Viewpoint Investing in children is never a waste of time
By MARY LOU KOWNACKI
What can we do? Thats
the question people ask every time theres a school shooting like we just
experienced in Santee, Calif., and Williamsport, Penn.
No one has the answer to what are the roots of the rage and
alienation. We cast our net: the vulgarity and callousness of the culture of
TV, movies and music. Too easy access to guns. Broken homes. Latchkey kids.
Lack of parental caring and responsibility. The decline of a common value
system. All of those combined with the emotional turmoil of adolescence.
The same week that the two shootings occurred, Poetry Alive, a
national poetry drama troupe for students, did a weeklong workshop at the
Inner-City Neighborhood Art House at 10th and Holland in Erie, Penn. The Art
House offers free lessons in the visual, performing and literary arts to 600
at-risk children after school and during the summer.
Im not claiming that the solution to childrens
violence is programs like Poetry Alive, but lets look at what those five
days contributed.
First, the children learned the skills of public speaking. They
had to stand in front of an audience and be loud, clear and engaging. I heard
in a workshop once that a study to determine what similarities, if any, existed
among those who had risked their lives to save Jews during the Holocaust
revealed this: Most of the heroic had performed publicly as children. They
played the piano or recited poems or acted in plays or sang by themselves in
front of many audiences as children. They learned to stand on their own two
feet. They got a sense of self-accomplishment, self-awareness and
self-confidence. Mahatma Gandhi, the nonviolent liberator of India, started
alternative schools in his nonviolent communities. Here, too, every day of
school began with the arts and with a performance of some kind by the children.
Gandhi thought this was essential to building self-reliant and courageous
individuals -- the type of individual who in time of conflict or crisis draws
from inner resources and does not bend to peer pressure.
Second, they learned to memorize one or two poems. You are
what you think, the Buddha said. What thoughts do you want running
through your childs heads? Which words do you think build sensitivity and
self-respect? The violent, anti-woman, anti-gay lyrics of Eminem, Shut
up, bitch, you move again Ill beat the f--- out of you, or this
from Langston Hughes:
Hold fast to dreams For if dreams die Life is a
broken winged bird That cannot fly.
Hold fast to dreams For if
dreams go Life is a barren field Frozen with snow.
Third, the children learned to work together. They were put in
groups of four, given a poem and together had to determine the characters, the
setting, the action and the script. The children disagreed, argued, but, with
the pressure of performance, knew they needed one another. They practiced
civility and the give-and-take of social situations. In the end it was a group
victory and it built community.
Nothing earth-shattering at first glance. But what if this
experience and others like it was repeated day after day? This is the
philosophy behind the Neighborhood Art House: If we put art and beauty and
values into the lives of children, we will reap soul.
Would children have a better chance to develop their potential if
a few times a week they were exposed to a painting by Monet, Picasso or
OKeefe, not just the violent and sexually explicit images of MTV and
BET?
Would their souls be richer if every day they listened to Bach and
learned to play Mozart, if they heard the lyrics of Sandburg and Dickinson
every day, not just DMX and Snoop Doggy Dog?
What if our children developed self-confidence and self-esteem by
performing and learning to play an instrument, painting pictures from what is
inside themselves and dancing to Swan Lake? What if they memorized words that
were inspiring or humorous rather than violent and nihilistic? What if they
learned to work with their peers for a common goal where all shared in the
applause? Would this help instill compassion, empathy, tolerance? Would this
dent the culture of violence?
Who knows? But Id rather take a chance on something like an
Art House than raise taxes for more juvenile detention centers.
A few days ago, one of our most talented students, 10-year-old
Johnny, left us. A well-known local artist was so impressed with Johnnys
work that she was arranging private lessons for him. Johnny came to the Art
House that day after school, as hes done for four years, and in the
middle of a class his father came in and told him to get his coat and collect
his framed art pieces hanging on the walls -- they were leaving for Florida.
Johnny started to cry. I love it here, he said. Please tell
everyone thank you, he sobbed to Sr. Anne, director of Art House.
Do they have an art house in Florida? he asked through tears as he
walked out the door.
I dont know, Johnny, but they should. There should be an Art
House or its equivalent on every corner in every city.
What can you do about the shootings in Columbine, Santee,
Williamsport? Lets try this: Invest in children. Support places like the
local youth centers, Boys and Girls Clubs, Big Sisters/Big Brothers,
YMCA-sponsored activities for youth, and others in your city. Tithe your time;
give a few hours a week to volunteering at an after-school program. Children
need mentors, a person who is interested in why they do or dont want to
get up in the morning. Dont worry about duplicating services when it
comes to children. We cannot have enough safe places for children to go.
Nothing you do for children is ever wasted, Garrison Keillor said.
Lets believe him.
One more thing about Poetry Alive: It breaks my heart to see 9-
and 10-year-olds acting way beyond their years. When their conversation is
filled with sexual innuendo, when their mouths are foul and violent, when they
swagger and take on a pseudosophistication, I can forget that these are only
children. But to see these streetwise kids get excited about elementary school
poems like Mice by Rose Flyeman and Sick by Shel
Silverstein and Sometimes I Feel This Way by John Ciardi, to hear
them giggle and play, is to rediscover innocence -- theirs and mine.
The catcher in the rye is what 17-year-old Holden
Caufield tells his little sister he wants to be, rejecting her suggestions of
lawyer or scientist. Holden, the narrator and main character in J.D.
Salingers classic novel, The Catcher in the Rye, wants to preserve
innocence. He tells his sister that he imagines thousands of small children
playing in a field of rye. At the edge of the field is a cliff and if the
children in their play wander too close and fall, he would be there to catch
them.
I confess that an adolescent Holden still lives in my 60-year-old
body. I know we cant protect children forever. But, my God, can we at
least wait until they are teenagers before we leave them alone to fly off the
cliffs of innocence? Can we at least try to catch them before they drop into
the abyss of sex and drugs and violence? Anyone for a catcher in the
rye movement?
Benedictine Sr. Mary Lou Kownacki is executive director of the
Benedictine Sisters Inner-City Neighborhood Art House in Erie, Penn. Her
e-mail address is marylou@erie.net
National Catholic Reporter, March 23,
2001
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