To Teach and Learn

Winter vacations are good times. They give me moments where my time is not controlled by the bell. A time to be with my family, a time to set aside time and forget it doing things I love doing. But in the middle of forgetting the time I can’t forget that I don't get to do the one thing that I love doing: being back in school, teaching. So, here are some good reasons why I want to be back in school. Reasons: 1. For the Attention I can never ignore the tremendous attention I get from my students when I am in the classroom. I never lose my audience. It is one of the best reasons why I want to go back. 2. For Feeling Useful When I am in the classroom I feel useful. I feel useful to my young friends and myself. Almost every day I go home with a feel of “time well spent”, every day I teach and I learn. 3. For More Laughter I also realized after much contemplation that I get to laugh more when I am with my students. They have never failed to appreciate m...

I met many challenges, many I never anticipated as a teacher. But at the top of the list, without any doubt will be teaching how to write an argumentative essay. I had no idea but I had to teach it, it was totally frustrating and scary at that time. The English curriculum was new and so was I. But that was not the problem, the problem was no getting any help because most teachers were new to the curriculum and the orientation program missed the teachers at PHSS. The scariest situation for a new teacher is letting your guard down, in this case, mine was having no idea about the essay and hoping my students would not ask me about it every day. The teacher's guide (BHSEC English) didn't help because it doesn't have even the slightest diminutive tip/hint on the essay. The essays given for study in the textbook were confusing. And I cursed the damn essay/s and the people who wanted teachers to teach this essay. I later found out the curriculum specialist themselves (national)...

The Bhutanese have a superstition that certain women have negative spirits (cultural gender discrimination).  These bad spirits are called soendae. The soendae live within a person and thrive when they are able to make other people sick. The person who is the host has little knowledge of the negative spirit living within her. When a soendae has visited a person, that person becomes sick or sometimes even die if the remedies are not carried out in time. When one washes his or her body with a herb called tsoe (rubus), scratches appear on the part of the body that has been exposed to the soendae . In certain parts of Bhutan, it is also believed that the soendaes maneuver in the form of small flames, hopping and wiggling from place to place. And if one is brave enough to whack it with a stick, the host becomes sick the next day. Bruises appear from the beating received. It is also believed that soendaes have groups and they sit for meetings before they proceed wi...

Now that winter has come, I like the cold weather while teaching. The cold weather is my ally in the classroom. The cold keeps my students awake and active and it, in turn, keeps me energized. I tell my students that we draw our enthusiasm for the lesson from each other. Though teachers and students volley the lesson's mood and progress, the teacher has the maximum strike. If they look dead it sucks the energy out of me but if I am dead then there is no other ignition to light up the fire in the classroom. If I see my students cold and shivering but very alive, it gets me going. That is why the cold is good in the classroom because it eases my effort. It an oxymoronic idea to have the students feel cold and fire at the same time. So, the Cold creeps into my classroom and I welcome it. It sits on a chair and is with us. Some of the boys wrap their kabneys around their bare knees as the Cold comes and caresses them. The caressing is kind in a strange way. It doesn't have the w...

Students can go to amazing imaginative limits to create nicknames for teachers. They are sometimes arbitrary but sometimes quite logical. The word soera means gift in Dzongkha. Twelve years ago, I first heard the nickname Soera . I was a student then. It was a nickname for Lopen Gembo Tshering. Over the years his nickname has changed to shakam (dried meat) because of his lean physical stature. I am not sure whether the students today still know him as Lopen Soera but when I was a student many only knew him as Lopen Soera and not his real name. Like anyone with a nickname story, Lopen Soera also had his. Every time his students misbehaved in his class, he would smile and tell them to come and receive their soera . His old face would conjure a tired smile as he flexed the bamboo stick. His other soeras were also unique and became quite popular with the other teachers. During study hours if he caught you polishing your shoes or combing your hair and not studyin...

My annual school concert kickstarted yesterday and the hi-light of the show, for me, was the tapori dance. It was absolutely entertaining and the crowd loved it.  This morning I wondered about it and looked it up on Wiki. And this is what I found;  Tapori  literally translates into  vagabond  or rowdy in  Hindi . Street thugs in  Mumbai  were perhaps the most notable taporis. Their unique style of speaking Hindi was called tapori language. They also had a unique style of dressing, which they called as tapori style. Tapori culture though resented by many is widely imitated by many as humorous or comical. It has found acceptance in Bollywood  films including " Rangeela ", "Gol Mal", and " Chasme Buddoor ". [1]  They are the equivalent of  gangstas  in  Hollywood  films. The tapori dance is very fast and it has a Tollywood (South Indian) flair to it.  The taporis spice up the annual conce...