Books recommended in the SRE workshop

I found a number of really interesting books in the last workshop organized by the NSW Buddhist council. I have not used them in class yet, but they seemed excellent.

•  The Centering Book, awareness activities for children, parents and teachers by Gay Hendricks and Russel Wills
  
• Zen Shorts by John Muth Recommended for year 1, 2 and 3.
  
• The Three Questions by John Muth
  
• Stone Soup by John Muth (I loved this one)
  
• The Prince Who Ran Away: The Story Of Gautama Buddha by Anne Rockwell (Author), Fahimeh Amiri (Illustrator)
  
• Her Father's Garden by James Vollbracht
  

Peaceful Piggy Meditation

On week two of this term I tried to reproduce the successful results I had on week one. We read Peaceful Piggy Meditation a short story about family life in today's fast world. 

The basic premise is that since "Sometimes the world can be such a busy, noisy place" then "it's good to meditate."

According to Amazon, the author is a certified  meditation teacher for children.

The books is very nice, both the writing and the illustrations. For teaching in a large class in fact that images are somewhat realistic makes reading it more difficult: all kids want to see them!

For the older kids I think the story was less interesting than the "Hermit and the Well" I read last week.

The Hermit and the Well

For the first lesson of this term I picked The Hermit and the Well a short story by Thich Nhat Hanh. Thich Nhat Hanh is a fantastic writer. The book tells, in first person, the story of a boy who goes on a school trip to a mountain to find a hermit. They do not find him, but the boy finds something much more important while sitting next to a well.

The story raises a number of issues that can trigger discussion. The kids were interested in knowing if the story was true, or if it could even be true. It also can be used to discuss how when we hurry we do not see the beauty of what lays on the path, or how we sometimes find what we are looking for, in something that looks completely different.

I was actually feeling pretty awful before the class. I had read the terrible story of child abuse and was feeling very sad. But somehow the kids were the quietest they have ever been. The class was fantastic. I had decided to read the story while we 'played' freeze and the distractors, and offer to give candy to those who won. At the end I gave a candy to each of them, because they had all been so good (I actually ran out of them half way).

With the older ones, I used the remaining time to discuss the story. It always amazes me how people can have so different interpretations of a text.
Note: Before starting the reading I asked what a Hermit was. Very few knew the meaning, so one of the kids explained it.

a class on the meaning of ignorance

Year 4 had dancing classes so we had a smaller group this week. It was good because someone misplaced the key to the classroom I normally use and we had to sit in a smaller one.

I can now say without a blink of the eyes that I am enjoying the teaching... a lot.
We had a nice session with both groups, but specially with the older ones.

I had promised to start using the textbooks I got from the Buddhist Council.
I asked them to open on page 38, that has a description of the enlightenment.


The text describes how Buddha talks about how Prince Siddhata sees how the root of suffering is ignorance. So we discussed the meaning of ignorance.
In my example, I explained that if I steal something, I do it driven by selfishness, I do not care about the other person. Selfishness was not realizing the other person's suffering.

I then asked them to give me their examples where we caused suffering because of ignorance.
Some of them included

• 'When we do not help mom clean the dishes. She has been working all day, and we just want to sit there without doing anything.... We do not think about her.'
• 'When we do not help in the house...'
• 'When we eat more than our share of food and leave dad or mom without enough food'
• 'When we make noise and misbehave in class, we do not think about the teacher and how he is also a person.'

Regrettably I can not quote word by word by these where pretty much the examples they came up with. I thought they were pretty good.

We then only had 5min to sit, but everybody was so quiet that I just let them sit for an extra 5min. Again I was very 'one' with them when guiding the session.
I can see that the advantage of that is that I can relate the meditation to what we discussed in class (e.g. sending metta to mom). I am not sure if this is the best, maintaining a routine is alo very important. Although for this I have well established the bell and taking refuge three jewels.

Positive discipline in the classroom

I started reading this book I got from the library.

Positive discipline in the classroom. by Jane Nelsen, Lynn Lott and H Stephen Glen. Prima Publishing 1997.

I just started it, but it looks very interesting. It emphasizes the need for techniques that develop Three empowering perceptions:

1. Perceptions of personal capabilities
2. Perceptions of significance in primary relationships
3. Perceptions of personal power of influence over life.
   

and 4 essential skills

1. Intrapersonal skills: understand personal emotions and use that understanding to develop self-discipline and self-control
2. Interpersonal skills: ability to work with others
3. Systemic skills: the ability to respond to the limits and consequences of everyday life
4. Judgement skills: the ability to develop wisdom and evaluate situations according to appropriate values

One of the activities I found interesting was 'Practice compliments and appreciations'. Students (and teachers) are not used to giving and receiving praise.

Some ideas from the book:

• Ask them to think of a time when someone said something that made them feel good about themselves.
• Ask them think (and share) something they would like to thank others for.
• Ask them to think of something they would like to be complimented on.
• If they are having trouble coming up with compliments, remind them how much easier it would be if they had been asked to criticise instead of giving compliments.
• If someone gives a criticism instead of a compliment ask him/her to try again (or ask other to do it)
• After the student got the idea, you can use an object passed around so the person holding it has to say a compliment, so all get a chance to do it.