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- Sep, 2002 |
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"Realization
Grows Like a Tree" |
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Rita
Taylor
Summer had begun and the rustling green of trees and fields was being complemented by the vibrant red of the World Cup soccer fans. It was at this time that a small group of people from Yeungnam University traveled to Silsang Temple in the Mount Jiri region, in order to meet the head monk, Ven. Doboep Seunim, and to become acquainted with Little School. Little School, founded over a year ago, is a small alternative Middle School, offering the first two grades. It is part of a broad range of activities connected with the temple.
Little School is only
one of various experiments and endeavors centered at
Silsangsa, the other main one being a school of Agriculture
that gives training in organic and sustainable farming.
The various community-, education- and
In our conversation with Doboep Seunim, it came out very clearly that the non-observance of this natural law of interdependence ("everything is connected") on the part of human beings has brought great stress on the environment as well as on the human being.
"We cannot exist alone", stresses Doboep Seunim. "We must cultivate a feeling of gratefulness for all things." Doboep Seunim is not alone in his understanding that it is our feeling of separateness from nature and from other human beings which, coupled with greed and lack of gratefulness and wonder, is causing the devastating aggression against nature as well as against each other. A total turn-about in our way of thinking, feeling and acting is necessary. In his speech and action, Doboep Seunim, who is the central inspiration for the temple, the Little School and the farming and cooperative projects, exemplifies both the simplicity and profundity of the truths embedded in the Buddhist teachings and philosophy.
"Realization grows like a tree" is written on the front page of Little School's monthly bulletin. Realization means self-realization and the working through illusions - the numerous illusions that take us away from the 'real', and that separate us from each other and from other forms of life.
In our conversations with Lee Koung Jae, the head teacher of Little School, Mr. Lee stressed that education is a developmental process for both the children and the teachers. So that realization may grow naturally as a tree, it seems very apt that this school is located in the heart of nature.
There are various things that distinguish this process-oriented education from the goal-oriented 'normal' public school education in our stressful urban environments. First of all, after the walk through the countryside from the small dwellings that are rented by the school for teachers and students in a nearby village, the school day begins with a meditation period. Secondly, the children work from three to four hours each week doing agricultural work. The school has is own vegetable garden tended by students and teachers. They also participate occasionally in the farming connected to the temple and farm school. In this way they not only experience the growth of plants from the sowing of the seeds to the flowering and fruit- or grain-bearing stage; but they also learn to "cultivate patience", as pointed out by Lee Kyoung Jae. Other work with hands such as woodwork, dying cloth with natural dye from plants, and cooking is also part of the Little School's activities. Working with their hands and with physical 'things', enables students to have time to think about themselves and others; or to literally 'get in touch' with themselves and the world. Preparing food as well as eating the noonday meal in the temple's cafeteria, also allows them to appreciate what the earth gives so generously and not to waste its gifts as well as the gift of labor from human hands. It is an attitude of mind that is cultivated not by words only but by actual doing.
Of course the children also study the conventional school subjects but the process of study is different. They have a degree of freedom to choose, select, change and contribute to the materials and themes of the teaching-learning process; and are also urged to criticize their teachers. In other worlds, structure, although it certainly exists, is not rigidly imposed from without, but is created by all and is in flux, in process, as is life itself.
This makes some very severe demands on the creativity of the teachers. For they must be the role models who can adjust and change in the process of development as well as give the amount of structure necessary. They foster the students' independence in life and studies - independence with responsibility to the community life in which they share. Other important qualities fostered at the school are broadmindedness and the ability to motivate themselves to study without 'being told to'.
The teachers who share small homes with small groups of students, cannot separate their role of teacher from their personal lives. They are simultaneously teaching and developing themselves as they meet the many challenges, both happy and sorrowful ones, that accompany this way of life. Their very small salary is hardly an incentive for this challenging work which allows children to develop their inner potentials in a natural way. This means that their real incentive comes from their devotion to the practice of the ideals that inspire the life at Little School. Getting rid of 'ego' or selfishness as well as seeking their own change through study and practice is part of their struggle.
It was Doboep Seunim's original plan to begin this school. However his present role regarding the school is one that also fosters the school's searching for its own way. He makes suggestions regarding the direction for the various community endeavors, which include the ecological one, but he does not 'control' any one of them. In fact, as one of the teachers mentioned to me-they themselves must go through the difficulties of finding the right path for the school which is in the experimental stage. That path is constantly in the making.
Little School, composed of trailers gaily painted by the children themselves, is at present very small as its name indicates, with about twenty students attending. They are receiving an invaluable life experience which enables them to have a broad worldview and to experience the balance between self and others, between human beings and nature in a dynamic, living way. They learn while doing. The light in their eyes, the fun and gleam of childhood, is not destroyed by a rigid school system that overburdens children by excess of intellect and an exaggerated struggle of competition. On the contrary, it is enhanced by their daily exploration into self, others, nature and study as a single unified process. In this way, yes, realization may grow like a tree¡¦ .
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agricultural-related
efforts operate under the umbrella name of "Indramang".
"Indramang" refers to the bejeweled
net of the goddess Indra, and it signifies the principle
that all things in the universe are interrelated; all
existing phenomena depend on and interact with each
other. Each jewel of the net of the universe reflects
all others. 
ÀÌÀü ±â»ç
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¢Æ Special ¢Æ |
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Copyright(c) 2001, The Yeungnam Observer. All rights reserved.