A Teacher
About time for me to put up a second post. Though the year doesn’t seem to start well for me, got a fine for parking along a double yellow line and another fine for speeding all within one hour, never mind, I will still thank my God for everything.
I would like to share with my readers an incident that show why I am still a teacher. It had been for more than half a year since I stepped into a class as I was busy helping my school to make the big move to a new campus in 2010. Last week, I was told to help out as there was no lecturer available and when I step in, I gave a pep talk to the students graduating soon. I could once again feel the joy of talking to students. Just that 10 or 15 mins of talk gave me such joy as I began to exhort them to out in their best for their final lap of their studies and I could sense that they were absorbing it and were prepared to burst forth in their last race.
It was so joyful and this is the reason why I am a teacher. Just 2 days back, one of my colleagues was given a grade that he/she was not happy with and ‘blew up’. Commented that the students better don’t step on his/her toes and he/she is in a bad mood. To me, this should not be the way a teacher behaves. Students are there for us to “shape”, to guide, and to be a source of encouragement and not for us to vent our anger.
Worst still, today I read in My Paper a comment from a Poly undergrad and this is exactly what she wrote. “My first option would be to continue studying and get a degree. If that doesn’t work out, I don’t mind applying for a teaching job with the Ministry of Education” Huh, I got a shock. Just because you cannot further your study, so just go and teach. Hey, teaching is a passion and must be accompanied with compassion for our students. It is not something like, since I can’t get my choice and recession is here, I just join the teaching force.
Hopefully, our MOE will never employ such people. They will only “rot” the next generation. I hope my readers who intent to be a teacher, will never adopt such an attitude.
So, a very Happy Chinese New Year to all my readers!!!
I would like to share with my readers an incident that show why I am still a teacher. It had been for more than half a year since I stepped into a class as I was busy helping my school to make the big move to a new campus in 2010. Last week, I was told to help out as there was no lecturer available and when I step in, I gave a pep talk to the students graduating soon. I could once again feel the joy of talking to students. Just that 10 or 15 mins of talk gave me such joy as I began to exhort them to out in their best for their final lap of their studies and I could sense that they were absorbing it and were prepared to burst forth in their last race.
It was so joyful and this is the reason why I am a teacher. Just 2 days back, one of my colleagues was given a grade that he/she was not happy with and ‘blew up’. Commented that the students better don’t step on his/her toes and he/she is in a bad mood. To me, this should not be the way a teacher behaves. Students are there for us to “shape”, to guide, and to be a source of encouragement and not for us to vent our anger.
Worst still, today I read in My Paper a comment from a Poly undergrad and this is exactly what she wrote. “My first option would be to continue studying and get a degree. If that doesn’t work out, I don’t mind applying for a teaching job with the Ministry of Education” Huh, I got a shock. Just because you cannot further your study, so just go and teach. Hey, teaching is a passion and must be accompanied with compassion for our students. It is not something like, since I can’t get my choice and recession is here, I just join the teaching force.
Hopefully, our MOE will never employ such people. They will only “rot” the next generation. I hope my readers who intent to be a teacher, will never adopt such an attitude.
So, a very Happy Chinese New Year to all my readers!!!
posted by Sebastian Chu at 10:54 AM
