The Joy of Learning

For young parents or experienced parents alike, very often I saw them panics when they heard their cousins/neighbors/colleagues are sending their children for mental arithmetic, language enrichment, …, you name it.

They get even more panicky when they heard 4 years old Susan can read above his grade level or 5 years old Johnny can do multiplication. Do our children fare better? You may say the public examination results are getting more excellent each year.

As an educator that familiar with the system, I knew that the biggest lies the results tell us is: “Our children are doing better academically”. Ever heard of “curve fitting”? Or the university I worked at previously called it “adjusted score”.

It’s a statistical lie, the translation of the terms is: you decided how many children should pass, and how many children should get ‘A’s and then adjust the percentile accordingly, that means those who score 45% may get an A, and those who score 10% may pass !! Which is normally the case for subject like mathematics!

As a teacher who have run a preschool and a former university lecturer, I have seen too often unhappy children and young adults who have lost their joy of learning. They started to rebel when they were old enough to do so at 10-12 years old. Many got into drinking and drug problem when they leave home for university and end up in the drug rehab.

This is one of those days.

This morning, I was awoke by a student’s mum, she was asking impatiently “Where are you teacher? I am at your school, how come you are not here yet?”

My! Where am I? I were in my dreamland one second ago, before the telephone rang!

Apparently, she needed to drive her father in law to see a doctor early in the morning and decided to drop her kids early at 7.15 a.m.

Well, my regular school hours start at 9.00 a.m, but parents can drop their children at 8.20 a.m. Though I maybe there earlier some days, but it’s crazy to expect me to be there at 7.15 a.m without prior notice.

This evening, I was supposed to attend a bridal shower, my cousin is getting married tomorrow. My “Spell to Write and Read” class ended at 6 p.m. One of the mums didn’t come to pick up her kids until 45 minutes later. I had to rush like a mad person because my dad was coming over to pick me at 7 p.m. This mum actually had the cheek to call me later in the evening and questioned me how come she didn’t see me or another adult with her 10 and 12 years old when she picked them up. Yeah, I was trying to take a quick shower and refreshed myself before going for the party and she came.

I tried to remember “customers are always right”, else I would need a plasma tv mount  to hang her on the wall.