Monday 3 September 2012

Pulling children back from the brink

For some teachers, going beyond the call of duty for their pupils is part of the job
By Radha Basu, The Straits Times, 2 Sep 2012

A couple of nights every week, avid cyclist Chua Gim San pedals to housing blocks across Singapore, sometimes covering up to 15km each way. These trips, jokes the 41-year-old teacher, help him to exercise.

But they are really labours of love.

When his students play truant and parents say they are unable to help, Mr Chua turns up at their homes at night, just to "show my face" or to share a few quiet words.

He has not quite figured out why, but most of the absentees are back in class the next day.

The soft-spoken father of three boys teaches information technology at Assumption Pathway School, where children who fail the Primary School Leaving Examination or drop out of secondary school get a second chance to learn.

For many of his first-year students, soldiering on in a new school after crushing failure is daunting. So turning up for class is hard to do.

Apart from the night visits, Mr Chua is also known to arrive at students' homes before school to coax them from slumber - and to class.

His creative ways do not always work but he is not one to give up.

"They need to know that someone is there for them. That whatever their problems, someone really cares," he says.

Going beyond the call of duty, yet believing that they are just doing their job, unsung teachers like Mr Chua embody a credo Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong reaffirmed during his National Day Rally last weekend. Singapore's schools and teachers, Mr Lee said, will continue to look out not just for the bright and the brilliant - but for their weakest wards as well.

Mr Chua's self-imposed duties extend far beyond showing 13- and 14-year-olds the finer points of Photoshop and Microsoft Office.

In a school where many children come from poor or broken homes, with parents either absent or weighed down by multiple jobs, he has occasionally had to step in as a surrogate parent as well.

A few months ago, for instance, he and a colleague spent the night at a hospital after a runaway student, estranged from her parents, was abused by a boyfriend.

"It's heartbreaking to see a child waste potential," he says. "As a teacher, my first duty is to guard against that."

Like him, Miss Ow Yeong Wai Mang, 44, believes that building self-worth in weaker pupils is an important step in any teacher's journey.

She teaches English and mathematics to Primary 2 pupils at Henry Park Primary. And as head of the school's pupil development department, she takes a special interest in building character and confidence in children who are struggling in school.

In addition to her official duties, Miss Ow Yeong has served for years as a friend and mentor to scores of children with special needs and those from poor or broken homes.

She initiated the Good Children Rewards Programme where, once every year, every child receives a small gift - like a notebook or a pen - to reward his or her efforts.

Another brainchild is Heart to Heart, where every child in the school has a teacher as a mentor to turn to for advice - on anything from academic pressures to how to deal with peers.

With children who are struggling academically, Miss Ow Yeong says she is not there solely as a teacher, but also as a "friend who is worried about them and knows that they can have a bright future".

No wonder then, that many former pupils return on Teachers' Day each year to remember the past, share their hopes - and say thank you once more.

Kwek Yi Zhen, 17, was there on Friday, when schools held their celebrations as Teachers' Day falls on Sept 7 this year, during the term break.

A diffident girl who could not read even at the age of seven, Yi Zhen was frequently bullied in class and was struggling with her studies when Ms Ow Yeong took her under her wing.

She taught the girl to read, kept her company during recess and celebrated minor successes with gifts such as bright print-outs of the hibiscus, Yi Zhen's favourite flower, or a magnet in her favourite colour, yellow.

Her biggest gift, says Yi Zhen, was the "happy book" - a decorated notebook in which, on her teacher's instructions, she chronicled everything that made her smile.

"You keep the stuff you are happy about with you and you throw all the unhappy stuff away," she explains.

The philosophy "worked like a charm", says Yi Zhen. She sailed through primary and secondary school and is in junior college now.

Describing herself as a dyslexic who loves to read and write, Yi Zhen says of her friend and mentor of more than a decade: "She helped me become who I am today. I can never thank her enough for that. And I still keep all her little gifts."

Policymakers and politicians have long extolled the virtue of teachers. But opinions have often been divided about the exact worth of a teacher's toil.

Last December, economists from Harvard and Columbia universities in the United States published a landmark study citing what some regard as the strongest evidence yet that good teachers - those who have the ability to instil confidence and pull up test grades - are indeed key custodians of a nation's future.

The study, which tracked a million children from elementary school to adulthood, showed that students of these "high value-add teachers" are more likely to go to college, earn more and less likely to get pregnant as teenagers.

Overall, a good teacher can raise the lifetime earnings of a single class of students by more than US$250,000 (S$312,000), the study suggested.

As in America, committed teachers in Singapore too know that for children from poor homes especially, teachers offer the easiest route to a better life. But thinking out of the box is often important to tackle the challenges these children face.

Earlier this year, Mrs Faith Denning from Northlight School discovered that a student had eight siblings and, together with her parents and Grandma, lived in a flat filled with "termites, cat poop and trash bags". The family had only four beds for 12 members.

Shocked, the 37-year-old drama teacher rallied friends and raised around $15,000 online for the family. They bought furniture, and cleaned up and painted the flat. The action exemplified the can-do confidence that the school wants to inculcate in its own.

Why did she not apply for state aid?

"The girl is my student," said the teacher, who uses drama to build confidence in children. "Her mother was pregnant again, so their need was urgent. I had to first ask myself, what can I do to help?"

To Mrs Denning, Ms Ow Yeong, Mr Chua and all teachers trying to ensure that the potential of weak students is not dimmed by circumstance, Happy Teachers' Day!

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