Hand-outs for Interactive English

For final examinations

ESPERANZA OR LIGAYA:
PICK YOUR CHOICE
Esperanza is a high school teacher in
one of the big public schools in Metro Manila.
She is one teacher who is really dedicated to her
profession. She believes that a teacher, to be
successful, must be one who continuously
learns and builds up his/her treasure chest of
information and knowledge. Consistent with
this philosophy, Esperanza looks at every
occasion as an opportunity for learning. She
always carries with her notebook cum diary,
where she writes every new experience, new
knowledge, new date and whatever insights that
she is able to draw from just about any
interaction with other people. She is very
selective about her off-school activities. Before
accepting an invitation for just about any affair,
she would always ask herself: Is this
something worth my time? What kind of
people will I meet and brush elbows with?
What learning do I expect to achieve? In many
instances, she would refuse weekend outings,
opting instead to spend her time at home to
work on her lesson plan or surf through the
internet. Esperanza is no ordinary teacher.
Among her prized investments is a computer
a top of the line model which she had learned
to master through special tutorial sessions and
self-study. With how she carries herself vis-vis her job, Esperanza is one teacher who really
teaches. Ask her students and they would speak
very nicely of her. She inspires students to
learn. In her science class, students do not only
learn about Newton and Einstein but also about
Cyranno de Bergerac and the windmills of Don
Quixote. Esperanza is able to make an
insightful relationship among facts, people and
events which ordinarily seem desperate and
unintegrable.
Esperanzas intellectual gift is accented
by her strong sense of discipline particularly in
the use of time. She is up at 5:00 a.m., and is in
school by 7:00 a.m. She is actually off by 2:00
p.m., but she stays in school until 5:00 p.m.
sometimes even until 6:00 p.m. to make
herself available for student consultation. No
minute is wasted with Esperanza. While waiting
for students to come, she would check test
papers or write an article for the Science Corner
of their school paper, or preside over task force
or committee meetings.
Esperanza is one teacher who is fully
married to her profession. But other teachers
believe that Esperanza is overdoing things.
Many of her colleagues share the view of
Ligaya, a fellow teacher, who has these to say
about Esperanza:

Espie is a teacher to watch. Shes a

real asset in school. But visit her place and
everythings a mess. Papers are cluttered all
over the place and left-over food remains on her
table for days. She has all the time to study and
teach but she cannot spare a second to dust off
her cabinets and arrange her things. She doesnt
even have time for a dinner or movie date. Its
hard to say how she would fare as a wife or
mother. But it seems that shes a world all by
herself and until she gets out of her shell, shell
never know what shes missing.
As for myself, I look at my job and
my other roles as wife and mother as if they
were drawers of a filing cabinet. I open only the
drawer that contains the files I need at a given
time. So I am a teacher when I am in school.
But when I go home, I have to shift to a
mothers role and when my husband is around,
I also have to perform a wifes role. Theres a
time for teaching and serving as a learning
agent for students. I dont carry my teaching job
at home. Of course, I teach my children but I do
that because I am a mother and not because I
am a teacher. What I am supposed to do in
school, I do in school. I dont consider it a good
habit to do my lesson plan at home while I
leave my children all to themselves watching
TV or doing their own thing.
My teaching job is a job, all right. But
it does not pay me enough to support the needs
of my family. Therefore, I have reserved my
weekends doubling up as an insurance and real
estate sub-agent in order to beef up my income.
But dont get me wrong! Im not one who
would spend so much time elsewhere and treat
my DepEd job as a part-time concern. No! I
make sure that I am not remiss in my
responsibilities as a teacher. I surely have to
work to deserve the monthly salary that the
government is paying me. Its just that I dont
carry my teaching work at home. I believe that I
wouldnt be a success by just being a good
teacher. I also have to balance this with my
other responsibilities with my family. After all,
we work because of our family and theres no
sense excelling in ones job if she fails as a
mother and wife. In fact, I think that my roles
as mother and wife make me a better teacher. I
have become more sensitive to the needs of my
students as growing kids. I feel that I am able to
relate with them more emphatically.
--END

Hand-outs for Interactive English

For final examinations

time he said I love you and the time she

nodded I do.

The Power of Music

(written by Miss Armi Cruz Castillo)

It has been said that unlike a

woman, music has no beautiful face to
grow old, or pretty fingers to show
wrinkles. It goes on and on, forever
charming, forever young.
Music, indeed, like all things of
beauty, is God-given, God-inspired. If
flows on like a rivulet, smooth and
enchanting, like a gossiping breeze as it
kisses the leaves of trees.
Music is the universal language. It
is, in fact, the language of the soul. It
speaks of pain, of joy, of sorrow, of
happiness, of war and of peace, of
damnation and exaltation. Yet, it speaks of
all these for all to feel and for all to
understand. For music is unhindered by the
written word.
Music does so many things to man.
It makes him feel the cool wind of the
countryside. It affords him to hear the
melodious murmur of the shore-bound sea
waves and at times lulls him to a deep
slumber. But most important of all, music
allows man to remember. It evokes in him
memory of moments when he was young
and careless and carefree. It reminds him of
the time when he could afford to laugh to
his hearts delight; of the occasion when he
would simply part his lips into a smile. It
reminds him of a sweet face, of a gentle
touch, of tender words and moments of
excitement and how he stammered the first

Music is like an enchantress. It has

beauty that magnetizes and magic that
compels. It has a soul that gives life,
thoughts that leave memories about which a
great man once said: What the heart
once possessed, it shall never
lose.
You see, it is really true. No matter
who you are, or where you are, so long as
you do not allow your mind to grow dim
and blind to the meaning of lifes beauty
and poetry, you shall be privileged to share
the Great Poets mind.
Through music, you may find
yourself in the sea, in the fields, within the
blades of grass, among the bees or even on
a leaf gently touched by the wind.