Francisco Pelagio
In every quiz competition, we highly expect that our students will bring home the bacon. But the moment the result is announce our expectation turns into disappointment because of the poor performance showed by our students. We always feel disappointed every time our student did not make it even just in a final round. Often times we put the blame on our students on their poor performance, but, who is supposed to be blamed? Are we not the one to be blamed for their poor performance? .As a teacher coach, what did we do to expect them to win? Is their preparation enough? If only we reflect on why our students showed poor performance during competition, perhaps, we will be able to realize that no one is to be blamed but us.
A Quiz bee is really a battle of preparation. Victory lies on how we train and prepare our student ahead of time for the competition. Thorough preparation is a must. Constant solving numerous math problems will help a lot in math competition. Cramming is an ineffective way to prepare as it makes it harder for our students to absorb and retain information. Often time, we train our students just two weeks before the competition. The result is that our participants do not make it to the final.
It is widely accepted that Muñoz National School-Annex is just the third choice of students from nearby barangays who are with honors in their respective school. They usually enroll in a school that offers science curriculum. With the talents of these students, it is hard to win over the school with high caliber students. But with the desire to win, hard work, dedication of the teacher coach and with determination of the students, bringing home the bacon is possible. Proof of this was the 2018 Division Integrated Quiz bee where their Grade 10 Quiz and secondary Sudoku contestant of MNHS-Annex emerge as the champion and was able to represent the division in the Regional Festival of Talents.
The hard earned triumph gave us enormous joy and pride in our heart. Especially when we think of the countless effort and sacrifices in training our students, the endless search for the possible solution to some problems given in MTAP quiz bee that even the coaches cannot solve , the continuous learning and constant solving of different problems just to improve the mastery level of the students and to improve their chances of winning ,those times when we even sacrificed our time with our family just to have training session with them, the countless effort we made just to make sure our students will be ready in time of competition and above all, the continuous motivation and encouragement of our Principal to prepare ahead of time.
As a teacher coach, we will not stop pursuing our goal to win over the favorites. If we fail, we will do our best to make it the next time around. We will just work harder and change our way of preparing our students. Set our goals and focus on the competition. As the saying goes,” If you can’t reach your goal, adjust your action not your goal”. The search for the elusive gold in MTAP Mathematics Challenge is not yet over. With greater dedication, hard work and determination, for sure, someday we will be able to achieve victory.