Role Modeling in Chinuch, Parenting, Politics, etc.

One of the most important things for a parent or a teacher to remember is that our students watch us. They scrutinize us. They study us. Whether we like it or not, it is so. Whether they know it or not, it is so.

They watch they way we speak, the way we daven, the way we interact with other teachers, with the secretary, etc. etc.

The Gemara recognizes this in a variety of places:

Students are told to learn only from a teacher who is pure (Moed Katan 17a)
Teachers must exercise care to refrain from a practice which others cannot correctly emulate. (Niddah 20a-b)
“Watching one's teacher increases one's sharpness” (Eruvin 13b)
By simply observing one’s teacher individual practices of the commandments can be learned. (Pesachim 100a)

We have a teacher in the school who does not own a car. He relies on carpools and hitchhikes (tremps) to get to school. Most of the time he comes to school late. Since his first responsibility is tefilla, most mornings he comes to tefilla late. He could explain to his students why he comes late and I think he has spoken to them about it. But the bottom line is this: if he comes late, why can’t they? Why us it so important to come on time to tefilla if my Rebbe comes late?

And they’re right.

In a somewhat-related issue, I saw this in the Jerusalem Post on May 18. It would be funny if it weren’t sad. Let’s not complain when our kids copy us!

Israel's pack-a-day smoking health minister, Ya'acov Ben-Yizri will present his Annual Report on Smoking - as required by law - to the public on May 31, the country's No-Smoking Day.
The event will not be marked by any special activities as it usually is, because of "cuts in the ministry's information budget," the ministry spokeswoman said on Wednesday.

The 78-year-old new minister said that he "is interested in the smoking cessation programs that the Health Ministry and the Israel Cancer Association offer. But at the same time, after decades of smoking, it is very difficult" for him to quit. Ben-Yizri's wife Hava said at the ceremony in which he was welcomed into office two weeks ago that she would be happy if he quit smoking.
Ben-Yizri, who has a nonagenarian mother, said he has been smoking a pack a day since he was 18. His only concession to good health is that, being a traditional Jew, he has never smoked on Shabbat. But he admitted that when Shabbat nears its conclusion, he feels the pangs of nicotine addiction.

The minister committed himself to avoid smoking when seen in public -although he has already been interviewed on TV while smoking in a car.

Ben-Yizri also said that since he works 15 or 16 hours a day as minister and is constantly in meetings where smoking is barred by
workplace laws, he has cut down his smoking by about half. Ben-Yizri said he "identifies" with the health message of the Health Ministry and the ICA that smoking is the world's primary preventible cause of death, "especially among young people."Fully 76 percent of the Israeli public do not smoke, but the ICA wants to minimize the smoking rate even further, as 10,000 Israelis die of smoking-related causes each year - about 2,000 of these are not smokers themselves but are exposed to second-hand smoke.

ICA spokeswoman Nava Inbar said that the association has received numerous complaints from citizens about the health minister's smoking. "I think that as a public figure and minister who recognizes the war against smoking as an integral part of health promotion, it's important that he serve as a personal example. No-Smoking Day is coming, and it would be a good time for him to quit," she suggested.
Health Ministry deputy director-general for information Yair Amikam said the minister promised "to seriously consider the possibility of quitting, and he will follow the existing techniques and may join one of them."