The Hidden Struggles of a Teacher

Every day is unique and comes with a load of tasks. As a teacher, there isn’t a single day of the week without work to do. Even on weekends, we might be summoned to work. To some people, teaching is not tasking and not even a professional job. Many believe it is simply about teaching and writing notes on the board. However, they are wrong; teaching is not limited to just teaching and learning.

A teacher serves as a role model to students and often takes on the roles of judge, motivational speaker, mediator, and many others. Beyond these responsibilities, we also train our students for both internal and external competitions.

For instance, this coming Thursday, there is an inter-school debate competition in the Ibeju-Lekki zone, where the winner will face their counterpart at the district level and compete for the chance to represent the district at the state level. Managing all these tasks in addition to teaching, learning, and record-keeping is no small feat.

The time a teacher wakes up in the morning is different from that of other professionals. Unlike most workers who resume at 8 AM or even 9 AM, a teacher must be in school before 8 AM.

In preparation for the debate, I started grooming my students yesterday since the competition is scheduled for Thursday, the 20th of this month. I am particularly glad that my students are responding well, even though I have to put in a lot of effort to monitor them and correct them where necessary. This is not a new experience for our students; it is something they have been participating in even before I joined the school.

The only challenge we have is that many of the academically gifted students seem to be less confident these days. This is not to say that the current students are dull, but they simply can not be compared to those we had in the past. I believe many students today are carried away by frivolous activities, spending their leisure time on the internet instead of studying.

I just hope that this week’s competition will be in our favour and that we will emerge victorious.