A teachers' day

Jayanthi Liyanage

Teachers care. Yes, they do, whether they be fluffy-haired, pince-nezed elderly ones, or, slick-coiffured, shapely-draped younger ones.

Little inane things they do can shoot up your morale.

My Botany teacher had an eye for colour. Bright saris she wore lit up our attention and in her words, stems branched and petals bloomed. Some girls were more attentive to her teaching than that of teachers who wore drab saris. I hope teachers will forgive me for being brash but I am just telling you how the psyche of schoolgirls worked in my time.

Teachers can do wonderful things to you.

When we were doing A/L Science, many girls skipped the English language lesson. When the teacher came to the class, a handful of yawning students was seen. She deployed a ruse a to get the girls back. Stopping language exercises, she started reading to us Shaw's Arms and the Man. One by one, the girls trickled in, and for days, we sat glued to our chairs, laughing at Raina's pretensions of higher love and intrigued by her transition from one army man to another.

My English teacher dared to detract from the syllabus to cope with the reality of our class.

When we were in O/Ls, my Sinhala language teacher chatted to us of drama, films and books before she began the lesson. She manoeuvred tickets for us to see stage plays.

I bought a ticket for the afternoon show of Navagattegama's Suba saha Y

z

Fifty years ago, debates on corporal punishment were unheard of. A searing wallop on hind quarters, or a painful rap on knuckles, brought a prankster to his senses. I am not saying that banning corporal punishment is bad. Life patterns change. Education practices advance. Better now, they say, as it is child-centred. Students work more, in and out of school. Teachers struggle to cover syllabuses.

Everyone is busy. Being busy makes one formal. Relationships distance. Numbers grow big. Individual attention is less. Interactions between males and females are more. All this evolves personal crisis. A teacher may not know of the tragedies of students. More students than we suspect must be praying, Teachers, please deliver us from personal crisis!

Students still offer betel leaves and worship teachers. I still get up if a former teacher comes near. Some laugh at me and say, "You are an adult now," but age does not change the respect you have for a person who sweated to improve your mind. Well, if not the mind, at least your good senses.

Teachers care. This day Sri Lanka honours its teachers, be kind to them and forgive their trespasses. What they draw from us and give back to us cannot be dismissed with a price tag.