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And the antecedent night was one monopolised by Dave Chappelle’ comedy classic, the closer.
Consequently, the night thereafter was of finger-twiddling boredom, for which our resident Dave Chappelle was sought to ameliorate tedium. And certainly not one to disappoint, readied was an installment of laughable caption; “Manickchand discusses with teachers ways to improve NGSA 2022 performance.” Thus perused I did, but in so doing triggered spasms of cacophonous laughter, that prompted the neighbours’ welfare check. For Teacha Priya is of no chalked classroom experience. In fact, the sum total of her qualification can be vocalised in half a breath- LLB, the solitary credential of chicken thief lawyers. But despite the incontrovertible aforestated limitations, Teacha Priya remains unabatedly deluded that the intellectual stratosphere she shares with renowned education theorist, BJ Skinner.
Thus, deconstructing was my motivation, before PPP aborted impregnated irrefutable evidence, to ascend the hilltops, vociferating that such plebeian doctor of medicine must be precluded from critiquing Teacha Priya, for he is of menial pedagogic credentials. But such a plea is likely to be as humiliatingly hilarious, as Ali’s COP26 eye on the tie, imagery. For on exiting Queen’s College post A-Levels, I revisited to indulge a year of teaching, in which counted in my good morning Sir cohort, were Teacha Priya’s husband, sister and Director of NCERD, Quinita Waldron.
Further, this plebeian resume’ registers MBBS, the prestigious MRCP(UK) diploma and a MSc in Medical Education. And notably, this Princess Street pleb is of dual Specialist Certification in Acute Medicine and General Internal Medicine, coupled with being a MRCP(UK) PACES examiner and Fellow of both the Royal Colleges of Physician of London and Edinburgh. Thus, I will propose to be binary, ghetto and plebeian qualified, to fearlessly dismantle Teacha Priya’s twaddle.
Teacha Priya’s preconditions
For the teachers agonised over this day, Teacha Priya of more egos than brain cells, arriving in black Prado with 100 police escorts to deliver her twaddle, before which Her Woman of the Bedchamber ascertained that all preconditions were met;
Any ghetto child, of shabby clothes or shoes, must be escorted to the back of the classroom. The most attractively aristocratic child, in face and attire, will present the garland.
The unvaccinated teachers shall be Teacha Priya’s waterperson. Teacha Priya must be greeted by 30 minutes of rapturous Kim Jong-un type applause. The ghetto children with the worse NGSA performances, causative of being 18+ months education deprived by PPP, shall wash Teacha Priya’s Prado, in preparation for their futures.
Teacha Priya’s twaddle
Thus pursuant to edict, Teacha Priya was garland, preluding oral spillage;
“Think of each student and devise a plan to assist each child based on their weaknesses.”
Well I’ve heard hogwash and I’ve heard balderdash but this must be the most ludicrous gibberish, ever vocalised by a bipedal mammal. For our underpaid and overstressed teachers aren’t of one to one sessions, rather they’re teaching sardine packed classrooms, not conducive to diagnosing and remedying individualised students’ weaknesses. For these CPCE qualified teachers know, and don’t need Teacha Priya to tell them, that with such limitations, pre-lesson assessments can inform lesson preparation, to collectively address such challenges. Further, as I’ve previously argued, children should be provided individual tablet, internet and interactive educational apps eg MyMaths, to consolidate learning and narrow knowledge gap.
Nonetheless, it was PPP that closed schools for 18+ months, orchestrating this disastrous knowledge gap, causative of our children’s poor examination performances. Therefore, this Teacha Priya smokescreen hogwash must be seen as an unashamed attempt to cast blame on our hardworking teachers.
More twaddle
“Please look at your children with a different eye so that you can prepare your children to enjoy a better life in the future.”
Really! What Teacha Priya meant by this nebulous term “different eye?” Was she advising teachers to conduct classes with multiple pairs of eyes and on approaching individual students, the socketed pair is enucleated, then replaced with a student specific pair? Or that teachers should practise classroom PPP-type discrimination? Or each child’s academic work should be contextualised to their academic journey? For surely our children “better life in the future” was cancelled after being 18+ months education denied by PPP.
Consolidated curriculum
Now despite a different day, yet the same Teacha Priya regurgitative unscientific consolidated curriculum nonsense, which should’ve long been reduced to ashes, in the Le Repentir crematorium.
For this nonsensical consolidated curriculum speaks to one year removed from our children’s curriculum, such that assessment of Grade 6 will not be at Grade 6 competence, rather it will be at Grade 5.
But such unscientific ineffectual twaddle, is easily debunked with Piaget’s Constructivism. For Constructivism speaks to learners building new knowledge, by assimilating new information into prior prior knowledge. Thus, with each school year feeding into the next, the knowledge gained in the antecedent years serves as a foundation, in building new knowledge. For instance, if the antecedent year was of spelling mastery then the following year, reading can be instructed. But if the spelling year is remove, as consolidated curriculum proposes, attempts at instructing reading will be an excercise in futility. Therefore, it lends to reason that a cancelled school-year, makes it impossible for students to build new knowledge, as it pertains to the subject matter cancelled.
Nevertheless, PPP consolidated curriculum wasn’t developed for our children, rather it’s a PPP political boasting tool to give the illusion that our children have recouped the 18+ months education deficit, when in actuality, their progress is only of class-years rather than competence vis-a-vis, your child in Grade 7 but only of Grade 5 competence.
Thus thereunder, are recommendations to address the education deficit, cognisant that compensation is only possible with lessons outside regular school-hours.
1. Extend school hours.
2. Shorten school holidays.
3. After-school private tuition for children with significant knowledge gap, financed by the State.
4. Tablets, internet and education apps, to facilitate extensive homework.
Investing in education
For APNU-AFC attempted remedy of PPP 23yrs dysfunctional education sector, but faced with urgent needs, short-term interventions were instituted, for longterm permanent fix. And of urgent need, was children not attending school, for want of transportation. Thus, boats, buses, bicycles were invested in boats, which overtime manifested in improved examination performance, moreso in the Interior.
But our education sector requires much more, for the infrastructure is deplorable. The teaching environment is lamentable. Teachers are reduced to janitors. Teachers obligated to purchase teaching aids for their classrooms. Need for Vocational Schools. Need for Special Education Schools. But certainly, these can only be realised through transformational leadership, not evident with the uninvestigated case of 500+ students, who hadn’t turned up for the NGSA.
Nevertheless, despite mass failure of our children, Teacha Priya rushes around photo-bombing top students’ photography sessions, oblivious that their successes were of parental investments in private tutors. But this photo-bombing of the few will continue unless there is significant investment in education, to provide our underprivileged children an equal chance, which tragically can’t be realised with PPP-Incompetent, Clueless and Egotistical, causative of the nearly 1000 Covid-19 deaths.
