THE MOTHER OF ALL EXCUSES….WHO’S MANAGING WHOM

ALL THE WORLD’S A CLASSROOM

` Ask my mother….I swear I did my homework…. I put it right here’….. He then starts throwing things out of his bag and searching in the outside pockets for his exercise book…. Ask his mother?…. ….NO…OO…. I’m not going down that road again. I could almost guess what she would say….` Of course he did it…I saw him do it!’ Or when they were supposed to have studied something and when questioned…. they would appear to be thinking hard…. eyes rolled up to the ceiling….for divine inspiration….. and on receiving a berating from me….. they would drag their mothers along the very next day to bear testimony that they had indeed slaved for two hours over the vocabulary, spelling grammar etc…. ` Then why doesn’t he know it? ‘ I would ask. They would shrug their shoulders, raise their eyebrows and drawl out nonchalantly…..` Aftos einai paithi tou eikosi’ [He’s an A student at school ]…. And they would leave the rest….the insinuations…. unsaid…. throwing the ball in my court…..He’s brilliant at school and so why isn’t he learning anything from you?…..  So I stopped consulting their mothers….but with missionary zeal I hovered over my little charges, drummed things into their heads with repetition…. the mother of all learning….. and more repetition…. and sent them home to study it again, flinging a few threats in their direction as they scampered out of the classroom.

All this hounding and discipline was a throwback to my convent school days in Malaysia, of starched pinafores, white shirts, blancoed rubber shoes, marching in a straight line to our classes after assembly, using a ruler to draw straight lines, margins etc, using a sharpened pencil and a clean rubber, books with no dog eared corners and so on. There was no such thing as forgetting to bring your homework…..off to the corner you went and stood there with eyes lowered in shame while the rest of the class snickered. And to top it all, they marched you off to church at the end of each month……to confess your sins…..what sins? There were so many venial sins I had committed that I could never remember them……so I made some up……and committed more sins. I never wanted to be like the nuns or the teachers of my youth….and God knows I rebelled against it but…….John Locke did well to shake his hoary head from his tomb…..it can’t be erased. Once your ` tabula rasa ‘ has been written on, in your formative years…..it will inevitably rear its sniggering head. It didn’t quite appear when I taught at other schools….. when I appeared friendly and casual. But poke its head out it did…..when I ran a school of my own. I shamelessly threw child pedagogy and psychology out the window and whipped my little students up into little crusaders. The only thing I didn’t do was……send them off to confession.

It all started when I saw children of primary school age using ballpoint pens, leaking ink blobs and smudging and smearing and scribbling out mistakes and drawing lines free hand without a ruler. In exasperation, I clamped down on their free spirits by using a litany of convent school rules. The ballpoint pen was banished from the classroom, composition homework had to come back written neatly in pencil, mistakes rubbed off clean and titles underlined with a ruler…..and no exercise books with curly corners and……NO EXCUSES!!! So one day, I had set one of my classes, with ten year olds….a composition on how they had spent their weekend. The following lesson, I went around collecting their books….not a whimper of an excuse…..things were going swimmingly well and I was pleased….my hard work was finally paying off.

The next afternoon, before the lesson, I sat down comfortably with a red pen poised in my hand, to mark their work. They all started off, more or less the same way…….` Last weekend I went to my village…..’ I suppose it’s like saying….I went back to my hometown in most parts of the world. I found it quaint in the beginning……never having experienced village life……but got used to it. When I came to the fourth exercise book, I noticed the little stickers of cars pressed on it and I knew it was Anthony’s book. Anthony had joined the school that year. In the new school year during registration, his mother had stood before me with Anthony by her side, eyes downcast and arms hanging loosely by his sides. She was different from all the other mothers……` He’s hopeless at school…..I  sent him to two English schools and he hasn’t learnt a thing.’….. It was the kind of traditional honesty that I was comfortable with, such a welcome change…. I said I’d give it a try. Then she sent him out of the office and whispered to me in a low voice………. ` I know you’re very strict…..so maybe you can scare him.’….. So that was it…..I was the Wicked Witch Of The East, who resided in the nightmares of little children…. and in the daytime…. shadowed them, breathed down their backs and made them tremble and quiver into SUBMISSION….. So I opened Anthony’s exercise book, eager to see what he had written. The first thing that hit me was…..he had written in ink….with smudges and smears. I could hear my voice bellowing in my head….. Didn’t I say ONLY in PENCIL?….And it wasn’t even a composition…..It was an EXCUSE……a single line scratched out in wobbly letters…..` Techer my dog is eat my pensil. ‘

My disciplinary methods courted challenges. There was this day when I stepped out of the office and entered the corridor. I saw my C class rushing into the classroom…..the boys hooting and shouting and warning the others that…. ????? was coming….I couldn’t quite catch what they were calling me. It was clearly a source of great merriment….the girls were squealing and the boys roaring out with delight. At school, I remember how we gave all the teachers nicknames….. so why wouldn’t my little horrors honour me with one……what goes round comes round. I was curious but with an upbringing of not gracing rebellion with a response but with…..stoic silence….I exercised restraint….it will exhaust itself…. and peter out…. When I turned to write on the board, I heard them whispering and tittering. When I turned around to face them I could see their mouths full of laughter waiting to burst out. This went on for a couple of days with no signs of abating….I considered singling out one or two and forcing a confession out of them….But children have their own tribal rules that are unforgiving of snitches….So I soldiered on and…. one day they shouted it out a little too enthusiastically ……and I caught it midair…..Ahhh…..so that was what they were calling me….I needed a strategy…..I took measured steps hitting my heels hard on the floor, creating an atmosphere of impending terror…..I could hear them shrieking and tumbling into their seats…..and then ripples of giggles breaking out…. and just before I entered the classroom….. I heard them shushing each other and whispering in voices spiked with excitement….` She’s here! She’s here!…..????? is here!! ‘….. I walked in, stood in front of them, narrowed my eyes and said …..` Yes she’s here!…..CRUELLA DE VIL is here! ‘

I had broken the cardinal rule of silence and had stepped into the game. This round was mine…..but only for a brief period.

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4 Comments

  1. Convent school days: The nuns used to say, they were called by God. Becoming a nun was a calling & entering the Carmelite Order was a higher calling, the Carmelites dedicated themselves to a life of silent prayer. From then on my fervent prayer every night was,”dear God please, don’t call me. I would be miserable if you turned me into a nun & the Carmelite Order will surely see the end of me.

    1. 😂😂 Well your prayer was answered…you didn’t get called. And even if you did I wonder if they could have silenced you.