Facebook discoveries

I created a facebook account just for the students.

I have since made some discoveries. Some are pleasant and some are quite ugly.

Some students have told me that a seemingly nice boy in the other class have tagged me as an 'alien'. When I asked the boy nicely about it, he denied it and I told the class that he didn't do it.

But when I saw it on facebook, everything became clear. He was the one who started requesting for me to be tagged as an 'alien' and when some girls commented that I would be very hurt if I saw it, he said,"Who cares about her getting hurt?"

I am surprised that many nice kids are not as nice as they appear to be.

It's such an irony that I told teachers that I liked that class even though they didn't know.

It didn't matter to me that they gave me lousy rating during the idiotic survey.

I feel that kids are kids.

But sometimes I feel that it's scary that these kids are already hypocrites at such a young age. They smile at you, obey your instructions, ask their friends to 'shut up lah, Mrs x wants to talk!' when they hate you.

I guess this is what you get when you are in a lousy workplace. Even kids are lousy.

I have a boy who loses everything I give him ie. worksheets, files, workbooks.

I thought of buying him the workbooks so that he could do them in class as he is from a poor background.

But I remember how ungrateful these kids can be.

A colleague I spoke to told me,"Don't bother to buy for them. They won't appreciate it. I bought 3 books for this girl, and she screamed at me."

It started when the girl claimed that she had no money to buy the books. My colleague subsequently bought 3 books for her. But one day, she saw that the girl had the money to buy English and Science books. She asked her,"Didn't you tell me you don't have money to buy books? But you have the money to buy English and Science books, yet no money to buy Maths books?"

The girl answered,"I told my mother you bought the books for me already, so no need to buy."

When my colleague explained to her that she bought the books only because the girl had claimed that she didn't have money, the girl screamed at her. From that day on, the girl rebelled against my colleague, doing everything to irate her. During Meet-the-parents day, she got her mother to complain about my colleague.

I have come to realise that some people deserve to be poor indeed. Their attitude says alot about how they come to become or remain in such a wretched state.

You try to be kind to them, you are being stupid. You're treated like an idiot. They take you for granted and think that you OUGHT TO do everything for them.

That's why I have decided that in the event that I need to buy books for this boy, I will make him pay me back, bit by bit if need be. Oh, by the way, this boy is the one who got me into trouble for saying that I taught him to lie.

I had not been able to get hold of the mother. I thought it unusual for a parent to be that unconcerned about her children's performance in school - her elder child failed his PSLE last year and is not doing well this year, her younger child is failing just about everything in school. And she didn't turn up for Meet-the-parent session.

The boy gave me numbers that didn't go through or had auto messages that stated unavailability on the receiver's end. I had had enough and went to the McDonald's outlet to look for the mother. I didn't even know what her name was. I went in and approached the counter staff,"I am a teacher from x school. I want to look for a student's mother who works here. She is a filipino. Her children's names are x and x."

The counter staff kindly rendered all possible information about the mother: her name, what time she works till, and where she works at after McDonald's.

I had to hunt the childcare centre she works at down as the information was invariably vague ie. a childcare centre near x school.

I asked around and a kid told me about a nearby childcare centre. I entered the place and asked for the mother.

Unfortunately, the mother didn't seem too concerned. She was more concerned about how I managed to find her.

I am just glad that I am getting out of here by the end of this year. It's insane trying to be kind at this place.