SWFM20: Let's interact

"Students of Class 10, does copying feel swell?"

While the words of Class 7's form teacher, Zhang Xiuyun, were clearly targeted, she had expressly said 'Students of Class 10'. Therefore, the students of Class 10 were enraged. There were some who snorted, some who hit the table, and even some who jeered, but out of their habitual respect towards teachers, no one spoke directly against her.

"Mrs Zhang, what is the meaning of this?" Standing by the doorway, Old Zhou suppressed his anger as he asked.

"The meaning? Just ask some certain students of yours," Zhang Xiuyun cocked her head to the side, replying without even the slightest semblance of politeness.

As per Xu Tingsheng's impression from his previous life, Zhang Xiuyun was a very domineering woman. Her relationship with most teachers was not all that great, and she herself seemed not to care very much about this.

However, the events that had unfolded had still diverged from that within his memories. When Mrs Zhang Xiuyun had first appeared at the doorway of Class 10, Xu Tingsheng had still thought that as in his previous life, she was here to invite him to interact with the students of Class 7, sharing his studying methods on Combined Humanities. In the end, it had just been his wishful thinking. Zhang Xiuqing had walked straight to the front of the room, blasting out with such a sentence.

When she had been speaking, her gaze had fallen on Xu Tingsheng.

Having been right behind Old Zhou in leaving the office, Vice Chairman Zhang held him back, he who was demonstrating at this point that 'even Buddhas can get mad'. Fortunately, the two teachers did not break out into a quarrel before the students. However, the disturbance here being rather great, after a short while, the teachers of the Humanities Office all emerged, coming over.

The Form Teacher of Class 7 stood at the front of Class 10, while Class 10's Form Teacher was instead standing at the doorway, the scent of gunpowder pervading the air.

"What's the situation?" The teachers inquired amongst themselves, discussing the matter.

Amidst the ruckus, Xu Tingsheng stood up.

"Mrs Zhang," Xu Tingsheng called in a clear voice.

All the gazes were drawn over by him, the area immediately falling silent.

Smiling, Xu Tingsheng said calmly, "Mrs Zhang, your earlier words…I think that I am the most suspicious one? I've thought about it, getting the various teachers to specifically make a set of examination papers to test me again would really be pretty troublesome. How about this; can the teachers serve as witnesses for me as I go to Class 7 and interact on study methods with the Class 7 students?"

Xu Tingsheng had said 'interact', but in everyone's ears, especially in those of the teachers, this was him wanting to go to Class 7 to 'conduct a lesson', not shrinking back from a battle of tongues with a crowd of scholars in order to prove his own innocence.

Xu Tingsheng did not dare to wait for anyone to interrupt him. He had already long since set the subject for 'interaction'. It was history, for other than history, what else could it be?

"I scored the highest in Combined Humanities this time, so I'll interact on history with the Class 7 students. It just happens that Vice Chairman Zhang is here, and the other teachers can help to serve as witnesses as well."

Xu Tingsheng had maintained a smiling face whilst saying all this, his tone calm. However, to the ears of all, this was a provocation, a blatant provocation.

Therefore, whether it was Zhang Xiuyun or Vice Chairman Zhang, neither of them was able to refuse it.

…

The venue for this 'interaction' was finally decided to be one of the big media classrooms. While Xu Tingsheng had called for the Class 7 students, the Class 10 students of his 'hometown', not being able to rest at ease, had insisted on going along, and many teachers had arrived to spectate as well. With that, Class 7's classroom was completely unable to fit all of them.

The media classroom was generally only used by teachers for large scale lessons or by external specialists for lectures. Vice Chairman Zhang had initially thought that this seemed to be giving Xu Tingsheng too much face, but had then thought that him getting laid bare before so many people would also not be a bad thing. That way, even if the vice-principal were to feel something on the matter afterwards, there was no way he would be able to blame him. Therefore, he had agreed for its use.

Another reason was that he could already no longer obstruct this matter. Be it the unconvinced students of Class 7 or the furious students of Class 10, an end had to be put to this matter.

In the end, the students of the two classes domineeringly entered the media classroom together, followed by many students of other classes, some even being from the lower grades. This was because classes had already ended, and with the news having spread, who would not want to come to see the commotion?

When finally no further people could be squeezed within the media classroom and its doors had to be closed, Xu Tingsheng saw Wu Yuewei standing at the back, as well as that Vice-Principal Lou who was in charge of the student affairs office. With a face full of attentiveness, Vice Chairman Zhang was offering him a seat.

