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St. Mary's School's dear retired teacher Mr. Giles Rebello then (left) and now (right) |
My teaching years were exceptionally happy and quite rewarding. Though I confess I was ‘bullied’ into the teaching fraternity by the late Archbishop A. Dyer (KD), I eventually became the fool ‘who came to scoff but remained to pray’.
What I offer here is NOT ADVICE to young teachers just embarked on their careers but a potpourri of pleasant reminiscences. Yet, if advice were sought, I offer them this brief bit of counsel; ‘GIVE UP! Otherwise you will only end up being a pain in the neck to your students or a torture to yourself…….. or both, If you are in the service only for the ‘cakes and ale’ you are not doing justice ….. you are a fraud!!
My forty teaching years have been a mixture of the bitter and the sweet; but the blend was a welcome cocktail of the genial gin of sweet success and the angustra of the bitter anguish.
In this happy Odyssey I was ‘aided and abetted’ by a colleague Kenneth Dyer, whom everyone called Kenny and whom some called ‘The Beast’.
We both realized that the perennial feud between teacher and taught was always there, and to break it we would have to invade enemy territory by joining the students in their games, their fun and their frolic. Sometimes [I confess- ‘mea maxima culpa’] we even originated the ‘larks’. Some Pestalotzical Principals might anathemise me for my educational techniques; but I really wouldn’t bother; the forty years were an adventure that I would want to live again. The narrations here are not offered for evaluation but for a friendly sharing on a rain-holiday.
The class teachers were obliged to accompany their students for what is called ‘Visual Instruction’, which consisted of ‘educational’ films, already gone stale ‘ad nauseam’ through the years. So, to beguile the forty minutes in the auditorium, we organized two student camps. At intervals, at a given signal one camp would yell and howl and wail like Red Indians on y the war path. Then silence – so thick you could almost slice it¡ Another signal and the other camp took over. In afternoon the Principal, who was partial to cat-naps, stole unnoticed into the darkHall to take about twenty winks of his quota. He must have been in his fifteenth wink when he was startled by the banshee-howling; he must have thought he was a member of the Spanish Guard and he was asleep and the Alcazar was being stormed¡ having regained his composure he rose to his full height of four feet eight inches, caught the nearest unsuspecting howler, gave him ‘one-two’ and made him kneel down; then stalked out of the hall like a conquering Cortez; he said no word of the incident to K.D. or me. We pacified our consciences by offering Peter the victim an ice-cream. ‘Forget it, sirs.’ Peter gallantly responded; ‘the raps were worth the fun we’ve had’. Some hard boiled pedagogical pundits might turn up their noses at a teacher’s complicity in such boyish pranks, but we didn’t care, for we were still boys in heart and soul.
Teaching English Literature, which included among others, such authors as Shakespeare, Dickens, Tennyson and Chesterton gave KD and me good scope to keep our students mentally alert and attentive. But, as a playful aside we also engaged them in the art of repartee and debate whenever the texts offered occasion. This was a great gamed and the scores between us and our students were fairly even.
KD was tackling a Shakespeare comedy that year. He gave the students ten minute assignment, an as critical as you can make it pen picture of a FOOL of their own imagination. A few attempts were read out until a ‘gem of purest ray serene’ was discovered; an utterly vitriolic caricature of a fool! KD duly praised the student for his imagination but gave this admonition, ‘the next time you meet your fool you must apologize to him.’ ‘Yes sir,’ said Mansur and sat down. A few seconds later Mansur got up with a precise, ‘I am very sorry, Sir’ KD took the hint. He straightened up; he stalked towards Mansur, he stretched out his hand. Perfect silence in class!! ‘I accept this apology Mansur, and….. Congratulations! I wish I could have originated a remark like yours!". A teacher of weaker caliber might have slapped the student for his insolence and killed his genius in one fell stroke; today Mansur is a Professor at the Oxford University. We realized that some students may be as clever as, if no cleverer than, we; and, if we didn’t give them that credit for their wit and wisdom, we would not be doing them justice. I believe that one was to win a student over is to let him score over you, unlike some of my tribe who are like Shakespeare’s ‘I am Sir Oracle, and when I open my lips let no dog bark’. If I sometimes confiscated a toy or a comic-book I heard hushed whispers loud enough and meant for me, ’second childhood’, ‘for his grandchildren’, ‘hang them on his Christmas tree’ or ‘you will never grow old’ [hummed in Nat King Cole’s style]. Even as I write this I smile and relish the memory that my students were alert, attentive and quick….and they could trust me.
