambara's 'Your Blues Ain't Like Mine" the intrinsic dignity of each human being. They gain insight into the heart of a truly noble man, Atticus Finch, in To Kill a Mockingbird. They perceive the thorny relationships between the leader and the led by f o 11 owing the well-intended but failed efforts of Brutus in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar.

Yes, our schools must feed the children. Yes, our schools are the best place to ensure the immunization of all our children. Yes, our schools should teach our children to work together, collect food for food pantries, provide services for the elderly, collect clothing for the less fortunate, and do all sorts of exercises that develop a sense of caring.

Of course, the family must revitalize itself. Of course, our children must be encouraged not to become parents while they themselves are still children. Of course, we must encourage our religious institutions to step forward again and have an impact on children.

Let us seize the teaching moment in behalf of goodness!