Seated at a corner, Old Zhou shot Xu Tingsheng, about to ascend the podium, an encouraging look. The scale of the occasion was really too great, such that most young teachers would inevitably feel nervous, yet alone Xu Tingsheng who was still a student. Old Zhou was actually rather worried about him.

Xu Tingsheng returned Old Zhou a peaceful smile, striding before the podium.

With that very first step, Xu Tingsheng became dazed, staring blankly ahead where he was. That feeling was very mysterious, as images of Xu Tingsheng's past and current lives seemed to flicker intermittently before his eyes, countless scenes momentarily appearing before him.

In his previous life, he had stood at the podium countless times. To the current him, this small little space seemed familiar yet foreign, painful yet emotional.

4 years-Xu Tingsheng had been a teacher in his previous life for 4 years. While he had not made it to a leadership position or earned much, those had still been his stablest, happiest and most satisfying days of his life.

Yesterday, once more.

For just that single moment, Xu Tingsheng even dazedly felt as though all that he had experienced earlier had just been a dream. Resigning was part of that dream, Xiang Ning was part of that dream, failure was part of that dream, pain was part of that dream, rebirth was part of that dream…having awoken in the morning, he had returned to reality, coming to work, conducting a lesson.

Laughter erupted from the audience, pulling Xu Tingsheng back to reality.

"Could he have been scared silly?" Someone muttered, expressing a thought that many people actually had.

Xu Tingsheng smiled apologetically. Something like this really couldn't scare him at all. His four years of teaching experience aside, in his previous life, Xu Tingsheng had once been the youngest teacher in history representing Jiannan City in participating in the Provincial Teaching Evaluation. Even in a great hall of over a thousand people, against teachers and specialists from all over the entire province, he had never been nervous.

That lesson which had earned Xu Tingsheng the first prize in the entire province was <Diplomacy of New China>. Having conducted this lesson several tens of times at various different places at differing times, it would be hard for him to forget it even if he wanted.

This was also the content that he had prepared for today. Since he was already playing with such high stakes, he might as well make it a little more vicious. To Xu Tingsheng, a problem which could be solved in a single lesson had never been a problem.

"Xu Tingsheng, which country's leaders attended the Potsdam Conference? Which countries were it that released the Potsdam Declaration?"

Xu Tingsheng had just wanted to speak when a Class 7 student down below asked a question. This was a girl whom he did not recognise. Perhaps she held no ill intentions, just being unhappy, unhappy that as a student, Xu Tingsheng actually even arrogantly intended to 'give them a lesson', even though his original word had been 'interaction'.

Therefore, she was actually being very crafty in asking this question.

Xu Tingsheng smiled, answering, "The countries which attended the Potsdam Conference were Russia, the US and Britain. Of these, Russia's leader was Stalin. For the American side, it has to be noted that President Roosevelt, having participated in several important conferences on behalf of the US previously, had already died of sickness. The one who represented the US was their new President, President Truman. If questions on this really come out in the exams, everyone should remember to be careful of such traps, yes? Just like how this beautiful student here tried to set one for me just now."

Laughter erupted beneath the stage, some people pulling out their notebooks and beginning to take notes.

When the laughter had ceased, Xu Tingsheng continued, "The British side is rather more complicated. At first, their representative was still Churchill, whom everyone is familiar with, that adorable fatty who was the earliest to take a photograph with the scissors hand pose. However, amidst the Conference, a new election was held in Britain, and Churchill was voted out of office. Therefore, you have to take note that there was a newly elected Attlee of Britain who participated in the Potsdam Conference as well."

This was an additional point of knowledge which had not been touched on in the books, something that was virtually impossible to come out in the examinations. However, it was precisely because of this that it was even more shocking. If Xu Tingsheng had just touched on the main points that had been written in the books, many of Class 7 would also already have grasped that relevant information. With him instead revealing external knowledge, suppressing them with such, the results were much more prominent.

While saying 'scissors hand', Xu Tingsheng had also woodenly flashed this pose, a round of laughter thus erupting beneath the stage. However, when he had spoken of Attlee, everyone fell silent. Computers were still not so widespread in this time and age, resulting in the scope of the students' knowledge being comparatively narrow. Therefore, virtually no one knew of this point.

Xu Tingsheng looked at the few Libei Senior High history teachers present, currently discussing on this in a low tone. Amongst them, many must have failed to notice this point.

