During my Flexi Adjunct era, I was once tasked to collaborate with a young untrained teacher who was a scholar. We were asked to work on a “bridging program” for Sec 1 NT kids laterally transferred to Sec 2NA. They did not take history so we had to give them a crash course in history.
The scholar gave the kids a lecture. He used the whiteboard to write words and unruly phrases. Of his masterclass, I could only remember “X is Y, but Y is not X: History is the past but the past is not (the discipline of?) History. There were no videos, slides, pictures, etc.
The kids must have been confused.
After the lesson, I told the scholar that his lesson was not engaging. I felt that with my experience, I had the clout to say that.
The scholar did not agree. “Was I not engaging when I spoke to the students?” He said. He did not accept any of my feedback. I backed off. I was just a lowly FAJT. I even apologised for having offended him. He told me that he no longer wanted to be part of this program.
Months later after he was in NIE and I was somewhere else, I received a text message from him. He thanked me for my feedback and I cannot recall the rest of his message because it is stored in a long defunct phone.
But I remember replying with some words of encouragement.
NIE must have made him realise that my advice was sound. I confess that I felt vindicated.