Ravi... 2001

Note: The stuff inside parentheses are the comments of the present day RavS.

Hi, my name is Ravi ( RavS: This guy has no idea he is gonna become legendary RavS! ). I study in Shiv Vani School, an alright school ( No. The school bloody sux ). I am in 8th standard, I mean, I passed 7th at the start of the year and now I have been promoted to 8th! I came first for the first time in my life, and it feels good ( suck it, all it brings is more pressure to perform. All you want is more than average marks and that's it ). I mean it's been my long cherished dream to get to the first position and it came after a long journey from 28->23->13->8->6->3->2->1 ( for what I can remember ) and even getting to there wasn't short of miracle. But let's leave it. I have so much more to tell you about myself.

OK, let me tell you about my favorite subjects. Maths and Science! ( somethings in life never change ). Well, English, SStd and Sanskrit are also OK. I hate Hindi, but I think the Hindi hates me more. I always get Hindi teachers who ridicule me and this year's madam ( without writing her name ) just slapped me, all because I filled the index before doing the work. Even the paper comes too long. It tiring to write those 'nibandhs' and 'jeewani' stuff. To save time, I don't draw lines over the Hindi word. And well as expected, have been scolded for that too. Talking about Hindi, I have recently been hearing about this guy called Vikas ( who later evolves to become VK ) who is just awesome with his Hindi poems. I have heard a few and he is just amazing. How can he write such stuffs at this age? Does he copy?

I don't like this SUPW period either. I had to take French during 6th because my best friend wanted to and he said it will be helpful if I ever wanted to go abroad or something. He also said there is this guy named Katyayan who has got 99.99% in 5th and he is also taking French ( No seriously Katy! ). But in 7th it became a pain in the . So, this time I made sure I don't get French any way.

Hey, did I tell you our class has got this whole new bug of pen fight? I mean we people are literally doing nothing but fighting pens during period change. And we have started to take it to the limits with filling up nails and other heavy metal stuffs inside our pens. Many a times, teachers have caught us with our acts and took our pens but we people are always back in business. I personally am not that great but play it anyway. Well, there is this guy named Yogender ( future YogS ) who is pretty good at the game but he usually plays with his bench-mate and not talk to us that much. And well it's kind of weird since he lives quite close to my home but we don't know each other that well ( wait till he becomes your bench mate next year, and start sucking into your life :) ).

And, well this year we have got a new guy in the class. His name is Prakash and I think he is the most respectable person I have ever met ( oh SUI!! ). He comes as a gentleman and talks with everybody so nicely. .

OK, enough of school talk. Because school is routine. Reach school, forcibly pray, study, play, wait for period to get over, pray Hindi period goes fine, return home, eat lunch ( 2 chapattis in school don't count ) then back to tuition. Come back home by 6 and now I am the king. I really love to watch Alladin and Duck Tales. I am also a sucker for newspaper ( told ya! ) but only the sport section and also like comics ( told ya that too! ). But bhains ki aankh, I don't get to read it that much. I have to get it on rent or read when bua brings them.

And I am a big cricket fan. That's the only sport I watch. Earlier this year, I was enthralled when Harbhajan made the mockery of Aussies and took 33 wickets in the series and Laxman played that legendary innings of 281 along with my favorite Rahul who got 180 something. I watched the whole series and it was just fascinating. But this new guy Matthew Hayden was just too much. He made 1000+ runs in test and one day series. Well I also came to know about the death of sir Don Bradman. I don't know who he really was but his average of 99.94 was just fascinating and he also said that Tendulkar plays like him. Wish he could have completed his century at least, in age.

This year, a big tragedy happened. The World Trade Center, about which I had never heard before came crashing down because of this terrorist attack by some Osama something. I only came to know about it the next day, because I was celebrating my B'Day on T'Day. Anyways, friends were saying it was huge and two huge buildings came crashing down when a plane hit them. So after school I ran back home and watched it on TV, from all the angles possible. OK, did I tell you we bought a new color TV a few months ago. I asked my dad to buy this LG one because it had this cricket game in it but now the game seems boring. I can hit almost every ball for a six.

