What is your memory of teachers? Reflecting on the teacher-student dynamics

‘The Atlantic Ocean is the biggest ocean,’ I answered as my father quizzed me for a general knowledge test. I might have been around 7-8 years old. He looked surprised and tried to correct me that the Pacific is the biggest ocean. But, I was not ready to believe him. What my teacher told me was more important. My father, then, even brought me an atlas and opened the globe to show the size of the two oceans.

Many years later, I was surprised to see my young cousin acting the same way. His teacher had got a wrong spelling of ‘lizard’, and when my uncle or his father tried to correct him, he was not accepting. What I would like to highlight from these anecdotes is not the errors, but the level of influence teachers have, especially when we are young.