The NYSC scheme in Nigeria really helped me a lot when I went for it. I was opportune to meet a lot of people and above all, I was posted to a school where I worked for a year. This made me familiar with many children and how children behave. Teaching isn’t an easy job and there are times when I get frustrated and begin to ask myself if that’s how frustrating I was when I was younger.
In the school, I was asked to work as the assistant teacher of Year3 and the age rage is 7-8. That’s for you to know how little they are and we help them with almost everything even though there are still so many things they can do for themselves. Also, everyone in a class can’t be brilliant. There are some ones who may find it hard to catch up with others but as a teacher, it is our job to make sure that everyone is on the average range.
A time when I was impressed by a child’s intelligence.
Out of all the pupils in class, there’s a boy named Giovanni. He’s not the most brilliant but that boy is exceptional and very smart. There are so many times when the teacher will be teaching and ask some questions, if this boy is asked to answer, he’d give an answer that’s even above his age range. There was a time when I sat with him and I asked what I could learn from him, Giovanni began to teach me about the Artificial Intelligence.
Would you believe that I learnt about Humanoid robots from Giovanni? I told him to sit with me on that day because he was disturbing the class and I expected that to serve as a way of punishing him but I still learned from him. He told me types of robots. He mentioned military robots, agricultural robots, industrial robots and so much more.
I was shocked that who could have taught this little boy all of these things and some adults don’t even know these things. I didn’t even know the full details until he taught me.
There are also so many things I’ve learnt from him but that was exceptional. He also taught me about the Tower of London. He said he learnt about it when he went to London and told me the story behind it. He mentioned that William the Conqueror built the tower in 1066 to demonstrate the Norman power. Honestly, that’s the major thing I could remember about the Tower of London but I’m glad I could learn that from him.
How did that encounter leave me?
Honestly, I was shocked. I made findings about the boy and I realized the kind of people his parents were. I’m sure that’s how he knew all of those things. I heard his parents are people who do much cherish education and they take them out including vacations to see so many things that they can learn from. Do you know that you tend to learn something faster when you see it? So when you want to remember, you go back thinking about what you saw then. Seeing is believing.
At the end of it all, parents are the ones who can help their child this far. I hope I give birth to a smart child too.
