Joseph Kim is senior pastor of Wonchon Baptist Church in Suwon. He also serves as a professor at Capital Baptist Seminary in Suwan and at Myung Gi University Graduate School, the Asian Center for Theological Studies, and Kyung Hee University, all in Seoul. He is chaplain of Central Christian Academy of Suwan, and is the national director for Christian Services, Inc., in Korea. Kim lives in Suwan with his wife, Enny Cho Kim, and their three children.
It was Parker Palmer who presented this incomplete sentence in his faculty workshop: 'When I am teaching at my best, I’m like a __.' (We were to fill in the blank by completing the sentence with a word picture, or metaphor.) To stimulate your thinking, I will share what Parker Palmer used as a metaphor for his own teaching. He viewed himself as a sheep dog, which has four vital functions. First, it maintains a space where the sheep can graze and feed themselves. Second, it holds the sheep together in that space, constantly bringing back strays. Third, it protects the boundaries of the space in order to keep dangerous predators out. Last, when the grazing ground is depleted, it leads the sheep to another space where they can get the food they need.
Palmer said, 'Students must feed themselves—a process called active learning. If they are to do this, I must take them to a place where food is available: a good text, a well-planned exercise, a generative question, or a disciplined conversation. Then, when they have learned what there is to learn in that place, I must move them to the next feeding ground. I must hold the group within those places, paying special attention to individuals who get lost or run away—and all the while I must protect the group from deadly predators, like fear.'
The Metaphor of ‘Professional’
The primary metaphor shaping us as teachers today is the metaphor of a 'professional.' The American Heritage Dictionary defines professional as:
- A person following a profession, especially a learned profession.
- One who earns a living in a given or implied occupation: hired a professional to decorate the house.
- Skilled practitioner; an expert.
Isn’t it true that we live in a world where everyone desires to be a professional? The ministry of Christian schooling is a complex endeavor. It requires more expertise than ever before, and the world we know is rapidly becoming a world of professionals. We spend quite a bit of energy and attention on improving our professionalism in teaching, a process that isn’t bad in itself, particularly in a society that places such a high value on being a 'pro.'
What is wrong, then, about wanting to be a professional? Isn’t being an expert in one’s field a good thing? It wouldn’t be that wrongheaded if, in the process of trying to become professional, we didn’t lose something essential about being a teacher. My thesis is that, in fulfilling our desire to be more professional, we have sacrificed something essential, something even more foundational to our calling. I propose that a better metaphor for a teacher is that of a parent and a pastor. If we are to restore the essence of true teaching, we must see our work from a parental and pastoral perspective.
One thing that helped me see the distinction between teaching and other professions is found in the Korean language. Like the languages of other Asian countries, ours has been influenced by the Chinese characters. In Korea, most job titles end with the word sa. But the Chinese character used for the sa in teacher is quite different from the sa used for other professionals. The sa used for most professionals is a character whose root meaning comes from combining the two letters of numbers 1 and 10. This word denotes a person who knows from 1 to 10 (or everything) in his field—an expert, a person with skill, knowledge, and prestige.
However, the sa used for teacher, although having the same sound, does not have the same meaning. It is made by combining the two letters that mean a 'hill' and 'gather around.' The hill is where people would gather to live and to create a community. Eventually, it came to represent 'a person who is looked up to in the community, because of his or her modeling behavior.' In other words, sa is a person who leads by example, one who cares and responds to the need for mentoring.
It is interesting that that same Chinese character that is used to for teacher is also used for pastor. In their wisdom, our ancestors who defined the word saw a qualitative difference in teachers and pastors from those of other professions. The defining essence of teaching was more relational than functional. We are teachers first and foremost not because we are technicians with expert skills in the trade of teaching but because we are mentors who desire to relate and lead our students by teaching them how to live a life. That is why Neil Postman puts his hope in teachers and what we do in schools because, 'Schooling can be about how to make a life, which is quite different from how to make a living.' Professionals are those who make a living; we should try to make a life and teach our students to do the same.
New Metaphors for Teachers: ‘Parent’ and ‘Pastor’
I realize that forced dichotomies are dangerous. However, I have chosen to highlight a few distinctions that separate the two kinds of metaphors that pull us as teachers in different directions—the teacher as a professional, or the teacher as a parent and pastor.
Various metaphors are used to describe the Christian teacher. For example, in Called to Teach, William Yount uses several metaphors: the teacher as dynamic synergist, as clear communicator, as dramatic performer, as creative designer, as classroom manager. In Walking with God in the Classroom, Harro Van Brummelen uses artist, technician, facilitator, storyteller, craftsperson, and guide as metaphors to help us understand what a Christian teacher is.
