Educational Rant

(Warning: Long rant much akin to talking to myself)

To teachers:

"If you're not serious about teaching, then don't teach. Don't go and fuck up other people's lives."

Seriously speaking, do teachers even know the kind of impact they have on their students? They should, since they were students once. Then why is it we still hear so many fucked up stories about horror teachers?

If you tell a student "you should drop this subject", do you really think the student is going to want to keep it, even if its possible for him to manage a decent pass if he works hard?

Discouraging remarks have the most impact when it comes from teachers - not family, not friends.

My brother wants a future in sports science. But biology is his worst subject. And now, after constantly failing it, he's feeling so damn discouraged that he's willing to take the risk and let it go - hopefully still manage to wrestle something out in future.

I wonder if it's too much to ask that teachers act as a motivating factor in student's lives, giving them the appropriate advice that would take them as far as their potential can bring them.

I always thought that was the point of being a teacher. Am i wrong? Or is being a teacher simply being a facilitator, an instructor, a transmittor of knowledge. That's it?

My brother's teacher told the entire cohort, "if you all think you cannot cope, then my advice to you is to drop a subject." (probably not exact quote, but the gist).

Really lah, she's not the first to say it. I've heard it myself in RJ.. but its only now that I realise what a stupid, stupid thing it is to ever say to anyone.

Now, most JC kids don't know what they want to do with their lives, so maybe it doesn't make a difference if they take that subject or not. But my brother does.

And when he hears this from his teacher, he just loses his will to fight harder for the subject.

Okay, so blame my brother for having not enough will power - but I still think a teacher's job is to strengthen that will power, and not weaken it.

And ok, so she was directing it to the entire cohort, and not just him. Slip of tongue. Should've qualified it with "IF you don't need it in future" (but at 17, who the fuck nows right).

Even so, what kind of message are you sending out? "Give up as early as you can and save yourselves trouble." Whatever happened to "try your best" and "work harder" and "you can do it!"?

Forget about being practical, forget about pulling up the school's overall grades by making the weaker students drop subjects. These are people you're talking about, not stocks and shares.

Of course, students must ultimately be responsible for him/herself - but teachers, don't make it harder than it already is, right? I hold teachers just as responsible as parents for a kid - whether you like it or not, as a teacher, you DO have that much of an influence.

That's just my opinon anyway.


My memory sucks, as I've mentioned before, but I will never forget how my primary 6 Chinese teacher put me down in front of the whole class after I ran around screaming with joy at having just managed to scrape an A for a test. ( I always get C or fail)

"You think your score very good issit? It's not good ok? Stop making so much noise and sit down!" (in chinese)

I remember this more vividly than all the encouraging remarks I've heard throughout my academic life.

I don't mean to be mean to teachers.. just worried for my brother I guess. They're human too, and I think too often I expect them to be perfect when they aren't. But I'm so lucky to have had great teachers (still having 'em hehheh).

I remember RJ's geog teacher MS Law, because she never ever ever ever favoured students, even those who were obviously brighter and scoring all the As. Usually weaker students get more scolding, gets the sacarstic end of the stick, etc etc.. but Ms Law made sure we ALL got the sarcastic end of the stick haha. It really is strange to see teachers picking on or scolding bright students. It's just a rare sight.

I remember Mr Purvis saying during the very first lecture, "all you kids not from a Raffles school... I know how difficult it is for you guys." He made it clear, that just cos you were from RGS or RI didn't mean SQUAT to him.

I remember the MANY occasions Ms Bala tried encouraging me by saying something positive followed by a piece of advice. Like, "You've good ideas, but you need to expand them further". Which really, sounds much better than a plain old "your GP essay is not up to mark". Small things, but I somehow remember. Haha, you've no idea how good it feels to see a "Good" scribbled by you in the remarks column of an essay.

And Mrs Ow...the maths teacher, who NEVER ONCE scolded me for sleeping in class. I've slept through ENTIRE tutorials. Meaning, I woke up to see her come in, and woke up again to see her leave. I asked her why, and she said the best thing I'd ever heard in my school life. "Hiyah I know no need to scold you, cos I know you know you stuff, so let you sleep lor."

Like. Unbelievable stuff. I still slept lah, but at least i made sure I really DID know all my stuff first.

Sigh. I miss my teachers. And I hope my bro don't drop bio.


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Question:

If you dislike someone for disliking something, are you:

a) alright
b) just as bad as the other person
c) even worse than the other person?

For example, when I see people treat a tissue seller rudely, I get pissed off at them. But that means I'm making a moral judgement on them - and seriously, who the fuck am I to decide that I'm better off? In this scenario, I just end up being as bad as they are.

The only way out of this situation, as I can see it, is to really "let them be" and have as few opinions on people as possible.

Which makes me recall what Stanford said to Carrie in some SATC episode, "We all judge. That's our hobby. Some people do arts and crafts; we judge."

Ya, so after ranting on to gq about this topic on dislike and hate I come back to the same bloody conclusion all the time, that i'm no better than those that I dislike. Judging is judging, no matter how you slice it.

"Sigh, we humans are so imperfect."
"Don't tell me you've just realised that."