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On November 5, 1974, I became the director of the Yasnozorenskaya secondary school.
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I well remember the scene of my introduction to the teaching staff of the Yasnozorensk school. As if it were yesterday, I see the eyes of the teachers, in which the question I understand is: “Who are you?”
“Really, who? — Mentally entering into a Conversation with them, I thought. — What will I bring you? I don’t want to manage, but to think together with you, to fight together for a school for children.”
And here I am in the director’s office … in my office. Everyone went home. Tomorrow is my first day, the second quarter of the 1974/75 academic year. Where to begin? Episodes from life in Bessonovka, the construction of a school, flashed through my imagination. “Remember, you met real mutual understanding only when, taking a trowel, you stood next to the workers, when they believed that you did not come to command, but to do business with them. Did you pay attention to how workers and teachers reacted differently to the idea of a school-complex? For the first, it became their own, and for the second, it turned out to be someone else’s, dictated «from above». The new must necessarily mature, be born in the collective. It is impossible to disseminate experience by directive, campaign. The imposed innovation turns people from creators into blind performers. So where to start?..”
Suddenly I heard someone’s excited screams. What is it? He quickly got up and opened the window. A cold autumn wind rushed into the office, and with it a fierce, gu.e.ya scolding, from which it became hot: the cry was a child’s. I saw a terrible scene: two tall teenagers were beating a boy of about eleven years old in a ravine. I don’t remember how I ran up the stairs from the second floor and further down. A few moments later, grabbing the hooligans by the collar, shaking them with such force, as if he wanted to shake out this bestial cruelty to a person forever: “What are you doing!” suddenly one of them whimpered: “Forgive me… we won’t be anymore… sorry… uncle…” I silently unclenched my hands, the teenagers stood with their heads bowed.
“What kind of fraer was found there?” came an unpleasant squeaky voice. I turned around and saw three shaggy guys who looked about 18 — 20 years old. They sat on a small hillock about twenty meters away from me, sipping cigarettes and spitting deliciously at their feet. All three of them squinted their eyes and looked at me insolently.
I realized that it was they who pitted the guys, and if I retreat now, if I don’t give a decisive battle, then never in this school should I be approved by any order as a director.
“So what, fight? And if these are accelerators-students? You’re a director, a teacher…” one inner voice said, but another firmly and persistently repeated: “Don’t back down…”
“But, but, you can’t even joke,” one of the guys said, not so confidently and brazenly. All three, as if reluctantly, got up and slowly moved away. I stepped after them: “Wait! Where are you? One of them turned around and suddenly rushed to the thorn bush growing along the slope of the ravine. The rest follow him. I stopped. This is a debut… But my heart felt better: a good lesson for those who stayed and, of course, watched us with all their eyes, He approached the boys.
“You understand, you beat a man!” Remember for the rest of your life: there is nothing on earth more disgusting than cowardice and cruelty, — I said loudly so that those in the bushes could hear. What grades are you in? he asked in a different tone.
But the boys remained stubbornly silent.
— But this is no longer masculine … Are you really afraid? ..
— What is there to be afraid of? I am in the sixth, my name is Vovka.
— And we are in the seventh … He is also Vovka, and I am Kolya.
— And I’m your director, Mikhail Petrovich …
The next morning I went to school … The building was empty, uncomfortable. My mood dropped completely when in several places on the walls, still smelling of fresh paint, I saw vulgar inscriptions.
From below came the loud voices of children and the noisy clatter of feet. I looked at my watch: it was already about eight. My heart raced with excitement as the school day began.
Past me on the stairs swiftly swept, without stopping, jumping over several steps at once, two out of breath guys from about the XNUMXth or XNUMXth grade.
«A-ah-ah-ah!» — a cry was heard from above, cutting the ears … “This is a victim …” flashed through my head. «We have to rescue.»
Quickly getting up, I saw how a high school student with a slight smile on a round, high-cheeked face energetically “released shalobans” to a teenager lying on the floor and squeezed between his knees, who, either from pain or fooling around, yelled his shrill “aaa” .
— Get up? I said forcefully and firmly.
— What did we do? — the guy muttered, rising from the floor and releasing his «victim». — We are playing … You see, he does not cry.
— What is the meaning of the game? Hitting each other in turn and yelling with all your might in a wild voice?!
“Headmaster…” someone said in a whisper from behind.
I turned around… A couple of steps away from us stood a group of guys, about eight or ten people, in pioneer ties. “Who knows me? — I thought… — Ah, old acquaintances. These are the same as yesterday… Vovka and Kolya… My work somehow starts badly: solid remarks… Not good…”
“Good morning,” I said out loud.