However, it is Paul who champions the concept of parent and pastor as metaphors for teacher Christianly. First Corinthians 4:14–20 helps us view several key elements of teaching from a parental and pastoral perspective.
I. Teaching That Admonishes and Does Not Shame
The tone and context of this passage stems from the picture of a parent admonishing a child. Often when we as teachers take on the attitude of a professional, we tend to look down at the student. We are the experts; they are the amateurs. We know; they don’t. It is from a position of strength that we approach our students. We become authoritarian, if not in relationship, at least in knowledge. We dictate, and our students note-take. We give, and they receive. Parker Palmer expresses succinctly the fallacy of such a view.
But our conventional pedagogy emerges from a principle that is hardly communal. It centers on a teacher who does little more than deliver conclusions to students. It assumes that the teacher has all the knowledge and the students have little or none, that the teacher must give and the students must take, that the teacher sets all the standards and the students must measure up. Teacher and students gather in the same room at the same time not to experience community but simply to keep the teacher from having to say things more than once.
Unfortunately, with such a view, classrooms easily become places that produce shame. Not knowing makes us ashamed. Shame can be an effective weapon in controlling student behavior. Precisely this effectiveness is the temptation we face when we deal with misbehavior. Shame is immediate, shame is effective, and shame is easy to produce.
But Paul clarifies his motivation for the Corinthian letter. He is not motivated by a desire to shame his readers but by a desire to admonish them. The word admonish is primarily used in the context of family nurture. The Greek word, as found in Ephesians 6:4, is nouthesia. Thus admonishing is instruction couched in parental love. Admonishment, unlike shame, is not primarily for control but for change and growth. Admonishing is clearing away impediments in the child’s life that would stunt growth and hinder positive change.
Paul wasn’t afraid to confront the Corinthians. He wasn’t beating around the bush, fearful that he might psychologically damage fragile egos. But he wasn’t using shame either. He loved the Corinthians, and their lack of spiritual growth was something that, because of his parental love, he simply couldn’t ignore.
When we admonish, we are disciplining, not punishing. As Walter Wangerin says, 'Punishment is merely the expression of someone’s discontent, irritation, anger—and then nothing is loved so much as that one’s thwarted desires, and his own power to say so. Again, nothing changes. But discipline loves the criminal. And though discipline also gives pain, unlike punishment, it seeks to change the child at the core of his being' (Little Lamb, Who Made Thee?)
My family went back to the United States on a furlough during my fourth grade in Highland Park Christian School. For the first time in my life, I was attending an American school. Although I had dual citizenship while I was growing up in Korea, my parents opted to put me in a local Korean school. As you can imagine, I was a nervous wreck on the first day of class in the U.S. school, and I was totally lost. My mother home schooled me, so I had some basic knowledge of the English alphabet and phonics, but I was nowhere near the fourth-grade level.
I vividly remember that the first class was spelling. My teacher, Mrs. Sharp, stood in front of the class holding a stack of cards with the spelling words on them. As each student stood up, she would read the word aloud, a student would spell it, and so on. Not only was I nervous in an unfamiliar classroom full of strangers, but I was frightened because I knew my turn was coming. I was ashamed because of what I didn’t know. I had no idea how to spell the words Mrs. Sharp was reading.
When my turn came, Mrs. Sharp saw me, paused for a brief moment, and then asked me to come to the front of the class. My heart sank. I was so embarrassed already that I’m sure my face was beet red. I don’t remember how, but I managed to get to the front of the class, and Mrs. Sharp announced that Joey (my childhood name) was going to spell on the blackboard. She explained briefly how people in different countries use different letters, and then she proceeded to ask me to spell her name, Sharp, in Korean. I wrote it with confidence. As I was turning around, I saw a sea of hands waving, as each student wanted his name spelled out in Korean. As the recess bell rang and I returned to my seat, kids were swarming my desk, poking their notebooks and even their Bibles for me to write their name in Korean. I spent the rest of the day, like a sports or movie star, autographing everyone’s books and notebooks with Korean letters. Mrs. Sharp wasn’t just an expert teacher, a technician in the teaching trade; she was a parent and pastor par excellence. She knew not only how to teach, but how to love and care for the child’s spirit.
In many Christian schools today, children come to us out of diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds. Feelings of inadequacy and shame are common in some classrooms. If teachers view themselves as technicians, they do not feel obligated to deal with such baggage. Mrs. Sharp could easily have carried on with her spelling lesson plan. However, she was willing to stop and notice the emotional state of one student. She had a mother’s intuition. Although she was newly married and had no children of her own yet, she knew how to be a parent to me.