On the other hand i gave them as much as i got. I was assessing the examinations answer papers. In one of them, scrawled on the last page in block capitals was “Please pass me sir GOD bless you”. On assessment the student had secured 54%. When the student got his answer script back he was enraged at being cheated of fourteen marks. I said in defense: “You requested me to pass you and granted your request”. Of course, I finally gave the student proper credit…. but i enjoyed giving him a fright.
This time I was at the receiving end. I sent a student to a nearby store requesting him to buy me half a packet of Charminar cigarettes. He was a long time coming but when he did and handed me the cigarettes I understood the reason for his delay. He had neatly cut up the packet and made an exact half-packet in which he had arranged ten half cigarettes! When I complained about his having wasted some of the smoking value of the cigarettes he replied, “If you had said five cigarettes” it would have been a different matter, Sir”. How right he was and i knew i was beaten.
KD once got it back in a similar fashion. HShakespeare Paper had this rubric at it’s hear: Answer Questions I & II and any three other questions. One daring student answered the two compulsory questions; then he went to write three other questions of his own and answered there. KD, always meticulous about details, (including courtesy and justice to students) knew he had blundered: the rubric should have read: Answer Questions I & II and any three of the remaining questions. The student was given credit for his full answer paper! With such magnanimity KD found it easy to win over his students.
The students often showed ingenuity and were rewarded even in smaller matters. The question “How may knocks on the knuckles?” was once answered pat ‘None, Sir.” And the boy was spared; or KD’s question ;’On which day will you come for your lunch-recess detention:” got this reply, ‘On Christmas Day, Sir,’ and with a big smile and a smacking of the students’ lips.Our Shakespeare classes gave us the best opportunities for our brand of teaching and of fun. If a skeptic should wonder if our students learned anything at all we refer him to the Rseults Sheets c/o The University of Cambridge. The following might satisfy our skeptic.
One year the Shakespeare text was ‘Julius Caesar’. On the 15th March (the Ides, when Caesar was murdered) I thought I’d remind mu students of the historic anniversary. But I had under-rated my boys. As I entered the class I was stormed with a shower of paper darts, pellets and daggers; a host of deadly looking masked ‘conspirators’ shouted: ‘Down with Rebello! Tyranny is dead@ Proclaim it in the market-place! Fire! Burn! Kill!”. The blackboard was covered with gruesome murderous slogans all threatening death to me and proclaiming freedom to all and sundry….even from Simon of the School canteen!
But the Blue Riband for the Shakespeare series must be handed over to Isaac, who, through classroom lectures and the Elocution Competitions, had been exposed to plenty of the Startford Bard’s plays. We had been contemplating a little dramatization for that week but Isaac forestalled us. He came to class, late as usual. At the door he declaimed pompously, ‘All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances’. (Enter Isaac). Then Isaac paraphrased. ‘Dost thou not know Sir Toby, my dear Andrew? (Isaac brandishes a sticky hand in Teacher’s direction. Teacher stunned) Waddling drunkenly into the class Isaac flipped an ice-cream into the air and caught it deftly ‘A catch! A catch! (deep bite on the ice-cream). Then he parodied, ‘If ice-cream be the food of fun, eat on. (One more bite) Let me have more of it, (another bite). The Isaac glared at the students: ‘Isee you stand like greyhounds in the slips, straining on the start’. (Last bite. Smug smile on Isaac’s face). The ‘clown’ would have gone on and on with scenes of more Shakespeare’s plays ifthe school peon had not interrupted his excellent impromptu performance. Like a Macbeth, Isaac turned on the peon with: ‘Avaunt and quit my sight. Let the earth hide thee. Thy bones are marrowless….’ The peon took fright and fled, possibly thinking that the whole bunch, Teacher included,was loco!
I would have gone on and on like Isaac, but for our Editor. And for your patient sharing so far, I am much beholden to you!
- Article by Mr. Giles Rebello
Retired Teacher of St. Mary’s School (ICSE)
Reproduced from the School's Annual Magazine of 1989
