Past tense of think? Thonk!

HOW do you teach poor students who don't even want to try?

It's not a problem if there are poor students who are willing to work hard to improve, but not achieving favourable results and completely giving up is a serious concern.

Brunei has placed a lot of emphasis on the importance of youths as the future leaders and having the skills to become marketable in the workplace through education.

But after having a conversation with a friend, who is a secondary English teacher, it makes me wonder whether some of our youths are trained to build the characteristics of a leader.

Here are some examples of students' answers to an English examination:

Past tense of Shoot = Shooted

Past tense of Think = Thonk

Past tense of Choose — Cheese

I am not trying to ridicule anyone here, but I find this worrying that they are actually such secondary school students. What's worse is that they cannot be bothered that they are poor in English, and refused to learn by not paying attention to classes.

They don't even know that learning is a privilege, because some children don't even have the opportunity of getting a proper education.

These days, teachers not only have to teach their subjects, but motivate them to learn and develop their character through various programmes and activities.

But teachers cannot produce results in a short period of time, unless students start to realise the importance of education.