I screensnipped this picture from Ara Adebisi Rukayat’s page after following the debate on the teacher who allegedly (na alleged o even when we dey see the proof) slapped his pupil. This video has caused a lot of uproar on social media and we bless Jah for social media, because even with our outrage, we all know that this has been going on since Lugard rode on the back of my ancestors to go and discover River Niger at Sintaku.
Wallahi bah, I had PTSD watching the video. It brought back painful memories of wild animals in human skins who had the misfortune of being made teachers. I remember one in LEA Primary School, Okeagi back then. Our morning ritual always go like this:-
Class prefect – All Stand!
We all obeyed and stood.
Class prefect – Greet!
Pupils: Good mooooooorning sir!
Teacher: Bad morning to you.
If I make this up make Amadioha strike me. Then he would go ahead to point at every pupil with maths questions. You will hear – ‘you, two times two’ and before you could gather yourself, he has moved to the next person with a different sum.
I pity the poor kid, but I also pity the teacher too because I think she needs a psychiatric evaluation and a revocation of her teaching license plus prosecution. Right now, she is a small problem – the bigger problem are the ones beyond the reach of video cameras? What percentage do you think they are?
We all knew the ritual, once you missed the equation, you had to stand. If you got it, you sat down. Once he’s gone round the class, he would start beating us that early monmon – three strokes of the cane or six each. Of course, almost all pupils would start the day weeping. Whatever he taught after that, nobody was in the right mood to listen or absorb it.
I thought that this type of behaviour has vanished with modernity. I remember parents who came to physically fight minders in church because their bad behaving kids were disciplined – not beaten. Anyway, that’s by the way.
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You see bah, teaching is a noble profession. I say so because I have had the fortune of teaching early in life. Those who attended Samadi International Nursery and Primary School in Kano in the 80s would bear me witness.
You see bah, before you can qualify to be a good teacher, you must understand a little bit of psychology and leave your religious mind outside the classroom. This is because we have teachers in 2024 who still think that southpaws are abnormal. They would do everything to change kids using their left hand because their chi had told them it is wrong. There are those who do not know the psychological composition of pupils – some kids are sanguine, some choleric; some have learning disabilities such as dyslexia etc.
If you went to a teacher training school (I didn’t) and you did not follow your psychology class or you did not pass them, it would be difficult to teach properly.
As a society, I think we should bring back the concept of having supervisors. When we had them, they came to check our teachers and sometimes interacted with us the pupils although we would dare not say anything bad about our teachers. Today, the classroom appears to have been left in the hands of psychos. It says a lot about the products that came out of our schools and why some of us hated certain subjects.
I was supposedly good in French and escaped the wickedness of our French teachers back then, but I wouldn’t say the same for some of my classmates who hated French because the teachers were simply wicked. Same goes for maths.
We will need to do a lot about our schools. If we are able to turn them around, even the society would be the better for it. I pity the poor kid, but I also pity the teacher too because I think she needs a psychiatric evaluation and a revocation of her teaching license plus prosecution. Right now, she is a small problem – the bigger problem are the ones beyond the reach of video cameras? What percentage do you think they are?
