Moral education of Confucius teaching has shown a great success in one of the secondary schools in Japan, Edo-chuan Secondary School located in Ibaraki prefecture. The philosophy of Confucius education dates back to ancient Edo period which occupied a prominent position in the society of Japan. Though after the Meiji Japan modernized its country with Westernization idealism, the impact of Confucian culture can be seen everywhere.
Confucius
Confucius is a great teacher. He emphasizes that the moral principles, virtues should be the first lessons taught to children since they were small. The earliest the proper education is given to them, the earliest they are being taught to respect elders, respect brothers and sisters, respect wife and husband, respect the society and finally respect to the country as a whole. By adopting the correct moral teachings to the children, the elders will not have to face the fate of being dumped into an elderly home or left abandoned.
Nowadays, more and more children are having lots of social problems including fighting, crime, murdering, stealing and many of them left school at a very young age. Also, the statistic shows that cases of crimes are arising and at a worrying state. Many primary schools in Malaysia, Korea, Japan, Taiwan and China have started educating small children with the Confucius teachings. And the results from these teachings have successfully cultivated good practices and virtues among the young generations. I suggest other countries to start teaching the youngsters with these teachings as a guide towards a happy life. By doing this, the country will be in harmonization as the young generations respect and bow to the elderly and these old people do not have to face the misfortunate fate just as I described in How often Do We Think about Our Parents when they grow old as their children take good care of their welfare.
A child is reading Di Zi Gui
There are many teachings of Confucius, but here I would like to introduce Di Zi Gui as a fundamental teaching for the youngsters. This book was taught thousand of years ago. In ancient China, people felt that it was important that the child should be well-disciplined and moral conducts, otherwise a child would amount to nothing. By not knowing the dutiful to parents, elderly and teachers, a child would grow up not listening to or respecting anyone. Additionally, teachers are afraid to teach and discipline children because they are fearful of violating the children's legal rights and being sued by the parents.
It is sadly to say that the relationships among people, between siblings, parents and children, husbands and wives, and employers and employees are deteriorating. Parents do not act like parents, while children do not act like children. Thus, by reintroducing Di Zi Gui to the public, I hope that it will be regarded as a good parental guide book for all parents to teach and educate their children properly. This teaching is preferably to be started at a very young age. It is always the best period for a pregnant mother to read Di Zi Gui word by word slowly by repeating many times to her kid before delivering a child. Many have done this and found that the child is obedient to teach after being born. By doing so, the future generation will benefit with good conducts and our world will be at peace.
Di Zi Gui contains seven chapters. Every word of each sentence should be implemented; its fundamental teaching cannot be violated. Here are some of the essence teachings for each chapter:
Chapter 1: At home, be dutiful to my parents
- Response promptly and correctly when my parents call me
- Do things that parents instruct
- Obey and accept parents' scolding
- Keep my parents warm in the winter; keep my parents cool in the summer
Respect Thy Parents
- Greet my parents every morning to show them that I care
- Make sure parents rest well at night
- Tell my parents where I am going
- Go and see my parents after returning home, so that they will not worry about me
- Maintain a permanent place to stay and lead a routine life
- Avoid doing things that are wrong to do or unfair to another person
- Doing things that are irrational or illegal are being unfaithful to my parents
- Do not hide things though small as a secret from my parents as this will hurt my parents' feelings
- Keep doing things that will please my parents but keep away things that displease my parents
- Do not hurt my body as this will make my parents worried; and do not do things that make my parents feel ashamed
- Be dutiful to my loving parents or parents who hate me
- Urge parents with kind facial expression and a gentle voice when my parents do wrong
- Attempt to dissuade my parents when they are in good mood, or if necessary, followed by crying to make them understand. If they do not want to accept me but end up with whipping me, I will not hold a grudge against them
- I will taste the medicine first before serving it to my parents who are sick. I will stay by their bedside to care for them throughout the day and night
