This Is Not The Congo

When I arrived in Nigeria to teach mathematics, I had only done two weeks of student teaching back in the States.  I was still wet behind the ears.

As a new teacher, I wondered how to maintain discipline in a Nigerian classroom.  However, when I started teaching, I found the Nigerian students to be polite and attentive. 

I forgot about my concern about discipline --- until the second month, when one class got a bit talkative.  I was about to ask for quiet, when a voice boomed out from the back of the classroom: “This is not the Congo!”  Immediate silence.

I pieced together what had happened.  In 1964, Nigeria had sent peacekeeping troops to the Congo, which was in the midst of civil unrest.  For Nigerians, the Congo became a symbol of chaos.  The mere mention of the Congo had shamed the class into silence.

There was something deeper going on.  I had not disciplined the class – the class had disciplined itself.  I had learned a lesson.

Many years later, when I was in the Army, I taught at the Fort Lewis School Command.  I recalled the lesson I had learned in Nigeria: a class should discipline itself.

I put a plan into action, with a little help from my brother, Richard Schneider, and from Quick Draw McGraw.  My brother had put a sponge-rubber ball on the end of a three-foot dowel, and called his invention: “The Kabonger”.  He named it in honor of El Kabong, who was Quick Draw McGraw’s alter ego: an awkward and inept superhero, who swings from a rope and bops evildoers on the head with his guitar. 

My brother used his Kabonger to playfully bop his kids on the head to remind them to calm down.

I scoured Fort Lewis and found a sponge-rubber ball and a three-foot dowel. I made a Kabonger, and took it to my class.  When a soldier acted up, I did not hit him.  Instead I gave the Kabonger to a soldier sitting next to him, and had that soldier bop the offender on the head.

It worked.  In fact, the Kabonger worked so well that soldiers in the class would recognize when someone was out of line and would ask me for the Kabonger.  They would then proceed to bop the offender over the head. 

The Army class was disciplining itself.  And, I, of course, would never get court marshaled for bopping a soldier over the head.

- . - .- . - . - . 

NOTE: Doug's best stories have been collected into a book: Puppy Out Of Breath.  Price = $11.  You can purchase a copy at  http://www.puppyoutofbreath.com