GMA plays teacher to Grade 1 pupils

It was back to the classroom yesterday for President Arroyo — not to teach economics to future policy makers, but geography and something about a "magic mat" to Grade 1 pupils in Mandaluyong as the city celebrated its fiesta.

And while her young students at the Andres Bonifacio Integrated School were not too familiar with western countries, Mrs. Arroyo sought to highlight the importance of illustration materials and visual aids in teaching.

During her teaching stint in Mandaluyong City, the President decided to teach geography instead of just telling the simple story of the "magic mat."

She asked for a world map as she was not content with a map of Asia and a globe and asked students to identify western and eastern countries.

Mrs. Arroyo was actually trying to drive home a point as she later directed the Department of Budget and Management to release P500 million to the Department of Education for the purchase of textbooks and instructional materials for public schools nationwide.

The President’s class consisted of the "brightest minds" in Grade 1 of ABIS as 44 of the 52 students she taught yesterday were the chosen scholars of the oil firm, Petron Corp.

However, world geography appeared too advanced for them.

The President wanted the pupils to name some countries in the west and got answers like China, Indonesia and Malaysia — all in the east.

She did get some correct answers such as America, Brazil and Chile and accepted "Las Vegas" as part of the United States, a country in the west.

It was easier for them to point at certain countries on the world map, such as England and Spain.

They were also able to easily hurdle her fill-in-the-blanks challenge.

For very correct answer, the President generously praised the children with the words "very good" and "excellent."

Later she sat down and read to the students "The Magic Mat" by National Artist for Literature Virgilio Almario and showed the illustrations in the so-called "Big Book" donated by Petron.

The "Big Book" series was donated by Petron in line with the Bright Minds Read program, which emphasizes storytelling.

One of Mrs. Arroyo’s standout pupils was named "Heaven." He said there was no such thing as a "magic mat" because the boy in the story was actually just dreaming when he traveled to different places on board the "magic mat."

"Heaven," however, was a bit older than other Grade 1 children since his schooling had been delayed for economic reasons.