— Good morning? Hello? The boys answered awkwardly.
Vovka and Kolya smiled, as if they were saying: “Nothing, nothing, don’t be discouraged, we’ll help.” The rest of the faces were serious, curiosity and distrust literally stuck out of their eyes. “Who are you?”
Ruler. The working conditions in each school are much more specific than typical: its own unique environment, its own, unique features. Each school, its life is unique, as each child studying in it is unique! Numerous examples confirm this when a teacher who works successfully in one school barely copes in another. Previous experience is not enough when it saves. In general, before Yasnye Dawns, I didn’t have a chance to work in a general education school, which, unlike a special school, should teach not those selected by competition, but all students. The first year at Yasnye Zori was therefore an adaptive year for me. A lot was new, unusual, often incomprehensible. What was read in books on pedagogy served only as a basis for comparison, but rarely as a guide to action. More often I had to rely on life experience, on intuition, on my ideas about how to act in each specific case …
In the first days at the Yasnozorenskaya school, I was struck by the nervousness and tension in the relations of the students. Shouts, screams, hustle and bustle, endless wrestling in jest and in earnest on a dirty, trampled floor, frequent outbursts of violent fights — all this was called «change». And this happened mainly due to the fact that the Yasnozorenskaya school was as if cobbled together from various recently closed small schools. The school did not have a team in the true sense of the word. It consisted of scattered groups of students from ten villages. Schoolchildren from one village strove to preserve the customs of their former school, and were deliberately hostile towards others.
The guys did not talk about each other, for example, “these are fifth-graders” or “these are tenth-graders”, but they always emphasized: “these are Rivne” (village of Rovenek) or “these are Yasnye Zori” (village of Yasnye Zori). So the school was divided into “Rovents”, “Yasnozorents”, “Cheremoshans” (village Cheremoshnoye), “Soltykovtsy” (village Soltykovo), “Ustyan” (village Ustyanka). “Lozovites” (village Lozovoe), “bochkovtsy” (village Bochkovka), “solntsevtsy” (village Solntsevka), “nechaevtsy” (village Nechaevka), “Vergilevtsy” (village Vergilevka).
Once, an excited attendant came running into my office.
— Mikhail Petrovich! There is such a thing!.. There is such a fight!!! There’s nothing we can do… Let’s go to the third one…
On the third floor, where I hurriedly went up with the attendant, there was a real fistfight, about 10-15 people in total took part in it, who violently beat each other. But then someone saw me. «Director, boys, director!» — electric shock in the crowd.
— Guys? I began, barely hiding my excitement. I am convinced that you have the moral right to defend your human dignity. But a fight is the most extreme, you hear, the most extreme means of protecting the good, the beautiful in a person. Each such battle for the sake of Beauty on Earth, you hear, for the sake of Beauty on Earth, strengthens courage, steadfastness, courage in a person. We talk about this with pride: a real man! But if a guy mindlessly and blindly swings his fists for fun, hits to humiliate, to hurt, whatever the power of his bones and muscles, he is not a man, he is just a male. With every shameful “fight” like this one, so easily reminiscent of cock fuss, the guy loses the man in himself …
As I said this, I saw how serious the eyes of the guys became, many of whom, it seemed to me, accepted every word that was said. But the next day there was another fight.
My words about male dignity, if they had an effect, then not for long, and I decided that it was necessary to “hit” the fighters more powerfully. But how? “It is necessary to hold a general school line,” experienced teachers who “ate” more than one pood of salt during their pedagogical work prompted me. — And there put the most pugnacious and cut them in such a way that it would be disrespectful to others. At the same time, we will expose the losers in a week. And you also need to call the parents so that they, for their part, influence … «» And what? I thought. — It’s a valid suggestion. I recalled the meetings of A. S. Makarenko, when they led the offender into a circle and gave him «on the first day.»
… I will remember that line for a long time — the first and last line in my life, which I spent with the aim of «warming up on the first day.» I wrote “I will remember”, but this does not mean that I see it in all details, rather, I don’t see it at all. But I remember the feeling of shame and guilt in front of those whom I “put out” … I remember very clearly the eyes of Vasily Smagin * (* Surname changed) he, as I found out later, after another brawl, gathered the guys for a small “meeting”, where they all together decided to finish «jungle»), surprised, they ask me a question: «Why so?» In front of the hushed school, with bowed heads, the guys came out. I struggled to understand what they were experiencing at that moment. And then I remembered myself when I was taken out like this in front of the ranks, when I heard almost nothing from the speeches of the accusers, only my inner voice: “Why do you need all this? Humiliate, inflict pain?!.. Well, wait a minute…” And I took revenge for a long time, as best I could, absurdly, childishly…
They began to read the list of losers. The girls of the tenth, filled with paint of shame, go out of the general system. Here is Vera Semernina (surnames have been changed). She has a sister in the third grade, with whom she replaced her dead mother and who is now in all eyes …
— Enough! Enough… Everyone is free…” I said in a suddenly sagging voice.
