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"Do you all understand ??!!!", "yes sir !!!" we all thundered, hoping that our frowned faces and overly loud shouts would convey how much we were tired of his class and wanted him to leave. This was our normal way of frustrating teachers out of the class and it always worked. We first stopped paying full attention, wear a frown and then begin side talks and small noises.
This always worked but that day's was different, infact it boomeranged and even left some people crying.
It was our math teacher Mr Atama , a very serious and rigid man who was never found smiling.
That day, He had already stayed his time and instead of leaving the class, he went and pleaded with the next teacher to let him use his time as he needed to complete the lesson he had scheduled for the week.
Everyone was angry but we couldn't tell him to leave or report him to the authorities, they'd say he was even doing us a favour and may even have us punished too, so we decided to do it our own way.
We started with frowned faces and grumblings and like we expected, it didn't work. He ignored everyone and continued his teachings. After a while we graduated to unnecessary applauding. Yes, we started giving him resounding rounds of applause whenever he finished solving any maths example. It was an unnecessary, undeserving clap and cheering, it was accompanied with shouts of "thank you!, thank you!" in the background, just Another way of informing him that he had done well enough for the day and needed to leave. We did it at intervals, interrupting and cutting his teachings. We had stopped paying attention and following the lesson and no longer cared about what he was saying but atleast we still looked at the board. We just wanted him out of our class. The one that got him most annoyed was when he introduced a new topic and everyone began clapping and making screams as if they had seen their favourite celebrities. All he said was "our new topic today is VARIATIONS", then boom!, there was an uproar, a very unnecessary, untimely,undeserving and unwarranted shouts of celebration
He was getting frustrated, he understood very well what we were doing but he was undeterred. He continued the his lesson. He was keen on finishing up his lesson and doing all the time he was given by the other teacher.
We had tried different things but none seemed to work. We got frustrated and decided to blatantly disregard and ignore his teachings. We began doing whatever we found pleasing to us. We began side discussions, some started talking about football and other trending things. Some started copying other subject notes while some were found drawing and cartooning him.
We would only chorus "Yes sir", whenever he finished whatever he was saying and said "do you understand ?". This was how the class went until about 20 minutes to the end of the class when he dropped the chalk he was writing with, moved to one end of the class where the washinghand basin was kept and washed his hands. He walked back to the front of the class again, wiping dry his hands with a hand towel and asked "Do you all understand all I have taught today ??", We all thundered "yess!!". we were happy that he was finally done and thought he was about to leave. He then asked again "does anyone have any question ?", we all shouted "No !!!", so loudly that even if someone said yes, there was no way he or she would be heard. We expected that it was going to be the end of the class. It was the normal thing teachers did whenever they wanted to leave the class.
We were all shocked when we heard him say " Tear out a sheet of paper for your test". What ???, test ??, how???.
Maths was a very important subject in school and no one could afford to fail it. The school always demoted people who didn't get atleast a credit in maths and so everyone made sure to always study hard for tests and exams.
This test was most impromptu and unforseen. Although it was our test week, the maths teacher had never given a test after a class before. We began pleading with him to reschedule the test as we weren't prepared but he refused. we begged and begged but all our plea was to no avail.
He set the test, a very simple test according to him , it was the last thing he had just taught and infact a replica of the last example he had just given. We didn't know what to write as we weren't paying attention. A lot of us submitted blank papers and only few wrote something tangible
That day was horrible, some persons were found crying as they were submitting their sheets, the only thing found on their sheets was tears.
Some of us thought he would discard the test because obviously, there would be massive failure and because of the cryings and plea by a lot of students, but he refused. This man wasn't moved by our tears and guess what?, he recorded the test scores and most people scored Zero.
From that day I realized that humans are not meant to fear women alone but also maths teachers.
So when I talk to my younger ones about school, I emphasize this "Fear maths teachers o".