In the summer of the ’90s, I was a teacher in our neighborhood.
Ann and I became friends one summer in 1994. She was already in her early years of high school while I was still in Grade 4. Although our family had already lived in the neighborhood for two years, I did not know other kids.
One day, Ann and I sat together reading and writing. She learned that I loved books. She saw that I read and wrote well, so she invited me to join her in teaching the younger kids in the neighborhood. I said yes.
Three times a week in the summer afternoons, Ann and I were teachers in our small makeshift classroom just beside their house. We set up small wooden chairs in a row behind a long wooden kitchen table. We had a small black board in front and a little standee beside it where we flipped manila papers for the visual aids of our lessons. Ann and I taught different subjects, but mostly reading and writing in English.
Ann introduced me to the class as their English teacher. I brought my books and read stories to the younger kids. I taught them how to read. I guided their small hands in writing letters and then forming words. With some older kids who were still struggling with their phonetics and subject-verb agreements, I taught them to read, write, and speak better.
It was one class for all ages. We usually had around five to ten kids in the classroom. It was all done for free. Ann and I never got any reward or payment. I’m not sure if the children’s parents even knew their kids were still going to school in the afternoons. Our Purok president and Barangay Captain probably did not even know, but we did it all with pure gladness and without much thought.
I can’t remember how Ann and I planned for our lessons. I think we didn’t have any. I just brought my books. We asked for the kids to bring their pens and papers. Everything just flowed from there. Ann’s mother was a public school teacher. That was probably where Ann got her teaching skills.
For two summers, Ann and I taught in our makeshift classroom. We didn’t have any measure for success except that before the summers ended, we were seeing how the kids became better at reading and writing.
After classes, we would all play together. I became friends with other kids. We were students and teachers, but we were all playmates. It was still like school, but this time I was the teacher. When I went home, it would be just in time when my Mamang and Papang also went home from work. At our dinner table, I would tell my parents stories of how my day went.
In one letter that I have kept until today, Ann wrote about how grateful she was she found me that time. She finally had a co-teacher. She said that she would often tell her Mama how amazed she was that at such a young age, I was already advanced in my reading, writing, and public speaking. She said I was a great teacher.
Soon enough all the kids started growing up including Ann and me. There was no longer a summer for the neighborhood, just summers for each of us to experience. Even though we were neighbors, we hardly saw each other. We stopped becoming summer teachers. Our classroom closed. The students were all grown up. There was no longer a need for teaching.
I have not seen or talked to Ann for years. I’m not even sure if this is still a shared memory between us. But I now look back to this memory with fondness. These summers were my first experiences of what it meant to be part of a community.
How does a community begin?
We tend to label certain experiences as coming from the need to help or to give, but positioning yourself as a helper or a giver changes the perspective. Ann and I were not helpers or givers. We did not teach because we saw a problem that needed to be solved or because we wanted to impress the other kids or their parents. We taught because we enjoyed reading and writing, and we found kids who enjoyed the same things but needed a little more attention than us, and so, we shared what we had.
We were merely sharers more than being givers or helpers. We shared our knowledge, resources, and time. We all shared in the fun. There was no measure of success and no expectation of a reward. It was the simple gift of community.
Positioning and distinction between sharing and helping matters. Helping suggests filling what is lacking. Sharing suggests using or apportioning available resources at the same time.
Perhaps that is why community forms more naturally when sharing rather than in helping. They begin when there is little to no agenda, only having something in common and making it available to others. The word community is derived from the Latin communis, meaning “common” or “shared by all.”
Looking back, that was what we built: a small summer learning community. We did not start because of a vision, strategy, or plan. We did not need a structure, agenda, or rewards. What we had were people who had a common love for learning. Out of that common love, we shared our knowledge, time, resources, willingness, and presence. And as it turned out, it was enough.
As for myself, sometimes, plagued with strategies and ideas, I find myself believing that I need to be excellent before I can get the job done. I seem to always need to know the prerequisites first before I can even say yes. But once in my life, I was a summer teacher, not because I was qualified, not because I wanted to serve, not because I was an excellent visionary and strategist, not because I had a cause to drive, but simply because, I wanted to share what I knew with a group of people who wanted to take part in it, and that was enough.
These days, a table awaits on Thursday nights for people to gather around. I prepare and would later find myself unfit and unqualified. But I thank God for helping me retrieve this memory as a reminder that the simple means of gathering and sharing even one thing in common is already enough. The summer classroom of 12 gifted me with a lasting lesson for the table of five. And so I come to the table and wait. I save space for others to join. We will all share what we already have.
LIFE NOTES 