MRS CHEONG POH SUAN
NOT FOR THE FAINT OF HEART
A veteran in the teaching fraternity, Mrs Cheong has devoted many years nurturing the character of generations of Clementeens.
The first class I taught in Clementi Town Secondary School back in 1999 was a Normal Technical( NT) class. There were challenges aplenty in this class – family problems, social-emotional issues et cetera. I realised that I not only had to teach them Mathematics, but more importantly impart to them the right values. To get to know them and reach out to them personally, I spent many hours after school talking to them and counselling them. The students sometimes committed petty crimes like stealing and I knew I had to lead them back to the straight and narrow. It took a lot of tenacity to do that, but the students knew I cared. One thing I must say about the Normal Academic and NT students is that they are really beautiful people who are deeply appreciative of their teachers. By the time they are promoted to the next level, you can really see a marked improvement in their behaviour and character. I remember this particular girl who only came to school for a grand total of two days for the whole year. During the two days, I managed to get her after school to talk to her, and know her better. I found out that she was facing family problems then. She was retained but when she did return to school to study the following year, she told me I was one main reason why she decided to come back. All through the years, I had protected my own privacy, but for her, I gave her my mobile number and always called her whenever she was absent. She must have understood that I genuinely cared for her.
The Express students are also my pride and joy. One remarkable student I encountered was Donavan Cheah. He had Asperger’ s Syndrome yet was highly intelligent. When he was first posted to our school, he had a tough time adjusting to the Secondary school system, the new environment and his classmates. Since he was different, he was ostracised and teased by other students. He would come to school with a bag of pebbles to pelt at anyone who was unkind to him, and even threatened others with a file from the Design and Technology room. You can imagine the headache he gave to teachers. When I taught him in Secondary Two, I had a taste of how brilliant he was. He would ask me high-level questions and theories about Mathematics that stumped me. I channelled his energy into his strength by challenging him to come up with Mathematics worksheets which he did, complete with model answers. Then I started a peer-tutoring system and put him as my chief tutor. That was the turning point for him. The students’ perception of him changed. From them on, he was cherished as a respected individual in our school. Of course he did very well for his GCE‘ O’ Levels.
In retrospect, I must admit that teaching is a lot of hard work, coupled with an even greater amount of heart work. One has to be strong and love what you do. Having taught for decades, I do get very tired sometimes, but at the end of the day, it is deeply satisfying. My personal belief is that no matter what subject we teach, education in essence, is not complete when we do not teach students about character.
Mrs Cheong is a Senior Teacher in CTSS and she was accorded the Caring Teacher Award and the Excellent Service Award in 2011. Mrs Cheong was conferred AST Associate of the Academy Award in 2012.
Our Future: Be the Change You want Others to See! 039