The «line» unexpectedly ended for everyone. Students walked past me. But things didn’t work out the way they always did. There was no usual noise and hustle. I had been working at the school for several months, but it was on that day that I first felt what a responsibility it was to be a principal. Maybe that day, that inexplicable feeling of kinship with the guys began to appear in me, which later will help to notice the slightest changes in their mood, arm me with the ability to look at everything through their eyes …
— Luda! I stopped Vera Semernina’s sister. — You, Lyuda, don’t think badly about Vera. An error has now occurred. Well done to you… — Lyuda’s classmates approached us. And I said louder so that they could hear: — We are proud of your sister. She is a real person. And now there’s an error…
After this line, a frank, difficult and very important conversation with teachers took place about a person, his dignity, responsibility of a teacher, mutual understanding: teachers and pupils, which is so necessary for creating a team. Seeing a student as a person and helping him to realize himself as a person — this principle has become one of the main principles in our work.
It may seem paradoxical, but the failure in the first line significantly strengthened my authority among students. The guys were no longer so closed, wary, as in the first days. Increasingly, I began to catch glances in which there was benevolent interest.
I finally believed that changes had come when, shortly after the line, a group of tenth graders came to me to … consult. They said so: «We have come to consult with you.» Since then, when, entering the classroom, I said: «Guys, your advice is very necessary,» I have not seen puzzled looks in which incredulous: «You are playing with us.» We started thinking, deciding, working together. We have learned to be a team.
Male conversation
This was at the end of January 1975. I learned that high school students bring alcohol to school and drink it during breaks. At first I didn’t believe it. “It can’t be that they drank, and even at school …” I thought. — Can not be». But one day, our «technician» Nina Petrovna Timokhina brought physical evidence to my office — two bottles with a sticker «Apple». “Here, look, I found it in the boys’ toilet,” she said.
What to do? What to do to stop this suicide? Or maybe only a few, some two people drink? So what, what are two? These are two lives, two destinies, two, perhaps already irreversibly crippled brains. But who are they? How to find them? I decided to talk to the guys of VIII — X grades. After the lessons, all the guys of these classes gathered in the assembly hall of the school.
“Guys, raise your hand, who has already drunk wine or vodka at least once,” I began directly.
There was silence in the hall. Only a whisper was heard somewhere in the corner. One hand went up…two…three…six…ten…fifteen… I stood as if paralyzed. Almost everyone raised their hands.
— It’s true? — I almost whispered … — And … how often do you drink?
— Yes, we do not often … on holidays, well, there, when someone has a birthday … — Tolya Lunev, a student of grade VIII, answered for everyone.
“Well, you’re more often kissing,” someone shouted cheerfully from behind, and his cry was drowned in a friendly outburst of laughter.
I got cold inside. I suddenly felt helpless, weak, naive and ridiculous. It was not the eyes of guilty people who had made a terrible mistake that looked at me. The eyes of the guys were innocently cheerful, as if the conversation was about something innocent, trifling …
“This is what it means to go out without preparation. You rushed again. But what to do, what to do?
Feeling that I could not say a single word, I was silent, realizing that it was stupid to stand in front of the audience like this and be silent … “What to talk about? About what to drink is harmful? You know that. What words to stir up the consciousness of the misfortune that has happened, the understanding of the indescribable harm, the murderous effect of alcohol on your brain, mind, “future? How to explain that the use of alcohol, generally an ugly, destructive phenomenon even among adults, is hundreds of thousands of times more harmful for a growing, developing organism? How can I express the feeling of anxiety and protest that overwhelms me? With such an attitude towards drinking, you turn your studies at school into nonsense, your childhood into stupidity, yourself into a cripple … ”And suddenly I realized that there had been silence in the hall for a long time and dozens of pairs of eyes were looking at me attentively. But these were no longer those cheerful, carefree eyes. They were eyes ready to listen, ready to understand, or rather, understanding eyes …
“When you were fighting each other during breaks,” I began firmly and slowly, “I condemned you, condemned you and will continue to condemn you with all the strength of my soul. I fought and will fight against this… Because the violence of a person against a person is unacceptable… When you do not learn a lesson. go to school, go, having prepared just in case an excuse, a lie, so as not to get a deuce, I condemned and will condemn you for this, because a lie has always been the daughter of cowardice, because there is nothing more disgusting for a man than cowardice and lies. But I condemn infinitely more those of you who are already addicted to wine or vodka, who consider drinking a glass or two as innocent fun or, out of the wildest stupidity. a way to grow up… No, I don’t judge, I despise the calmness in you when you see a peer drinking alcohol and don’t stop him… You betray him, you kill life in him, because with every drop of alcohol he poisons his brain, mind. You, who flaunt your drink, are the killers of your future. And I don’t feel sorry for you, I hate this bravado in you, because you deprive yourself, because you deprive yourself of strength — male, human strength, because you are leaving, shamefully leaving the struggle. For what kind of wimp is a wrestler?! — I stopped talking … once again looked around the room. Nobody lowered their eyes. The still anxious, stern and understanding eyes of the boys looked at me without blinking.
