“The strength of the dojo lies not within the four walls, rather it lies within the hearts of the students.” ~ Prince Loeffler Shugyokan Dojo
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Many teachers—especially new teachers—think that the way to create good relationships with their students is to make their dojo fun. Although having fun in the dojo is important, focusing on having fun is the wrong emphasis within the dojo. The dojo and the syllabus must be interesting, intellectual, critical, creative, purposeful, and highly relevant. This focus is very different from just having fun. Getting students genuinely interested in what they are doing in the dojo develops good learning practices.
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Many traditional schools are based on one-way teaching, from syllabus to student or from teacher to student. Shouting commands like a drill instructor across the dojo floor. Even more so now with the advent of online learning. In contrast, ‘democratic’ lessons see teaching and learning as an undertaking between, teacher to student, student to teacher, and student to student. Democratic lessons nurture the creation of knowledge, as opposed to the mere memorization of knowledge. Democratic lessons honor the knowledge and experiences that students bring to the dojo and advocate learning as a social act; they de-emphasize the memorization of endless facts and techniques that will soon be forgotten.
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One of a teacher’s most important responsibilities is to show students the relevance of what they are learning. The underlying principles of a democratic lesson, as opposed to an instructor shouting commands at students is—choice, discourse, social responsibility, community, critical inquiry, authentic learning, and teaching a relevant and creative curriculum—this helps promote caring relationships between teachers and students. In turn, these relationships play an integral role in encouraging meaningful learning.
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If as an instructor you are just teaching your students to punch and kick, to just fight, you are totally missing the point. Social and emotional learning and character development are critical to a student’s success in in the dojo, and in life. It needs to be part of our day-to-day work as educators. We must educate their hearts, just as others have educated ours. This, I believe, is is one of the fundamental principles of Okinawan karate. ??
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Educating hearts and minds. “When educating the minds of our youth, we must not forget to educate their hearts.” — Dalai Lama
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? Photo Credit: Andre Bertel