Commentary to an article (4)

I just have to write a response to this article, when I see it, as it is something close to my heart; it is related to the relationship of teachers and students. The article's link is below.

http://newpaper.asia1.com.sg/news/story/0,4136,124376,00.html?

After reading this article, I realized that the classmate and the teacher were at fault for causing this boy to be blind. If the classmate had not misbehaved in class, and the teacher had not lost his temper, none of this tragedy would have occurred. We must analyze the behaviors of the classmate and the teacher to understand why they acted in this way, and to prevent such an event from happening again.

The classmate may just seem to be having fun, making some noise. However, he is showing disrespect to the teacher, at the same time, disrupting those who would rather listen to the lesson. Respect is a core value in our society, if this 14-year-old cannot respect his teacher, how can we expect him to be a building block in our society? We could speculate as to how his behavior is shaped, probably due to his friends, as a person is shaped according to the people around them, and in this case, as he is a student and teenager, his closest influences would be from his friends. We could speculate his friends would probably have the same attitude as him, perhaps due to the family being too lax in enforcing these values, thus it is no wonder that this classmate do not have respect deeply rooted in him.

The teacher seemed to have lost his temper a bit easily and threw a dangerous object (ruler) at the boy. Did the teacher stop to think about whether the ruler would injure anyone? I doubt so as if he had thought about it, he would not have done so. Did the Ministry of Education impart knowledge to the teacher to inform him to keep his temper in check? These questions puzzled me after I read the article. Moreover, this teacher only visited the injured boy once in hospital after causing such serious damage to his eye that he may go blind. It can be assumed that the teacher is not very sympathetic to the boy.

However, perhaps the classmate thought it was just fun to talk loudly in class, and did not think about the consequences and implications about it as he is only 14, and too young to control his desire to talk. The teacher, perhaps angered and irritated by the classmate after many warnings, lost his cool and threw the ruler to vent his anger only, not to injure anyone. Teachers are not gods, they are only humans, and thus it is understandable that they would lose their temper. Perhaps again, that the teacher feels so guilty about injuring the boy that he dare not visit the boy in hospital.

Lastly, as I am a more responsible-type of student, I am not sure about the “classmate’s” mindset. Even if I do not like the teacher, I would still respect him or her and listen to the lesson, as I know that the teacher must have some experience in this subject and it is to my loss if I do not listen.