Onboard flight – 9W2306, 7th June 2008.

I was never destined to be a teacher trainer. It happened by chance. A sweet twist of fate, an unwished destiny. In fact I feel I have hardly made choices in my life. Things have just happened and I chose to go with the flow.

The reason I did B.Com (H) – Vinnie did it and it seemed the obvious route for a commerce student
B.Ed – 2 months vacation and fewer working hours
M.Com- Something to study while I started with my first job, and a masters degree looked yumm
M.Ed – Next obvious degree.
M.Phil – To get promoted
and so on…

I ve never been like the kind of teachers that I had. I broke the mould from the very beginning, which often made the people around me feel that I wasn’t cut for the job. I mingled with my students. I refused to follow the trend of dictating notes. I treated them as adults and they too had the right to raise voice.

Getting to teach the most feared subject (Philosophy in Education) really helped me figure out a way to teach like the teachers I admired back in college and yet bring in the qualities I so wanted them to have aswell.

Initially it was a great pain. Required a lot of homework and preparation on my part. Gradually I made my way and drew analogies from movies to explain the content and broke the content in flowcharts to make it more comprehendible. End result- Students loved my class, the subject and I derived some strange thrill out of the whole ordeal.

There is nothing more satisfying than coming out of a class where your students feel a “Wow” on the way the concept was explained and you feel great that you’ve somehow made a difference to their lives.

Yesterday was my last day at work. And probably the last time I went in a class to train teachers to be. I used the same teaching aids that I had prepared when I was a teacher trainee. And now they finally rest in peace in the dustbin after their fruitful service of 5 years.

Can’t say about my students, but I feel truly delighted by this journey.