An Unlimited Dosage of Patience

If you are planning or contemplating to embark on a teaching career and you don't have a leeway for consideration or over extended understanding, then forget about toying with the idea in the first place.

I have been actively involved in the teaching profession for quite a considerable stretch of time now, and here's one tip I can share with you-never talk down to students. With this revelation, I am more particular about the senior high students. They have their own minds and own protocols that I've needed to adjust to. Yes, once in a while, they would bend down to my rules. But that gesture always came with a bargain. I also commended them for their sweetness in unpredictable instances. Basically, I have been more entangled in private schools, more so Catholic schools-where students are primarily inculcated with "golden values." These so called values are interpreted as inevitable in a society where the matriarchal influence rules.

Truth be told, I have been very lucky to have handled obliging and well-bred students over the years. But there were also times when I was forced to manage students who were not only rebellious, but very demanding and unsympathetic. The following scenarios are just some couplets of my daily musings with these students who have taught me dearly the value of self-control but most important...the deluded word, PATIENCE.

SCENARIO A: This is a routine for me-assigning someone to lead the prayer for the day. And a stud would whine, "Ma'am, I can't do a personal prayer...can you call someone else?." Well, okay, I would assign another one...until 20 minutes has passed and the simple task has been passed on from one hesitant student to another.

SCENARIO B: I always remind my students that it is basic for them to carry ball pens. It's plain common sense so they won't have to bother their classmates later in quizzes or seat works. I have lost a bundle of ball pens in the past because some students forgot to bring their pens, have misplaced their pens, and so on. And mind you, they have had no courtesy to give me back my pens!

SCENARIO C: I try to lay down rules during exams and group activities as religiously as I can. So when I order, "Please get 1/4 sheet of paper," another student (who acts unmindful and deaf) would echo, "Ma'am, is it 1/2 sheet of paper?".

SCENARIO D: I do take care of my voice since I have lost it a couple of times in the past because of exhaustion and overworked situations. So I am very specific when I give a directive, "I will only repeat the question twice." Before I know it, I have repeated the question multiple times for incessant students. "Ma'am, again? what's number 3 again?."

SCENARIO E: This final scenario is the deed that can make me throw ire at the saints displayed around the campus. Many students are guilty of this-not turning their homework in on time. I cannot comprehended the majority of wild excuses-even preposterous ones-that digital students from the Millennial era would enlist just so they can be forgiven for late homework or overdue projects.

Maybe next time, I will share popular excuses that students often barricade themselves with whenever they fail to complete assigned tasks.