Portrait of 2 valedictorians at the excellent teacher exam in Nghe An province

Teachers must understand students

Before the competition took place, Mr. Thach also said that he had prepared carefully, not just 1 month, 2 months but nearly 4 years. During that time, he focused on investing in completing initiatives and scientific research topics. Notably, there were 2 initiatives recognized as industry-level initiatives with the topic: "Training mathematical thinking for high school students through understanding the difficulties and analyzing some common mistakes when solving probability problems" (school year 2015 - 2016) and the topic: "Training creative thinking for high school students through applying vector methods and coordinate methods to solving problems of calculating distances in space" (school year 2018 - 2019).

With these two excellent initiatives, in the "qualifying round" of this year's provincial excellent teacher competition, Mr. Thach rose up with outstanding scores and was one of the candidates with the highest initiative scores. Mr. Thach shared: "Many people may think that doing initiatives is to cope or to run for achievements. However, for me, doing initiatives is completely a passion and the initiatives that I have completed are all drawn from my teaching practice and aim at the first goal of being an initiative that can be applied to all students."

To keep teachers and students close, he had to grasp each student's situation and share with them like brothers and sisters in a family. Students who were weak had to be focused on tutoring them. Later, when he had experience, the school often assigned him to be the homeroom teacher of a key class to train and create a source of good students. However, despite being given priority, he always asked to teach in a weaker class to help students and also to train himself and get familiar with many different pedagogical "situations".

Teacher Phan Hoang Thach and his students.

This was also a very good experience for him in the provincial excellent teacher competition when he accidentally drew lots to teach in a normal class, students did not know the lesson in advance... However, the situation that arose during the lesson and was handled harmoniously and reasonably by him was highly appreciated by the judges and finally surpassed more than 100 other teachers to win the "valedictorian" position in Mathematics. Talking about this result, teacher Nguyen Ba Thuy - Principal of Bac Yen Thanh High School said: "When I learned that Mr. Thach achieved the highest result in the competition, I was really not surprised because I have been in charge of the Math group of the school for many years and I understand Mr. Thach's ability. This is a young teacher with ability, passion, always devoted to students and especially constantly creative and innovative to improve the quality of teaching lessons".

10 points are encouraged if the essay is creative.

Unlike teacher Phan Hoang Thach, teacher Le Thanh Huyen - a Literature teacher at Phan Boi Chau High School for the Gifted, had a smooth start to her teaching career because she was a National Literature student and a lecturer at Vinh University. She was one of the youngest teachers to win the "valedictorian" award at the provincial excellent teacher competition at the age of only 32.

Talking, Ms. Huyen was very reluctant to talk about achievements, because for her it was just a competition and everyone who took part in the competition had to try their best. Instead, she talked a lot about teaching, about her students, with her own, very young views on the teaching profession. According to her, the lucky thing was to work at a key school, with many good colleagues, willing to support and create conditions for young teachers. The students at the school were also very smart and talented, forcing teachers to renew themselves.

Talking about Literature teachers, she confided: “People still say that students today are very reluctant to study Literature, but I see that, whether they are students of natural sciences or students choosing social subjects, they all love this subject. In my opinion, when talking about Literature, we should not just think of it as simply studying works in textbooks. More importantly, teachers must inspire students. In a lesson, we do not necessarily have to cover all the knowledge in the lesson, making students feel heavy and tired. Instead, teachers must ask questions, organize activities, and through that, teachers must see the creativity and intelligent thinking of students.”

Because of this thinking, teacher Le Thanh Huyen has her own unique and suggestive way of giving questions and is also very flexible in giving scores. "To evaluate students, I don't need to look at a long and full essay, but I will give them scores during the teaching process. In addition, with the same topic, depending on the student, I will give different answers and scores. I even give many students 10 points if I see in their writing a deep life experience and understanding," Ms. Huyen shared.

Teacher Le Thanh Huyen and students at Phan Boi Chau High School for the Gifted.

Coming to the provincial excellent teacher competition, she also brought these concepts into her lectures and she felt the students' love for her lessons. In the practical lesson, she also encountered a rather special situation when the teacher asked questions but did not receive cooperation from the students.

However, it was her teaching experience and confidence in handling situations that won over the judges. Speaking more about the results, she also affirmed: “I think there is no such thing as luck and this is the result of a long journey of effort, struggle and accumulation. I also do not consider this the final destination and all my efforts are never enough. This is first of all for myself and ultimately my mark in the eyes of my students, friends and colleagues.”