The education of a student matters especially when they become the next generation of teachers.
As a successful and outstanding teacher I pride myself on my
ability to forge, and maintain excellent relationships with my learners, as
well as my outstanding pastoral practice. I feel that I need to finally share
with the world the psychological anguish my primary teacher put me through (as
there are some teachers who are still out there, using and abusing their role)
I will take you back to my primary school days in the 90’s,
I had a teacher that was so feared by us children that even, fear itself was
scared of her. Back in the 90’s you would be surprised to know that the
blackboard was still king of the classroom, and there was only one computer in
the entire school. One of the perks of moving into the juniors was not only
getting a desk (and you could a poster on the inside lid) rather than tables,
and saying goodbye to the assortment of trays with our names taped across them,
to the fountain pen...oooh. The downside was the thought of being taught by
this teacher, to which I will keep her name anonymous and refer to her as Mrs
CB.
My first encounter with this particular teacher came as
early as year 3. At my primary school when we moved into the juniors we were
taught in classes where half of the class was one year group and the other half
was another year group; for example half of year 3 and half of year 4 were in
one class, and half of year 5, and half year of 6 in one class. The fear of
being in a class where half of the learners were as old as up to1 year older
was bad enough, and unfortunately I was bullied by a few learners from this
year group and the torture wouldn’t end there either. When I moved up to year 3
there were two teachers Ms CB, and Mrs R (again I keep the names anonymous) I
was so relieved when I found out I had got Mrs R because that meant I wasn’t
being taught by Mrs CB, until this point I hadn’t had any run-ins with Mrs CB,
PHEW. The only time we were placed with our own year group was for Maths and
D&T (Design and Technology) which for us unfortunate year 3’s was taught by
her.
One Maths session that I will never forget, because it
effected my confidence in Maths for the rest of my life was this one. We were
looking at long multiplication in this session, and we all had to take a turn
answering the problem on the blackboard. Today was NOT my lucky day. So, Mrs CB
called me up to the board, but before I was able to answer the question on the
board (which, by the way, I had no clue how to answer or where to begin) she
would ask us a question unrelated to the problem on the board or even Maths, and
my question was...
“Jim tell me, what is my name?”
I answered with “Mrs CB” to which she replied with,
“No, that’s not my name Jim, what is my name?”
At this point I was looking rather red in the cheeks with embarrassment and confusion, some learners were also quietly sniggering at me. So I repeated “Mrs CB.”
She continued “that’s not my name Jim.”
By this point I was crying in front of the class, as my futile attempt to stop my emotions had failed, I was humiliated, and felt so thick, I still couldn’t understand why she was tormenting me as I had answered her question twice, but she told me I was wrong, I continued to cry as the whole class laughed at me.
Mrs CB then addressed the class “My class 3CB, tell James what my name is!”
The whole class in unison said “Ms B!”
What I didn’t know was that Mrs CB had changed her name due to her divorce coming through, and she reverted back to her maiden name which began with a B hence Ms B. To add insult to injury she still continued to make me do the long multiplication, which of course I couldn’t do. She proceeded to keep me at the blackboard blankly looking at the problem whilst sobbing. The shame of having to walk through the entire class to get back to my desk which, was located at the back of the classroom, has never gone away. This was not the first time she was to shame me in front of the whole class, I wasn’t the only one though as I had this particular teacher for 3 years. Thanks to her I hated my primary school days and developed an intense fear of Maths, not just because of that incident but because her best teaching tactic was, if you didn’t understand, she would shout at you until you either, got it or cried, which happened to me quite a lot. The teachers at secondary school often wondered why I would never ask for help or say “I don’t understand” however, it was too late by then.
The silver lining in this cloud was that her bullying inspired me to be a teacher, because I never want anyone to ever have the experience I had. I would never make a learner cry for my own entertainment.
When we left at the end of year 6 Ms B was moved from year 6 to reception, god forbid what she did to those poor children as god knows how many kids lives she ruined at least mine was later on in my school life! I know she left the school within a year or 2. I wonder if the school knew how she tautened and humiliated her students. That I will never know.
Lastly she said I wouldn’t go far in life. This is my response nearly 20 years later...
I still managed to get some GCSE’s, a job to which I was
promoted to an Assistant Manager, and later a Branch Manager, I even got a few
A Levels on the way, which led me to my undergraduate degree where I obtained a
2:1 with honours where in my first week I sadly lost my sister, because she was
involved in a road traffic collision back in 2006 (she was 14 and I was 19). I
have later gone onto Produce TV, Act on professional stages across the West
Midlands, presented live TV to the UK & USA, written a book and completed a
level 7 qualification (PGCE in Further Education).
Ms CB, the bullies and death, I say to you in the most
professional way, “up yours,” you didn’t break me, and I achieved in life, no
thanks to you and your humiliation!
Kind regards,
The one who achieved!
