Dear Lord Heavenly father,

I have learned so much over the last three months.
And yet all this worldly wisdom
has failed to fill me up.
I still fill as empty as ever.
It is now that I realize that only your love and grace
can fill me up.

Work is good.
It does not only give me the money I need to look after myself,
It also gives me some form of distraction and purpose.
I find it enormously meaningful
To spend my time educating the young.
It is so much better than just focusing on my training alone,
having no regard to everyone else.

I feel that this job is really a noble one.
And I truly appreciate it.
I do not know how long I would last in this profession.
I feel that I am lacking grace and favour in this area.
And that is why people keep finding fault in me.
This is why I receive all kinds of mean comments.

Perhaps teaching is really not meant for me.
Maybe there is a better job out there for me.
Whatever it is, please give me a sign.
Bless me with the wisdom that I might know what to do.

I believe firmly that good leaders and bad leaders,
You created them both.
And you gave them both with power to govern your men.
Thus, I must respect these authority figures
and leave when my time is up.

Please bring me to a better place,
Where I can feel welcomed and at ease.
This stress is affecting my health.

I pray for your grace to be upon my school,
my students,
my family,
my training squad,
and me.
Please bless us all with your superabounding grace and favour.

All this I pray in Jesus's name,
Amen

I used to take everything very seriously. I was a perfectionist. I wanted everything perfect. But as I got older, I learned to take things more lightheartedly. For wisdom and God's grace has taught me that nothing earth really matters. As long as God is still God, we are luckiest and most blessed people on earth.

But my job - teacher has successfully instilled another voice in head. Teaching has this tendency to blow up every minor error. It makes every minor hiccup sound catastrophic. "DO YOU KNOW THE CONSEQUENCE OF THIS?" We are being taught how letting one child off the hook for a minor mistake can lead to a serious consequence.

I tried to live up to this expectation. But I just can not be perfect. And this has made me so stressed, I find it hard to do my job well. Everywhere I go, every student I see has a potential problem... Minor things like forgetting to go for a haircut... not tucking in their shirts... are all major problems... and if I ignore them, I will be condoning them and encouraging them. That will be my irresponsibility as a teacher.

I hate this voice of law drumming in my head... It is robbing me of my peace... Perhaps teaching is really not the job for me. I need a job that shouts grace grace!! A job where my patience and cheerful nature will be appreciated.. and not hated and despised as a form of negligence!!

Teaching

I used to think that the most important trait of a teacher is intelligence. You have to be an expert in the subject you are teaching in order to be a good teacher.

Now I know that I was wrong. To be a good teacher you need to be so much more than an expert in your subject. You need to:

1. Be willing to be hated (Remember that your job is not to make the students like you. It is to help them do well in their studies and grow up to be good people)
   
2. Develop a new face/personality (your face have to be in a permanent frown in class - otherwise, your students won't take you seriously)
3. Patience is important!! (But you must never let your students know that you are patient. You have to be the most unreasonable, demanding teacher you can be in order to discipline the students - the students must be so frightened of you that they are afraid of stepping out of line)
4. You got to be firm (if you cannot manage the class and get them to respect you enough to listen, no matter how good you are at a subject, you will never be able to teach them anything)
5. Students respond well to clear instructions. Even the naughtiest of kids love instructions. They need step to step instructions. Never give vague instructions. NEVER leave the kids without instructions. Even if you have nothing to say, make something up. They need to hear instructions.
6. Every child has this inner longing to be disciplined. It is only when you discipline them, that they know that you care about them.
7. Never lower your expectations to meet your students'. Pressure them to rise up to meet your expectations.
8. You must believe in your students and be willing to enforce discipline on them. If you do not discipline them and let them run around like monkeys. They will take that as their identity. Enforce the correct identity on them - good students. Pressure them to rise up to it.
9. Teachers get so much respect that they often don't deserve. Every personal small act of kindness is blown out of proportion. So value your words and take every opportunity to encourage and talk to the students individually.
   
10. If you put in your best effort and your heart into teaching, your students will feel it. This will inspire them to work harder themselves. Nothing is more encouraging then seeing someone who believes in you.

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I have been told that I am not teaching material and that I must face up to that humbly and accept that not everyone is born for teaching. Maybe they are right. There are some aspects to this profession that I just cannot stand. I cannot stand putting up an angry face all day. I can stand shouting all day long. And I can't stand getting all kinds of unconstructive criticism from people who have this solidified bad impression of me.

If teaching just involves teaching and helping the students. I would very confidently say that this is the job for me. Unfortunately, it is so much more than that. Above being a responsible teacher, you have to be able to make your superiors like you... You have to also do all kinds of backstage work like marking, setting of papers, planning events, organizing of equipment, CCA management....

MOE, if you are reading this... Please hire some people who specialize on all the additional work so that we teachers can focus on teaching... Anyone can do admin work. Anyone can invigilate. Why hire a graduate, who has been trained for years in her subject just to force her to do admin work? Why waste the energy and precious time of such talents teachers on such tedious, mundane tasks? Why not just hire an O level graduate to do those tasks so that the nurturing, patient and genuinely concerned teachers can focus on doing their job - teaching? They will also be more patient and kind to their students as they will be happier. Please do not waste the energy and talent of precious teachers by making them clerks and admin staff as well....