Now wish if I could have a computer also . Some of my friends have already got it. When will I get it?( You will get it buddy, just be patient ) I just want to play Mario and Pacman and Dave on it the whole day like my friends. Yeah, I have this cassette game player which you can connect to TV and play all day. But it will be so much fun to play it on computer. You can also work on MS Word and Powerpoint and Notepad ( Yeah, I will see how much you work on notepad ) and play music and stuff.

Sometimes, I wonder what I will become in future ( Say computer engineer )? I mean, if you would have asked me this when I was a kid, I would have given you different answers, like Doctor, Pilot, Police man ( Engineer? ). 2 years back, I was sure I was gonna become a scientist ( Damn it, say Engineer ). But don't know now. May be join Army ( ? ) or a Civil Services ( ?? ).. or an Engineer ( yeah ;) ). I have read about these IITs and IIMs and all. But I really can't tell right now.

10 years from now? I don't know. I would like to have a computer for sure! And would love if all my friends could go to the same college as me ( :( ). And to Ravi of that time.. Sabki Bhains ki Aankh Nikal diyo!! ( Thanks mate! )

Paper Setter's Mindset

"Let her/him attempt this paper and pass it"

"Did they copy the paper from another university?"

"WTF was that, was the paper of some other subject?"

"Did they got this paper made from the peon or from the lab assistant?"

Sound familiar? Heard of them? Well these are a few things either I have said or heard people talking about whenever the conversation turns to exams. And these days, I can't really blame anyone for thinking or talking like that. When one works really hard (well cramming GBs of data is not easy!), you expect to get rewarded for it by an easy paper (Of course, when you know the answer, the question is easy) and then some good paper checking, making the hard work successful and giving the mind the right signals that hard work is rewarded.

OK?? NOT OK

But the way we (OK, at least 'I') get the exam papers, my mind gets the signal that it is OK, if I don't work hard. It is OK, if I don't prepare fully for the exam. It is OK, if I bank on my general knowledge of the topic rather than actually knowing the answers to questions. It is OK, to just study a topic 5 mins before the exam and go and write the paper (ask me, I did it in my exam on 31st December 2010). But everyone including me knows, in reality it is NOT OK.

Ideally

(please take note of the word) the exam should be taken to check your 'general' understanding of the subject (not everybody is an expert in Analog Electronics alright). But the paper setter seems to think as if we would have become an expert in 3 months of studying the subject, like it was the only subject that we had to study.

Ground Reality

I find it most ridiculous when you get a 15 marks question when all 'you know' AND/OR 'it can be written about' is of 5-7 marks. So, what options do we have? • Growing the limbs and redundant body parts of the answers which should have only got the mid-gut (read core).• Choosing larger font size (16 rather than normal 11 or 12). Also making use of cryptic fonts (think Webdings or Monotype Corsiva). • Making the text 'centered' rather than 'justified' (leaving margins on both sides of sheet.) • Leaving a blank line after every 3 lines or so of text, on the pretext of making the answer seem legible and neat.

Size Does Matter

And teachers also seem to go for the length rather than the content of the answer. 

"You see, he has written 7" answer so he gets 8 marks while your answer is just 6.25" inch, I still gave you 6 marks, what else do you want?"

"You should have explained this also (even if it means going out of context). This is not enough for a 10 mark question (crap some more)"

Choices. Really?

I don't know which syllabus the paper setter follows, because you almost always get 10% or more of question paper 'out of syllabus'. What's hilarious is that those questions will be given as a choice. So, you exhaust all your choices in 'don't-know-from-where-the-MoFo-gave' questions. So, now all you are left with are the questions that are 'compulsory'. Hey, don't blame the paper setter, he/she gave you a 'choice'. It's you who didn't take it. The choices between questions is also horrible (See my this time's ACN paper to know what I mean).

And what's more ridiculous

...is the way the question paper is set. Instead of asking the question in a simple manner, they will twist it like Jigsaw Puzzle. There will be wrong or incomplete information provided in the question (shame for an end term question paper). The paper seems like has been made at the last moment, just like we prepare near the judgement day. So, whichever question is seen first is given without caring that it is actually going to be attempted by thousands of students in coming days and may be the deciding question for whether the student passes. Recently, a friend told me that his question paper contained significant number of questions from a single page of a book!

I know

...what I have written here is not 100% applicable for all the papers we get. I was quite impressed by the way last paper I gave was set. And University exam papers can't exactly be set like School Board exam papers, all scientifically prepared because they don't have that much resource or time. Also, some of what I have said might be the result of some bad exam experiences (lack of preparation, lack of intelligence, hard luck etc.). But what I have said is not entirely wrong. If you have ever faced University Semester style exams, you will agree with that.