“Think about it,” I said again. — And take, each according to his own conscience, his position …
The teenagers left the hall in silence, as if reluctantly. The faces were thoughtful…
What were you talking about with them? their classmates asked me in the corridor. — Some of them went wrong. Gloomy, angry, do not speak …
“We had a male conversation,” I answered, and suddenly I thought that there had not been a conversation. “But why do I get the impression that we talked? I thought as I sat in my office. Was there two-way communication?
Mathematics teacher Zoya Gavrilovna Grayvoronskaya came into the office: “Have mine done something?” And seeing my bewilderment, she explained: “They came to the class (we agreed to work out after school) gloomy, sat down, took out notebooks and were silent. I see: something happened … I ask: “Have you done something?” They are silent … “Will we study today?” They are silent. Then Lunev got up and said: “Let’s move the additional ones to tomorrow, today is somehow not right … We had a serious conversation …” — “Have you been to the director?” — “No, they gathered all the guys … It’s just … there was a male conversation …”
— Did he say so?
— Yes, but … And what made you so happy?
— So the conversation, you understand, the conversation still took place !!
«What, you weren’t there?» asked Zoya Gavrilovna in bewilderment.
— There was … But I was not sure if the conversation took place …
Left alone, I again began to remember everything that was in the hall. I remembered how I asked a question, how the guys laughed heartily after someone’s remark to Lunev. When did the break come? The turning point came before my words. Yes, yes, I didn’t say anything yet, but the guys’ eyes were already focused, serious. I remembered their faces filled with intense attention, when I, feeling a sudden silence, looked into the hall …
This means that our conversation began even when not a single word was said. The guys first saw my attitude to what was happening, felt my thoughts, and only then heard. My words were only an addition to the conversation that had already taken place …
breakdown
I will not hide: I thought for a long time whether to write or not to write about that case. And yet I decided: I must write. To make tomorrow better than yesterday…
— What happened to you? Who hurt you? — I ask Tatyana Vasilyeva, a student of the XNUMXth grade, trembling all over from loud sobs.
But Tanya, covering her face wet with tears with one hand, and the blouse torn on her shoulder with the other, shakes her head negatively …
Are you supposed to be in class right now? Did it happen in class?
Still not saying a word, the girl just lowered her head even lower. In her trembling thin shoulders, in her whole hunched figure, as if crushed by an invisible heavy load, there is screaming despair, resentment and hopelessness …
— Were you beaten?
Tanya opened her face for a moment, trying to say something, but she could not, again choking on sobs.
— Did it just happen?
The girl nodded her head…
So, in class…
Lost in conjecture, not completely believing that in our school, and even in the lesson, someone could hit the girl, hoping that maybe I misunderstood something, exaggerating, I opened the classroom door, where Vasilyeva studied …
“Sorry to rush into the lesson,” I said to the rising graduates, who obviously tried not to look me in the eye, “but …
And then I saw that Oleg Senichkin was sitting on the back desk, lounging, stretching his legs far into the aisle. A contemptuous smirk spread across his red face. In narrowed eyes — a challenge.
— Senichkin! Are you tired?
“But I didn’t give a damn about … your speeches …” he drawled, defiantly brazenly uttered …
Looking at his strong tattooed hands, for some reason I remembered my first day at school, those shaggy ones …
“So what happened here anyway?” I turned to the class and asked gloomily.
“Yes, there was one x-brave one here …” Senichkin gritted through his teeth, cheekily and loudly, glancing triumphantly at the class. — She was, but she got it … for an excess of social activity.
