traffic mimes and gun spoons

Former mayor of Bogotá, Antanas Mockus, is my new hero.
Today, he has become my role model for teaching.

If you think about it, the best leaders in the world don't use power and threats to control their followers. That's more like cult leaders. Good leaders also don't resort to bribes, at the other extreme, to control their followers. That's more like self-serving politicians. Somehow, though, it is completely accepted for teachers to use only these tactics. The entire school system is pretty much based on these two methods. Why shouldn't we expect teachers to be dynamic leaders, not just behaviorist enforcers?

That's why reality TV shows like SuperNanny and Brat Camp piss me off. They act like the best way to raise children is to break their spirits until they comply. (Sit on the Naughty Chair!) Well this guy proves that fear of punishment is not the best way to teach people, to actually motivate them to change.

It reminds me of the way religious systems often try to control people with threats of punishments or rewards (whether physical or eternal) versus the way Jesus interacted with people and changed them from the inside out with His compassion and intelligence. I could say more about this, but I'll save it for another day.

I'm not saying there's no room for "discipline," or whatever you want to call it, and rewards in schools. But if that's all we're doing, then we're not really helping people change internally, or care about others, but just turning them into self-centered little robots.

True leaders make use of the creativity, compassion, common sense, and honesty they possess. I only hope I can be creative and dedicated enough to teach a group of students like this guy taught a city. Honestly, it will be so much easier to fall into the same way everybody else does things, and the way our current system tells us to do things. But...that is not what I'm called to! What a huge job I have ahead of me.

Mad love for all my teachers out there! Haha.