22/09/2025
I learned to read from WORDS, to SYLLABLES, then SENTENCES and PARAGRAPHS
I benefited from a special grace in my educational journey especially as far as reading is concerned.
I started school in class one at the tender age of 5 in the Government School that was opened some years before not far from our house in Kovvifem.
I went from class one to six without ever discovering the logic governing word formation in English.
I learned and memorised the alphabet but not the sounds and not the syllables so all I ever pretended to read was memorised or mimicked. I remember a particular text in Evans Primary English Book three : "Mr Ndi and her farm". Out of fear for the cane, I memorised this text and it is stuck in my memory till this moment.
I don't know if my teachers taught me systematically how to read and I didn't understand or they didn't but what I know is that without being stupid, I always passed the exams because as the teachers read "magically" during exams or so I thought, I could understand what the answers were and have them copied in most cases. And with the oral exams I usually succeeded to score more than half of the total number of marks.
It was until class six while we were taught by sir Sunjo Benjamin Yovla alias Chia Makibu' of blessed memory when an elder sister, Wiysela Eucheria now a nurse, whom I heartily celebrate here was helping us to understand and do our homework when by God's grace, it suddenly dawned on me that "the" was always "the" in all texts.
I went from there to learning many words like that and by some effect of the muse, I discovered that the words were divided into syllables and syllables to sounds.
When I say we, I mean myself and my brother Wiylanyuy Emmanuel.
From the moment this logic was revealed to me, I now studied freely and without a sickly dependence on others, my self-confidence skyrocketed and my scores went sky high.
That is how in secondary school, education was no longer a source of torture for me but a delight as the lad who once managed to pass exams could confidently compete with the best of the class.
I share this story to invite teachers to know that they have a sacred and irreplaceable rule in making children to learn how to read, count and calculate in the simplest logical way possible.
This can only be done if the teachers are properly formed themselves, full of motivation, patience, love and passion.
So, dear educators, do not let other little boys and girls go through what I went through to start reading for I doubt if most of them will benefit from the grace that illuminated me delivering me from my intellectual darkness.
✍️✍️✍️I remain Njodzela Louis, The Educator and the polyglot.
For your EXCELLENT translations To and From English, French and Spanish, contact my air conditioned WhatsApp: +237694997226/+237680771324.