— So this is … you-s-s! — refusing to understand and believe the cynicism of the tenth grader, I drawled. It was as if a whirlwind had boiled up inside of me. I quickly approached Senichkin, firmly squeezing his shoulder, which jerked towards him, sharply turned to the class …
— And you allowed … — I hardly picked up words from the anger that overwhelmed me … — And you allowed a healthy kid to beat a girl before your eyes ?! What does it mean?! Guys! Before your eyes, a person, a girl is beaten, but you are calm … you didn’t throw this one out … out of the classroom, didn’t stop, didn’t stop this dishonor, this shame ?!
Senichkin jumped out from behind the desk. His eyes were filled with blood, there was something alien, evil, cruel in them.
«Short — from below» — like lightning struck in the brain. Everything else was done automatically… When I approached Senichkin, who was sitting on the floor next to the teacher’s desk, he quietly but distinctly said: «Now it’s clear, dad…» Suddenly, light blue eyes looked at me. I even wanted to look around: maybe this is not Senichkin? ..
“To the office,” I threw curtly, “there… Tanya. This is very important for you, for her, for everyone …
— I understand … No need for too much. I understood everything, thanks … dad, — Oleg said, emphasizing the word «dad», and left the class …
Feeling suddenly tired, I sat down in an empty seat at the first desk. It was hard on my heart.
“In a few months you will receive a document on secondary education, it is not by chance that they call it a matriculation certificate,” I said, as if thinking aloud. — It reflects your progress in the study of sciences … Unfortunately, in a number of disciplines there is no one, the most important one — how to become a person. Apparently, this is due to the fact that in this subject we do not stop taking exams for a minute throughout our lives. Throughout your life… Everything that happened in your class should not be repeated. I ask you to make the most thorough analysis of what happened. Strictly ask each actor. — I put pressure on the word «everyone». — Please let me know the solution…
Opening the office door, I saw Oleg and Tanya.
— Well? Are you talking? I asked absently.
— Mikhail Petrovich! I already told Tanya. What words can there be … Now this is for life … Tan! Mikhail Petrovich! I’m ashamed of myself… I… if you only knew… — Oleg’s eyes sparkled with tears… — Don’t, Oleg… — Tanya touched his arm. “I forgave you…
“Go, they are waiting for you in the classroom…” I interrupted Tanya. — Oleg, come to me … the day after tomorrow, after school …
They went out. How interesting is the human being!
She tells him: «I forgave …» This is because of kindness, from the indestructible human desire for good to another.
She told him: “I forgive you,” but what happened will enter her life for a long time and every time it will respond with pain when what she experienced suddenly pops up in her memory … But won’t Oleg’s deed remain an unhealed wound in his heart? .. How to redeem him now? How to smooth out the pain caused to another? If it were possible for a person, as in a movie, to reshoot an unsuccessful shot of his life as an unsuccessful test. Man creates life once. Nothing in it can be repeated, corrected, changed, no matter how you change, correct, return your deed, teacher … You, probably, have already prepared an accusation for me? No need… I myself, no matter how much time passes, I will blame myself for this unforgivable mistake. I also blamed myself when the tenth graders, knowing how I evaluate my actions, came to the office to say: “You did the right thing …”, I blamed myself when I read a letter from foreman Senichkin two years later: “… Most of all I remember Your short but lifelong memorable lesson… then I realized that if you went to the point of setting yourself up for dismissal, not retreating, not reconciling, not making any agreements with my position, then your position is stronger than mine … I was then ready to sink into the ground with shame when I saw myself from the side with your eyes … «
How long I will work at school, I will blame myself for not being able to arouse a sense of shame in Senichkin in another way — I could not express my attitude to his act in a different way. And God forbid, if someone misunderstands me and uses the out-of-the-ordinary case described as an example to justify their cruelty… But I write about these non-standard, atypical cases because they helped to correctly see the starting point of the power of pedagogical influence, and this was of great importance for choosing the most effective ways of education in the future. After much reflection on each of the cases described, I came to the conclusion that an unexpected positive effect of my pedagogical failures is the conviction and sincerity of the reaction to what I consider disgusting in people and their actions.
If you don’t feel anger, but act it out, then there is no anger. If you yourself do not believe your words, how will the student believe in them? You can only pass on to a student what you yourself are filled with. Pedagogy does not exist outside the personality of the teacher. Ways to improve the student’s personality go through the improvement of the teacher himself. The statement: tell me who your teacher is, and I will tell you who you are, is just and right, just as the statement is right and right: tell me who you are, and I will tell you who your teacher is. And I also thought that our upbringing had become mostly verbal. Isn’t that the source of many of our troubles? Today we are in dire need of educational activities. As you know, in order to bring up responsibility, there is one means: to lay it on a person.