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.” Read the rest of this entry »