I still remember when I was in my secondary school, I have one
favourite teacher and she was my English teacher. Her name is Madam Yanti. But
she had been transferred to another school. So my classmates and I would be
getting a new teacher. It would be hard to take over Madam Yanti’s place. She
was thoroughly organized and he had the syllabus down to what she would teach
on each day, with all the key points on handouts. Plus, she was very caring and
patient person. She also often entertained us with her jokes. We all love her
and we would never forget her.
One week later, we
have been informed that we will get a new teacher to replace Madam Yanti’s
place. When she walked into the classroom, I heard a few girls giggling. Miss
Sarah, the new teacher and she looked very ordinary. In fact, she was rather
thin, short and young. Some of the girls commented that she did not wear
make-up at all. On her first day, Miss Sarah introduced herself briefly and
explained how she would approach teaching English Literature. She told us that
she wanted it to be a “living” subject because human life is complex and
wonderful. Indeed, we could all learn about life from the stories written by
great writers. She knew that many people do not like to learn literature
because it is bored. So she wanted us to
change our mind set about boring literature.
She also asked us to
write on a piece of paper a short description of what we each like and dislike,
and what we want our lives to be. I have no idea what actually she wanted to
do. When we handed it back to her, first of all I thought that this exercise
would end up like the others before. Usually, it would be forgotten by us as
well as by the teacher. But, she proved me wrong. Each time when she talked to
us outside the class, Miss Sarah seemed to remember the details we wrote and
showed concern about our interest and expectation of life. She tried to make a
conversation with us based on how what we have wrote before.
She told us to enjoy reading, we have to imagine that our mind is
like multi-dimensional television set. When we read, we do not realize that
actually we create pictures and images in our mind. If the book is the good
one, we can also feel the emotions that the characters in the book are going
through. Reading a book is an imaginative experience that cannot be duplicated
by any technology. Nowadays, people prefer to play with their gadget rather
than reading a book.
Miss Sarah would
often ask us to give our interpretations or views the overall of the book. She
always considered our opinions carefully and never used the word ‘wrong’, in
this kind of way, many of us lost our fear of literature. She is a very calm
and patient teacher. In fact, we enjoyed offering our views and we looked
forward to her interpretations which she explained in a clear manner.
Whenever we had covered the lessons and had some free moments
before the class ended, Miss Sarah would tell us about her study. She studied
in University Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM) and also worked as a teacher at Sekolah
Menengah Kebangsaan Bukit Damansara, Kuala Lumpur. Her journey of life had
taught her that there are many universal emotions and needs that unite people
all around the globe. That is why we can learn to enjoy literature written by a
writer of any race or from any period of history.
On the last day of class, Miss Sarah gave us a list of books which
we might want to read during the holidays. She promised to all of us that we
would enjoy reading them. Our class gave her a book “A Great Teacher.” We thanked
to her for making us enjoy and love to learn a subject which many of us had
considered dull or difficult.
What she said was true. That time, I was enjoyed reading the books.
Until now, reading has become my hobby. This hobby gave me a lot of advantages.
It is not often that we get a teacher, who not only teaches to prepare us well
for the examinations, but she is the person who also cares for us as
individuals and she was like my mom.
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