Shame and grace have profound influences over people’s lives, whether in a personal or public arena. As a teacher, word and deed can greatly influence the student, either for their betterment or to their detriment. It is important to understand that the philosophic approach to education (as well as the avenues from which it is pursued) can produce both productive or negative results in the student. These results may last a lifetime, so the teacher needs to carefully weigh his or her responses to the student. Even more so, the teacher needs to have perfect clarity in his or her calling and craft.
The American Heritage Dictionary (1992) defines “education” as:
1. The act or process of educating or being educated.
2. The knowledge or skill obtained or developed by a learning process.
3. A program of instruction of a specified kind or level.
4. The field of study that is concerned with the pedagogy of teaching and learning.
5. An instructive or enlightening experience.
Clearly, with this definition, education is seen in a positive, favorable light wherein the student learns knowledge or skills adding to their educational welfare.
As such, the teacher has the responsibility to speak and act in ways that enable the educational process and not in ways that burden the student with emotional baggage. Every day, teachers face common situations wherein they must evaluate students’ progress and performance. How the teacher responds clearly shows whether the teacher is using grace to motivate the student to become educated or using shame for other dubious purposes.
All too often, teachers react or respond to the student in harmful and abusive ways. VanVonderen, in Tired of Trying to Measure Up (2008), states, “Abuse, in my definition, is when Person A uses his power or his position and authority to force Person B to perform in order to meet the needs of Person A” (p. 56). Thus, in order to maintain an atmosphere to their personal liking (or for other more sinister reasons), a teacher may resort to abusiveness to accomplish that goal. This abusiveness may manifest itself as public humiliation, disqualification, ambiguity/inconsistency of rules and regulations, physical harm, and even simple character-bashing in the public and private sphere. The goal of these actions is to crush the student into submission and raise the teacher in power over them. The result can be emotional, mental, physical, and even spiritual suffering for the student, leading to long-lasting negative trauma.
Often, teachers verbally embarrass their students if they show a lack of knowledge or skill. This shaming occurs because of a weakness of character or poor emotional health of the teacher. Fossum and Mason, in Facing Shame: Families in Recovery (1989), state, “Beneath the power oriented, manipulative behavior we usually see a frightened person” (pp. 88–89). Teachers are human beings, too, and so may incorporate behaviors that soothe their self-esteem instead of helping the educational community.
In addition, when faced with the reality of a student’s ignorance, the teacher may respond with a “What’s wrong with you?” attitude. This can be a shift of blame away from the teacher to the student. The teacher gets paid for educating the student, and if the academic standards are not met by the student, it may reflect poorly upon the teacher as an educator (and affect funding). Therefore, blame is placed on the student to “regain the illusion of control” (Fossum & Mason, p. 95) Outwardly, the teacher has done all that was necessary; the student has merely slacked off again.
Furthermore, the teacher might have an undefined system of rules and regulations that areas solid as an amoeba. Drifting without form or substance, the student is often unaware as to what expectations are required of him or her. They stumble again and again trying to determine what the teacher wants and demands from them, scholastically. All too often, they find that what had earned them an ‘A’ the week before has been disqualified for some apparent hidden reason that the teacher believes the student should have known. Thus, in order to succeed, students basically need “invisible code books that they carry in their heads . . . to survive” (VanVonderen, 2008, p. 45) in the shame-based system that the teacher has created in the classroom.
Failure or lack of perfection from the student may result in a harsh critique from the teacher and a possible lecture on their short-comings. This may be done in front of the class but may also be done in private. Unfortunately, this shaming may even take on violent attributes with the teacher physically shaking, slapping, shoving, etc. the student. However, no matter whether in verbal or physical form, the shaming comes to the same outcome: poor self-esteem, unwarranted and burdensome guilt, and emotional imbalance.
With an understanding of what education is and a comprehension of what constitutes an abusive relationship between the teacher and student, what, then, makes up healthy, graceful teaching practices? If the negative actions of the shaming teacher mentioned above detracts from the educational process, then a positive, graceful approach must be supportive to the student’s goals of learning. This positive, graceful teaching style will manifest itself in actions that are affirming, open, and consistent. A teacher incorporating grace in their teaching methods will let students know that despite their performance, they are accepted and valuable as members of society.
True, they may have not met certain academic standards, but that has little to do with their worth as a person. As VanVonderen states in Families Where Grace Is in Place (2010), in a healthy system, “People are affirmed for being who they are” (p. 141) as opposed to a shame-based system where “behavior is the most important thing” (p. 141). The student needs to hear from the teacher that grades are only an indicator of knowledge learned, not acceptance earned.
In this graceful teaching system, the teacher will also create a realistic learning atmosphere. Rules, regulations, expectations will all be accessible for the student and will be fairly bestowed upon them. The student will not have to read between the lines or second-guess what the teacher is really saying or requiring of them. Deadlines and assignments will be what they appear to be on the surface. Students will be responsible for their academic performance because “people are responsible for their choices, and it is appropriate to hold them accountable for them” (p. 145).
In fact, that is one of the great lessons learned from school. Supplementing this, a graceful teacher will provide consistency and reliability for the student. Much of the time, it is difficult enough just learning the facts in school. Compounding student education with a confusing and conflicted teaching style only muddies the water more than it already is for students. Definitively, the teacher exists solely to provide cogent, beneficial knowledge to the student that will help him or her in the future.
Therefore, the best transmission of that instruction is when it is accomplished with clarity and stability. To that end, standards and grades should be consistent for all students over time and throughout it all. The student should be given the consistent message that the evaluation of their performance is done mainly to see what more they need to learn and not to determine what quality of a student they are.
Not many positions hold as much importance and impact as the teacher. The effects that educators have on their students may last for years and years. Hopefully, this influence will be a positive one but, sadly, far too often the student leaves the educational system with more emotional hang-ups than when they entered. In the end, the teacher has been a confusing and weakening factor rather than a beacon of support and truth. If education is truly supposed to be an instructive or enlightening experience, then it is quintessential for the teacher to pass on pedagogy of the head and the heart.
In other words, the graceful teacher will not merely help the student learn academic knowledge but will also do so without impairing students’ mental and emotional health. The graceful teacher will demonstrate to the student that he or she, no matter what their academic standing, is a valued member of the community and a person of worth. This knowledge of the heart may in many ways be the empowerment needed for students to soar high and far in their future educational and vocational endeavors.