Instruction From the Heart

The author is from Cabetican Elementary School Elenita Matias Porlucas

When a child feels that she/he is inside a place he/she can express freely his/ her feelings, learning becomes easy…it is so simple to gauge if the classroom serves as a home for students---they always come early for schooling and go late afterwards.

Classrooms are teachers’ workplaces where they practice their profession of instructing the young. Whether they succeed or fail professionally. They are different from the workplaces of any other professional group. Classrooms populated primarily by young people rather than adults and are designed with that in mind. They have a particular purpose, recognizable physical characteristics, and a feeling that sets them apart.

When compared with each other, classrooms have similar general characteristics but are different in detail. Most have walls but those walls look different. All involve instruction, but it is never the same. A teacher controls all, but not all teachers are exactly alike.

Classrooms are crowded places in which to work. They are not very large spaces and they contain furnitures, equipment and supplies. There is a constant activity. Teachers do not only work in this congested environment, but they are personally responsible for its smooth productive operation. Classrooms have a particular and consistent social context. They are youth dominated and learning oriented, with an adult in charge. Under normal conditions, all activities are set to seek the learners needs. Desks, teaching devices, bulletin boards, chalkboards, electronic equipment and so forth are all strategically located for that purpose, Verbal interactions are structured to accomplish it.

The pandemic unexpectedly came and changed the educational set up of our second homes. Classrooms were contained on gadgets and screens.

Everything that happens inside the classroom have instructions and it comes from the heart. All of these happens in the old normal, and all students look forward to experiencing the real classroom scenario, their second home and excited to receive instructions from the heart.

--oOo-

The author is Head Teacher I at Mabalacat National High School