Once our primary teacher of class 2 wrote eight parts of speech on the blackboard, and wanted us to note them down in our copies, which many of pupils couldn’t memorize and started beating with a wet whip.
Mansoor Mallah
Hailing from Bhiria Road, a town in district Naushehro Feroze, Sindh, I followed the legacy of my old siblings by studying in government schools, as our laborer father could hardly afford that. My parent’s struggle and wish was all that their children get education and grow as good people.
Although, we all reached to our goal, there are many things which have always kept me anxious and thinking about them. Among such things are the weird teaching techniques and methods, and far from the content needed for future.
Since my early classes, I noticed some naive and out of the question things that my primary teacher (who taught us all the classes in the primary school) told us to memorize. He once wrote eight parts of speech on the blackboard, and wanted us to note them down in our copies in class two, which many of pupils couldn’t memorize and he started beating us with a wet whip of the tree branch, usually named as ‘Mola Bux’ in schools. Another thing he taught us was ‘how to get one’s body purified’ (Taking Bath). Since then till now, I wonder what actually needed of teaching the method of body purification to a student of class two. And the terminology that he used was beyond our comprehension, or at least my comprehension. That was another way which became cause of my and many like me students’ beating.
By sharing this experience, I don’t mean that authorities concerned should take action against the teacher or constitute a committee to investigate the teaching methodology of that teacher neither I criticize a teacher and his way of teaching. I just want to highlight one of those the most watershed flaws in our education system, which have kept our education system with mediocre results.
I wonder that in our country where it is thought necessary to train a police constable or soldier three to six months, there we see government reluctant to spend over teachers’ training and on their capacity building. While people in power even on national level do understand that the real security and sustainability of the nation/country can only be insured with proper teacher training, but instead of this fact they don’t focus on training of teaching staff.
This is one side of government schools, where there are teachers, sort of which I have mentioned above, while on the other, there were and are the teachers who are and were facilitators in true sense, and who made us think out of the box and brought us near to books other than our curriculum/text books.
Although, incumbent government is struggling with the challenges in the recruitment of the teachers, but the problem of teachers’ training remains unsolved and ignored altogether. In such a scenario, one can only ‘hope’ for better future prospects of Sindh education.
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Mansoor Mallah is based in Bhiria Road, Naushehro Feroze, Sindh
