I am an educator at a primary school in Pietermaritzburg.
I teach English, EMS, LO and HSS to Grade 7 learners. A few years ago I had a learner in my class who was performing badly at school. He was not attentive in class and was always daydreaming. He was struggling to keep up to date with his work. Some educators and many learners called him ‘failure” or ‘stupid”. One day his mother came to see me and told me that she was fed up with him and that she was going to put him into a special school for slow learners.
I asked her to think carefully before she made a decision. I volunteered to help her son during break and after school. I believed that her son had more potential. I helped him to get all his work up to date. I photostated work that he had missed in the other learning areas at my own cost. Within a few weeks he was a changed person. When it came to examination time I helped him develop a study timetable. After the November examination I was overjoyed to see that he had performed better than the so-called intelligent learners. Furthermore, he had passed Grade 7.
His mother was so excited that she wrote to me expressing her gratitude. In my reply to her I warned her that she must never give up hope on her child. You see, all too often we are quick to label learners as ‘intelligent”, ‘stupid” or ‘failures”. Parents must make an effort to check their children’s work daily and spend quality time with them.
In this learner’s case, his parents were divorced. This had a psychological impact on him and he lost interest in life.
Furthermore his parents did not bother to ask him what he felt about the divorce.
Parents, please remember that when you bring a child into this world, it is your duty to nurture him/her.