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We are selfish. In our society, many people are focused almost entirely on themselves and instant gratification. People clamor for service to come to them instantly and are furious when they have to wait. The most popular kind of picture that we see on social media is “selfies.” Many times, when you are on your way into a building, the person in front of you drops the door in your face. Now, I don’t think these people necessarily mean to be rude, but they are so involved in their own thoughts and focused on themselves that they don’t even realize you are right behind them.
Just go to any public place and you will see it. People are maybe walking in groups and some of them might be talking to one another, but more and more you will see a group of people together, but entirely separate because each is wrapped up in the world of his cell phone. As we become more self-involved as a society, we also are losing the ability to empathize with others. This lack of empathy causes less kindness to others and a big problem is developing.
The lack of kind actions and words in every day life is appalling. The very fact that we have to encourage people to do “random acts of kindness” speaks volumes. Now, I am not saying that there is no one out there that is kind. I encounter kindness and know many people who do their utmost to be kind to everyone, even the rude people who are insulting them. I just think that there is a noticeable lack of kind actions in our society.
Because people are so wrapped up in their own lives and their own dramas, they forget to consider what the other person in their conversation may be experiencing– if they are even actually listening to the other person. We are so busy and our minds are constantly thinking about what needs to be done or that internet sensation that just popped up. We spend endless hours sucked into the vortex of social media and for some people, video games. We are so plugged in that we sometimes forget to unplug and unwind.
What is this doing to our kids? It is creating a generation of lazy and impolite people who use social media as a forum to air their dirty laundry and pick fights.
How do we combat this problem? Well, first and foremost, we need to create spaces in schools where students are learning about how to act in a way that is not selfish. We need to teach kids to empathize and consider the feelings of others before they act. As a teacher, it is imperative that I work to help students see how being kind can be the best choice in almost every situation.
There are many ways that teachers can work to help students learn how to be kind and productive members of society.
First and foremost, we must work to get students reading. The more you read, the better you get at empathizing. Putting yourself in the shoes of the characters in the books you read gives you practice thinking about how others might feel in different situations.
Next, we need to create safe places in our classrooms in which students learn to communicate in kind ways with one another. We need to create a space for do-overs and mistakes and learning how their actions affect others. How will students learn to empathize if we always punish them for unkind actions, without giving them chances to learn from their mistakes? We need to create spaces in which students are made to see why their unkind action was wrong and then given a logical consequence for that action. Many times, the consequence is as easy as working to make the situation right again with the person they have wronged.
Lastly, we need to create an environment in which kindness is valued. We need to model being kind. We need to help students to understand what it looks like to be kind. We need to help students learn how good it feels to do something kind for another person without expecting anything in return. We need to teach students that it is important to hold the door for the person behind them. We need to teach students about the adage-“You can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.”
Let’s work together to create a generation of kind people who work hard to create a community in which we all work to achieve common goals instead of being selfish.
I see a lot of kindness in my world, especially among my students, most of whom are seniors in high school. Yes, books teach empathy. I’ve read several studies about that recently.