Human interactions can be divided into coercive and
non-coercive ones. When we get our way with other people, it can be because we
put a gun to someone’s head, broke their legs or otherwise threatened them with
something truly unpleasant. Alternatively, people might choose to do what we
want out of their own free will, because they like us or, perhaps, because we
paid them. It is easy to understand the evil of coercion when on the receiving end of it. We have all sorts of words for other people wielding power over us, tyranny, injustice and oppression. Things are a little trickier when we are the ones a position of power. Our actions are always for the “benefit” of those in our charge or even for “humanity” at large. That our charges may not appreciate our “humanitarianism” simply demonstrates that they are “ungrateful” and “deserve” to be in a subordinated to our will. Even otherwise decent people are tempted to use force for no other
reason than its mere simplicity. Picture any narrow problem involving other
people and I challenge you to think of a more direct solution than to be in a
position of power to threaten those who get in the way with physical harm for
their continued defiance. The problem with such a view can only be perceived
when taking a larger view that asks not how we can solve specific problems, but
how to avoid oppositional relationships and create situations in which people
have a reason to cooperate. Coercion will eliminate human obstacles, but it
fails to turn those same obstacles into ladders that will allow us to rise.
This argument against hierarchical systems of power is most obviously relevant to politics. I am here interested in the question of teaching. If defenders of authoritarianism have, in the past, argued that a specific group was “like children” and, needed to be ruled over, teaching involves literal children, who presumably need to be kept in the care of adults. What I am attempting to grapple with here is not even the issue of corporal punishment. Modern education has eliminated corporal punishment, and I think that is a good thing. Regardless of whether there are cases where students truly deserve what is coming to them, such punishment corrupts the relationship between teachers and students by turning it into an oppositional one. This inhibits the larger project of transmitting values and methods of thinking that should be at the heart of education and are necessary for progress. That being said, even if teachers lost their paddles and yardsticks, teaching remains a fundamentally authoritarian process built around coercion. We still hold over students the threat of failing grades and by extension the long term likelihood of being denied a job and a ticket to prosperity. This power is strengthened by a presumed moral authority. Students know that they cannot touch us, but the school administration and even their own parents will support us if we act against them. Not only do we have the right to punish, but we will be affirmed as right in doing so. This authoritarian structure even manifests itself in the act of teaching in the form of the lecture. Such a system presumes the existence of a teacher in possession of the “right” answers and the masses of students in need of enlightenment. The teacher then stands in front and “transmits” knowledge from his mind to those of the students through speech or possibly visual aids. The logical corollary is that the teacher is in a position to stand in judgment, presumably through exams, as to how successful students have “absorbed” this knowledge and, therefore, has a moral right to reward or punish students with grades.
A few years ago, I spent a year teaching high school
history. I was fortunate in having a talented class. I remain in contact with
several students, who continue to seek me out for whatever life or academic
wisdom I can offer them. That being said, as with all human endeavors, there
were regular conflicts of interest. At its most basic level, there was a
conflict in the sense that students often wished to do other things than sit in
class and listen to me. I am not a tyrannical person, greedy for power. On the
contrary, I am an idealist, who believes in the cause of teaching. Furthermore,
I felt pressure to justify the paycheck I received as a teacher by making sure
I spent every moment doing things that an outside observer would recognize as
productive teaching. Ironically, if I had cared less, I might have performed
better. For example, I saw it as my responsibility to keep students in the
classroom and refused to let more than one student out at a time to use the
restroom. I even refused to let students leave, who I came to believe were
abusing their privilege. I also objected to students doing work from other
classes during my class. As I am sure readers would agree, when narrowly
considered, everything that I did was in my rights. My mistake was that I
perpetuated a mindset for myself and my students of confrontation in which it
was me versus them. Perhaps the biggest sign of this was that it frustrated me
when students did not do as I wished, which manifested in my doing a fair
amount of yelling. Again, it is not a matter of whether I was in the right in
specific cases. The very fact that I could get frustrated should have been a
sign that I was not receiving something that I believed I had a right to and
should have begged the question of whether these students owed me anything. For
this reason, I owe all my students, particularly the “problematic” ones, an
apology. That I was the true student, learning how to teach, may perhaps serve as
a reason to treat my very real failings as a teacher with some charity.
This past year, I started tutoring a group of kids from a
large family, ranging in age from toddler to teen, on a weekly basis. Needless
to say, I do not work with all of these kids at the same time or on the same
things. Theoretically, the first hour should consist of working with the
younger set on their reading. The littlest ones should be able to pick out
words in the story as I read to them. The bigger ones should be able to do some
of the reading. The second hour should consist of me hosting a discussion about
history and politics with the older set. Lessons rarely work out so neatly. Not
all of the kids are interested in doing anything with me at a given time, and they
are not always interested in the same things as another kid. In practice, I
find myself jumping from kid to kid and vastly different topics with a fair
amount of horseplay mixed in. My goal is not to control the situation, but to
engage a few kids at a time for a brief period before moving on to something
else.
Being a tutor, as opposed to a teacher, means no yearly
contract. Thus, the parents can get rid of me anytime they choose. This reality
increases the pressure to perform “teaching” actions. I have this dread that
the parents will walk in and see one kid playing a game on my kindle, another
reading a book while I have a light saber duel with a third and decide that it
would be cheaper to simply hire a babysitter, disregarding the fact that I was
explaining the importance of conflict in narrative. Oddly enough, what makes
tutoring workable for me is that, unlike teaching, there is no temptation to
believe that I have any authority. Recognizing and accepting this fact means I
am less likely to attempt to exercise this non-existent authority. Lack of job
security is scary and certainly makes me anxious to hear that the family likes
what I am doing, but it is not something I can control. So I have no choice but
to focus on what I can control, and that is being the best resource for the kids
that I can in whatever form they choose to take it. Hopefully, they have
learned at least half as much as I have learned from them.
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