PUPIL: Mrs. XYX, my back hurts.
TEACHER: Why does your back hurt?
PUPIL: My dad beat me on my back with his belt, lifting his shirt for his teacher to see his back
TEACHER: 😮😰😨 @ the sight of the child's back.
Teacher inmediately brought the attention of the head teacher to what she had just seen.
Head teacher thereafter invites the parent for a conference.
HEAD TEACHER: Sir, we noticed several marks on your son's back and from enquiry, he told us you flogged him.
PARENT: (Responding confidently) Yes, I did. I asked him to write numbers 1 to 200 and he couldn't. How can a 4 years old not be able to write 1 to 200. My neighbor's daughter in xyz school, who is also 4 years old can write 1 to 500
HEAD TEACHER:😳
PARENT: Yes. In fact, my church member whose son is just 3 years old told me his child can write numbers 1 to 200 already. So, how come my own son who is already 4 years old cannot write ordinary 1 to 200. In fact, I don't understand what you are doing in this school, is it quantifying and identification of numbers that I am paying for. I have not brought my son to school to play with all those materials in your class, let him write, let him write😠
Yes, this is the reality of what pupils, teachers, school leaders and owners go through in the hands of many parents.
The enormous competition in the private education space in Nigeria has brought about so much unethical practices. In so much that schools give parents wrong impressions, building too high Expectations in them. Imagine a school promising that a 4 years old will learn to recite and write numbers 1 to 500🤷🏻♀.
What's the way out for us?
1) Set the right standard(set yourself apart and never join the bandwagon to do what is wrong)
2) Train and equip your teachers with the right knowledge. Many teachers don't even know what is right and what is wrong, hence, they cannot justify what they are doing when parents harass them or question their competence.
3) Get your teachers involved in curriculum development. Whatever curriculum you are running as a school, train your teachers on how to adopt it to your setting and use it.
4) Enlighten and train your parents. There's no point hoarding information from your parents, as a matter of fact, you need them to know so they can complement what you're doing. When your parents are equipped with the right information, they won't compare your child with children from schools where things are done wrongly.
Bugging our children with knowledge not relevant to their age is child abuse, beating them for not knowing what they have no business knowing makes it even worse.
Let's protect our children by enlightening ourselves.
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