People who Accomplish things

When this idea struck my mind, I could not help thinking of both teachers and students. It’s due to the fact that they are all divided into two groups : those who accomplish things and those who claim to have accomplished things. When I was a student, I used to have classmates who accomplished things in class and those who claimed to have accomplished them. The other day, I was reading Mark twain from whom I learnt this truism. And my previous experiences as a student and a teacher have inspired me more to know more about the two groups.

If my memory serves me rightly, I would say that I belonged to the second for a very short time and then went on to belong to the first group for the rest of my life. As a middle school student, I used to claim to accomplish things. I would tell my parents that I did well at school. I would tell my classmates that I did well in the quizzes I sat for and I even showed them my grades. However, with time, I sooner or later had to belong to the first group. I would attribute this sudden change to my maturity. To my surprise, most students still belong to the second group.

I still vividly remember this when I was a university student. We all sat for countless exams then, but the thing that differentiated one from another was the fact that some of us chose to reveal what they wrote on the exam paper, while others chose to keep their leaps sealed until the markes were given to us. If someone accomplish things confidently, inside he feels it needless to say it to others. As for others who claim to accomplish things, they have to say it to their peers, for they are not confident enough about their work.

Let us draw an analogy between the two groups from the psychological point of view. The fact that those who claim to accomplish things do not do well in their academic life, while those who accomplish things without claiming do really well can be explained in this manner : because of their weakness or incompetence, some university students feel compelled to say whatever they do in class to other students either to show off or to confirm that they too are great. As for the other group, provided that they have already done well, they see no point in explaining every single question or answer.

Recently, as I was making for my class, I heard a teacher complaing of a sore throat to the headmaster. I stopped to say hello to both. And when the headmaster enquired why, the teacher replied that it was because he talked a lot in class and explained things for so long. I am sorry to say that I had to burst into laughter when I heard that. But I tried hard not to show it. A few weeks later, the same teacher came again one day, complaining to one of the administrators that time did not suffice him to complete all the lessons. I really have no idea why he claimed to have accomplished all these trivial things in his class.

One day, on the bus, some teachers and I were discussing certain things about the educational system. Out of the blue, a teacher of Arabic intervened to say that the report he had lately written on the level of his students won the first prize. Worse, he began to get into the details of it. I couldn’t stand it. Everyone has the right to claim to me what he accomplishes but only when I enquire about it.