BY KHADIJAH BAWAZEER When I was doing my undergraduate studies, my class had a funny French teacher and because she was funny, I found during a recent reunion that a lot of her students remembered her for her weirdness. She was the kind of a teacher who infuriated students or made students feel frustrated because most of us did not know what she wanted or what was in her mind. If you think that her demeanor was not important, it definitely was, particularly if you consider that she graded her students by making them guess what she was thinking of. In the reunion we all remembered the three guessing questions she once gave in an exam. The first question was, “What do we see first when we visit a friend?” and the second, “What do travelers do when the ship leaves the harbor?”The third was, “Guess what were the answers.” Many students had learned a lot of French vocabulary and sentence structure to be able to write a paragraph describing what they would see first when visiting a friend's house. The answer was a name sign and the door bell. Only one or two students gave the right answers. Many got zero, although most of us thought that our answers were acceptable. There were so many answers the students could think of but how would they know what was an acceptable answer or what was she thinking of? The answer to the second question was that the travelers would get a white handkerchief and wave it. Students who said that the passengers would wave to the people in the harbor to see goodbye were considered to have gotten the answer right. She explained the “right” answer in a very theatrical way. In retrospect, we laughed. However, when we were students many of us were frustrated and infuriated, particularly those who believed that they should have been given the full mark for using the right words and for their grammatically correct sentences. After all, it was a French class, not a subject in philosophy or whatever. Many students felt that she added insult to injury when she told us that she was very generous in giving grades and that those who got good grades should not be happy while those who got bad grades should not be sad. The girls in my class were flabbergasted. One girl, out of bewilderment and frustration, took her paper and a pencil to the teacher and asked her to cross out the grades if she got them out of her generosity. The teacher did not cross out the grades but the student did not get an A, although she was one of those who guessed the correct answers. That experience raised one question: What is the purpose of education? Students need clear thinking and great confidence to face the challenges of life. Many times, we undermine the purpose of education by being vague and by instilling fear and worry among students and people, instead of instilling calmness and trust. (The author can be reached at [email protected]) __
