Practicing Falun Dafa Turned Me into a Compassionate Teacher

(Minghui.org) I am an elementary school teacher. It was almost impossible for anyone in the school where I taught to take advantage of me. One teacher said that she was only afraid of two people in the school, and one of them was me. I did, indeed, have a grim countenance. I was very stern with my students and ruled over them. I’d speak to their parents, punish them, criticize them, and sometimes even hit them until they obeyed.

My students were obedient on the surface because I used all sorts of methods to scare them. A student once told me that my glare was so frightening that it seemed like bullets were shooting out of my eyes. I thought highly of myself at that time. But looking back, I know I was behaving like an evil communist party devil.

After I started practicing Falun Dafa in 1998, I no longer got into conflicts with my coworkers at school. I also did not compete for fame and gain. The principal once asked me to fill out a form to compete for a title at school. I said, “Please give it to someone else who needs it more than I do.”

A new teacher noticed how well I conducted myself when we worked together and praised me. I said, “It is because I am a Falun Dafa practitioner.” I told her the truth about the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) persecution and helped her withdraw from the CCP and its youth organizations. She later gave birth to a daughter just as she had hoped. I knew that she was blessed for accepting the truth about Dafa.

I tried my best to abide by the principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance to teach my students. I no longer yelled at them or treated them badly. I was considerate and thought about how it was to be in their shoes. I did not force my methods on them but reasoned with them based on the principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance. If an issue involved all the students in the class, I’d let the class decide what was right or wrong. That way, they were able to truly understand the facts of the matter.

I discovered that young children do not have any socially motivated ideas, and they tend to deal with things positively. A class that is inspired is able to solve problems in a positive manner. I guided them to look inward and to understand that it is not always other people that are at fault. We resolved things appropriately and they matured through the process.

I was also recognized by many parents. When a student who wasn’t doing very well wrote a beautiful sentence in her essay, I read it aloud in front of the whole class and praised her. In tears, her parents told me, “This is the first time a teacher has ever praised our daughter in class. She was really happy when she got home.” That really made me emotional. As teachers, all we seem to do is find errors, criticize, and correct students’ work. I am fortunate to be a Falun Dafa practitioner and that has guided me to be a good teacher.

I treat all my students the same. I remember a naughty boy named Huang. When he transferred to another school, his former teacher was so happy that she lit fireworks to celebrate. I was his Chinese teacher in fourth grade. I realized that he did not pay attention or do his homework. He would also chew on his pens and rustled his papers during class. Although his mother bought him box after box of pens, he never seemed to have a pen that worked. When I picked him to answer a question in class and affirmed his answer, the whole class looked at me in amazement, because they’d never seen that happen before.

Students often told me, “Huang isn’t letting the younger students’ into the bathroom” or “Huang is fighting.” Before I became a cultivator, I would have dragged Huang to the principal’s office or called his parents. Now I don’t go to such extremes. I told him, “Students have to finish their homework,” and he agreed. The students had to copy the assignments written on the chalkboard during class. But Huang didn’t finish before class was over, so I helped him copy them down.

Huang started doing his homework, paid attention in class, and raised his hand to speak. Although he sometimes didn’t control himself well, his classmates no longer regarded him as a problem student. The learning environment improved for everyone, and teachers stopped discriminating against him. His parents asked that Huang be transferred back to my class when he was assigned to another class in fifth grade. In the past, I would have handled him based on the Party’s perverse ideals and made a mess of the situation.

I used the good parts of the textbook to teach the children about traditional Chinese culture and guide them to understand the heavenly principles that good will be rewarded and evil punished. I also told them something that Master Li, the founder of Falun Dafa, said:

“The more he swears at him, the more de he gives him. The same is true with beating up or bullying others. As one hits or kicks another person, one will give one’s de away according to how badly one beats up the other person. An everyday person cannot see this principle at this level. Feeling humiliated, he cannot put up with it and thinks, “Since you hit me, I’ve got to return the same.” “Wham,” he gives that person a punch back and returns de to him. Neither have gained or lost anything. He might think, “You have hit me once, so I should hit you twice. Otherwise, I won’t feel avenged.” He will hit him again, and another piece of his de will be given away to the other person.” (Lecture One, Zhuan Falun)

Master’s Fa principles are very clear and direct. Children are shocked when they hear his teaching.

I’ve also used Chinese myths and folk tales to teach students about China’s divinely inspired culture. When I read them the story about The Cowherd and the Weaver Girl, a folktale that tells why two bright stars in the sky are on either side of the Milky Way, I said, “Perhaps this story is real and not fiction.” Some of them thought that it was a superstition, so I explained to them what superstition meant. I used the principles of Dafa to breakthrough the CCP ideology and propaganda about evolution. They are once again touched. Although they’re young, they still understand what I tell them.

I encourage them to be considerate. The Cowherd and the Weaver Girl tells of a forbidden romance that is ended when the Lady Queen Mother banishes the pair to be distant stars in the sky. I asked the students to comment on the character of the Lady Queen Mother. Most of them thought that she was unreasonable because she punished the weaver girl for marrying a mortal. But one child said that the Lady Queen Mother was selfless because she did not pardon the weaver girl just because she was her granddaughter. The child said that the Lady Queen Mother was fair and punished the weaver girl according to the rules of heaven.

My heart is no longer moved by whatever a student does or says. I do not yell or reprimand them for being disobedient. Instead, I am able to deal calmly with any issues that arise.