II. Teaching That Doesn’t Just Tutor but Fathers
As our students pass through life, they meet many technicians brandishing their wares. These tutors sell, convince, rationalize, and perhaps motivate, but they don’t birth. They don’t nurture. In a student’s lifetime, few genuine mentors emerge. Paul fathered the Corinthians in the gospel. What a word picture! Gospel truth is given a new birth when it is imparted through a relationship with a mentor. A teacher, when she is at her best, becomes more than a tutor. She becomes a mentor, a role that is steeped in parental and pastoral imagery. Any child growing up will meet a number of technicians. She will encounter doctors, plumbers, and policemen. It is part of living. The child would not be less if she didn’t meet such people, but every child would be less if she did not encounter a teacher who became her mentor, her spiritual parent, and her spiritual pastor. 'Technique is what a teacher uses until the real teacher arrives.' (Palmer, Courage)
Paul bemoaned the fact that there were not many father figures—i.e., parental and pastoral relationships—in the spiritual lives of the Corinthians. How much more pronounced this problem is for today’s generation! It is amazing how today’s parents, even Christian parents, have fallen into the trap of putting their children into the hands of 'countless tutors.' The lack of parental and pastoral care for growing children has been a problem for centuries, but never before as acute as today. As teachers, we have never been in a place where the parental role is the single most important one for us to offer the child at school.
III. Teaching That Models and Doesn’t Mince Words
My father, a native Korean, went to the States to study. After completing his seminary studies, he started preaching in small country churches in the South. He had a Bible (KJV) and a Korean/English dictionary, which he carried with him everywhere to figure out what people were saying about him. He went to one church where the pastor introduced my dad, saying, 'Billy Kim is a model preacher.' My dad looked model up in the dictionary, and the definition was 'small imitation of the real thing.' The pastor went on to say, 'Not only is Billy Kim a model preacher, but he is a warm preacher.' He looked up warm and found 'not so hot!'
As I work with teachers, not only in my school but in schools across the country and around the globe, I detect a pervasive sense of inadequacy, and this sense of inadequacy infects teachers indiscriminately. The young teachers feel inadequate because of their lack of experience. They fear being caught in a situation in which they don’t have experiential knowledge. Experienced teachers also feel inadequate, but their inadequacies are of a different kind. The technological age has so shortened the life cycle of current expertise that we are afraid of the unknown, of the new—the new science, multiple intelligences, multicultural learning, and cooperative learning, for example. We become fearful, afraid that the field of education has left us standing at a remote bus stop. We can’t escape the overwhelming inadequacy we feel, and technology is making it worse for us, not better.
I have found a way to break out of this. Our expertise will eventually all fade and age, but one thing will only improve with time. Our primary focus must not be what we can do for our students but what we can be to our students. We can’t necessarily surf the Internet as well as they can. We might not be able to use PowerPoint or MP3 files in our lesson plans. But we can all be a concerned, caring parent figure in the lives of our students. That takes the kinds of knowledge and skill that never get obsolete.
The teacher as parent says boldly, 'Be imitators of me.' If we are only professionals, we don’t need to model. A doctor doesn’t ask a patient to do as he does, at least not in any actions that are key to what a doctor does. A lawyer or an accountant doesn’t ask his clients to do what he is doing. But a parent does, and so does a pastor. Imitation is the primary mode of teaching between parent and child, and it should be so between pastors and parishioners. A child mimics the words of her parents as she learns to talk. A parent models hygiene habits, eating habits, and praying habits. The pastor leads by example, for he is merely a fellow follower of Christ.
But teaching by imitation is not a simple act. We minimize this kind of teaching not because we don’t value it, but more because it isn’t obvious enough for us. We want things to be formalized. We prefer modes of teaching that are on the surface of our consciousness. But most valuable learning, in my opinion, happens below the surface. We mimic without realizing it. Real teaching, much like parenting and pastoring, is a subversive act.
Paul writes to the Corinthians that he is actually coming to evaluate their spirituality. Teachers who are parental and pastoral also evaluate, but their evaluation is qualitatively different from that of teachers who are simply professional. They evaluate not just to standardize or to make comparisons with the norm but primarily to chart growth and progress. Their evaluation is more for empowerment. A parent wants to know his child’s progress so that he can empower him. The teacher as parent and pastor knows that ultimately in the kingdom of God, a person’s internal strength and genuine character are evaluated, not just those things one can describe in words.
Let us move beyond tutoring; beyond the paradigm of the teacher as professional. Let us joyfully accept the foundational perspective of the teacher as pastor and parent, a perspective that will cause us to reflect more deeply on the life-shaping influence of our role in children’s lives.
Exploring Our Metaphors 4.3