point and counterpoint

Kids in Classroom (flickr.com)

Classes have started for barely a month. It was a warm June afternoon, lunch break just ended, and the class were busy having good chats before the next classes start, punctuated by the percussive footsteps of some students hurrying to get back to their classrooms in time.

The English teacher walked right in, and the class was in order. After the mandatory prayers, the students took to their seats. “Today,” the teacher said, “we’re going to write an essay.”

The chatter fell silent at the mention of the word “essay”. After all, when you’re dealing with the teacher who handled the school paper for more than a decade the mere mention of the word evokes a death sentence. “And because you’re in high school now,” the teacher continued, “this won’t be the same as your grade school ‘formal theme’. You won’t be copying your teacher’s sample essay; you will make your own.” Sensing the students’ apprehensions,  he said, “I won’t make it hard for you. You will be writing your thoughts on a topic you all know about.”

At the time, the country was gripped in the frenzy of the Metro Manila Film Festival scandal, which involved a handful of big names in showbusiness. This was before the age of The Buzz and Startalk, before Hayden Kho and Katrina Halili. “I’m sure you all have something to say about this, don’t you think?” the teacher said. Some heads nodded. “Good. I’ll help you out by writing one essay myself.”

The English teacher wrote a short outline of a typical essay…at least, as he saw it. He wrote a sentence as the young eyes followed his hands. “Now how do you think we should continue?” he said. A few hands raised, and one suggestions followed another. A few hands copied each sentence from the blackboard.

“Class, don’t,” the teacher said. “You’ll need to come up with something original. I’m just showing you how to do your essays.”

After a few minutes, the sample essay was completed, all six paragraphs of it. In his deep tenor voice, the teacher reread the essay, punctuating his reading with some explanations on how the paragraphs jell together. “Listen up, everyone,” he said, “I don’t care if your grasp of English is not very good. That’s what this class is for. What I care about is how you write the piece. Write to express, not to impress.”

Silence. “Now it’s your turn,” he said. “Since we don’t have much time left [back then, only 40 minutes was allotted for each subject], you can write at least the first few sentences or paragraphs. I’ll return your papers before you go home later this afternoon so that you can work on it at home.”

* * * *

On the day of the next class meeting, the students talked about their essay grades. The teacher promised that the essays would be graded by the morning, and that they will be handed to us on the next meeting. For most of the class, the experience was anything but excitable or enjoyable; many students were relieved that the ordeal was over after a few days. The only question that remained was that how the papers were marked.

And then the teacher walked in.

“So,” he said, “how did you find your essay writing projects?” Half of the class groaned, while the others only smiled in bemusement. A few eyes rolled, relieved that their ordeal was over.

“But this is just the first grading,” the English teacher said. “You still have three quarters to go.” The teacher enumerated his overall impressions of the essays, highlighting the class’ collective mistakes. “Take a look at this sentence,” the teacher said, writing another sample. “Something there doesn’t make sense, and a good number of you wrote this way.”

(flickr.com)

After the litany was over, the teacher erased his writings. “I want to show you now one of your classmate’s work,” he said. “It’s something you might want to consider studying. This is the only one that got everything correct.”With the paper in one hand and a chalk in the other, he scribbled the first few words of the first sentence, which read so much like it was written by a refined hand.

Having completed copying the essay, the English teacher then read each and every sentence of my essay and, again, explaining every now and then why it worked. “You see,” he said, “This is how you avoid getting roundabout. That’s how you should write, direct and straight to the heart of the matter. And if you noticed, he used a semicolon here.”

After his discourse has finished, our English teacher said, “I’ll be handing out the papers to you guys. Please do study what went wrong. I did read every sentence of your works and I hope you’ll pay attention to my comments, it will help you.” Turning to the model writer, he said, “And as for you, I only have very few corrections. Mostly little grammatical things. Keep it up. And, oh,” he said, turning to me. “You may want to join the school paper, by the way.”

And that…was how I discovered I could write, fifteen years to this month.