PS: Now that I am all bossing around here like I know how to set the perfect paper, I wonder how I would have set the exam paper. Hmm.. Interesting! Well all I know is that I would have definitely experimented with different styles, like I do in blogging and life in general!

My Idea... of an Ideal Teacher

"Teachers teachers everywhere, everyone has to preach

Teachers teachers everywhere, not a single to teach"

I have been a student all my life. And as a result, have encountered teachers of every kind based on region, language, gender, color, and physical appearance. They being a teacher, these criteria does not matter also. But may be barring a few, most of them haven't been able to meet my high (impossible?) expectations. But this post is not about showing negativity and disappointment. This is about positivity and hope.. that may be aliens will teach us someday.

I myself have been a teacher in some sense (teaching my brothers, and being a part time tutor). But I know I am nowhere near the perfectionism that I want from a teacher. But that does give me some idea about what I, as a student, want from my teachers. Here is my idea of an ideal teacher:

1. Impartial: An ideal teacher got to be impartial towards students and give each student the same time and support, keeping personal perception aside. She (from now onwards, 'she' implies 'he/she') must give more marks for the same question, only because it deserves them, not because the answer was written by her favorite student. Many a times, I have been guilty of getting better marks this way, and believe me I feel really embarrassed.

2. Understanding: Is it too much to ask from a teacher to be understanding? If one becomes a teacher, does she stops being a human? Its a known fact that, not every one has as high IQ as me (no, don't laugh, I am really intelligent!), some students need more time to understand the concept than others. Anyone can teach students who can self study, to teach the students with low motivation towards the subject is the true test of a teacher.

3. Patient: So many times I have heard teachers telling students to ask any concept 'n' no. of times, till the time they don't understand it. But it is amusing to see the same teachers getting irritated when the student is unable to understand the concept even after the third attempt (may be n=3). When I was a kid, I used to get beaten by the teachers for not knowing the alphabets. I learnt them properly only in 3rd standard. Today, I ask myself, what difference did it make in my life to learn alphabets 4 years later than what children normally do? Was it justified to get slapped and scaled on the palms?

4. Adaptable: The field from where I belong keeps changing overnight. In this scenario, it is unacceptable for a teacher to be rigid about her teaching methods. She should be ready to accept that a student can find a better solution to a problem, he/she can know more than her. An idea should not get rejected just because its not mentioned in the book. Anyone would love to go into a class, where the teacher is innovative in her style of teaching. Takes real life and unimaginable examples rather than copy book examples.

5. Knowledgeable: It never hurts when your teacher is the master of the subject, truly passionate about the things that she teaches. It only gives a student confidence that he/she is in the right hands. But to tell the truth, I give a rat's arse about the teacher's knowledge of the subject, as long as she meets the above criterias. If the teacher is willing to do the hard work, ready to accept her ignorance about a topic and willing to learn with and from the students, it doesn't matter to me, whether she is a B.Tech or a PhD.

"I may not be the best of the students.. But that is the precise reason why I deserve the best teachers"

PS: In junior classes I studied about ideal gases only to be told later that there is nothing like an 'ideal gas', but its poor cousin the 'real gas'. I think an ideal teacher is an endangered species, if not non-existent. So, my real teacher will be:

1. Hot: I mean not metaphorically but literally. If her temperature remains high all the time, this will mean nobody will dare ask the questions (such a waste of time). The syllabus gets over well in time, and you can concentrate on better things in life. Also, when she is burning hot, that means she will take loads of holidays (she is not well stupid), implying loads of free classes.

2. Sexi(st): Its been a long since boys have been victims of discrimination in the class. Its time girls should also get the know what it is like to be beaten, just because you are not a boy. Grr..

3. Charming: There I said it. She doesn't know anything about the subject? No problem. She can't solve even the basics of problems? I will manage. She doesn't think she is qualified to be a teacher? You are in majority, mam! All I want is that she (here she implies she) has a nice personality, good looking face and sweet voice. If you can't be easy on brain then just be easy on eyes and ears. Just don't make the 50 mins of an already boring class a torture for me.

Happy Teachers' Day!