"Finally, the most important point that this student asked about, I feel, that you should attempt to remember rather than understand, is that while the nations that participated in the Potsdam Conference were Russia, the US and Britain, the <> was released jointly by China, the US and Britain. The reason for this…I already said that there is no need to understand this, heh."

This time, no loud laughter remained. Even if there was laughter beneath the stage, it was also repressed with lowered heads. Comparatively speaking, the sounds of the tips on pens on paper were now louder, with many people in the process of taking notes.

Xu Tingsheng paused for a while, waiting till all those lowered heads were raised once more before he continued, "This is the response to your question. Is this beautiful student satisfied?"

Under the gazes of Xu Tingsheng and everyone else here, the female student of Class 7 who had posed the question lowered her head, her face reddened, "Yes, thank you."

Xu Tingsheng's gaze swept the entire area, "Are there any more questions from the floor?"

…

Following this, Xu Tingsheng continuously answered seven to eight more questions, most of them being real inquiries. Of course, there were also some which were intentionally trying to make things difficult for him, such as a few obscure dates and whatnot. Xu Tingsheng answered them all.

Amidst such proceedings, the questions posed by the Class 7 students became more and more tricky, appearing like they just had to make Xu Tingsheng lose face.

"I would like to ask Student Xu. When the Chinese Cruiser Zhiyuan was sunk in the Naval Battle of the Yellow Sea, how many soldiers died for their country?" A pleasant-sounding voice resounded.

Looking over, Xu Tingsheng saw that it was the female student who had been first in the entire year the most times in the Humanities stream. He remembered her name being Ye Yingjing, not because of her outstanding results, but because she was beautiful.

Study queens were common, but beautiful study queens were rare.

This question of Ye Yingjing's was actually already approaching the point of being nonsensical. However tricky the previous questions of the Class 7 students had been, they had still not reached the point of being so outrageously ridiculous. However, this question of hers clearly had the look of her openly making trouble.

Some students of Class 10 were rather enraged by this as they made heated criticisms in lowered voices. However, Xu Tingsheng shot Ye Yingjing a look of gratitude. If it was said that those earlier questions were tricky but still in earnest, and such questions with true evidence and logic were making things difficult, this nonsensical question of hers was actually helping him to resolve his predicament, because no one would care about whether Xu Tingsheng answered correctly or wrongly. On the contrary, what they would pay attention to was Ye Yingjing's nonsensicality.

After this question had been asked, it was certain that no one would dare to pose tricky questions any longer, because that could be linked together as continuously stirring up trouble for no good reason, easily leading to the condemnation of all.

"This little girl rather has a sense of justice."

Xu Tingsheng complimented her inwardly as he smiled, "I must thank Ye Yingjing for helping me to resolve my predicament. Still, I can indeed answer this question. The number of soldiers who died for their country along with the Chinese Cruiser Zhiyuan in the Naval Battle of the Yellow Sea was 246."

Xu Tingsheng instead came and resolved Ye Yingjing's predicament as he gave an answer to her question, an answer which was straightforward, decisive, and filled with tremendous confidence.

No one thought of doubting it. Everyone, from the students to the teachers, was stunned. He actually knew even this? But what amount of perused reading materials and level of memorisation abilities did that entail?

SWFM21: Student or teacher?

After Xu Tingsheng had revealed the statistic of 246, the entire room fell silent.

Ye Yingjing was the first to recover as she stood up, “Student Xu, you...actually, I asked the question arbitrarily. I don’t know the answer to it at all.”

Xu Tingsheng smiled, replying relaxedly, “Actually, I answered it arbitrarily as well. I knew that you didn’t know it.”

Noise erupted.

Some felt a sense of relief, some were rendered speechless, some wanted to laugh, some didn’t know whether to smile or to cry, but virtually everyone here was currently thinking the same, “So it was answered arbitrarily. That’s good, that’s good. I’d still thought that he was really already monstrous to that extent; that would really make people not feel like living.”

The students who had earlier been shocked by Xu Tingsheng’s straightforward and confident answer virtually to the point of falling on the ground and prostrating themselves and the teachers whose confidence had taken a huge blow finally managed to properly straighten their weakened knees once more...they had nearly collapsed and knelt.

Their completely shattered and scattered self-esteem was also in the process of being pieced back together.

“The statistic of 246 might be wrong...I deduced it based on the deployment of the Northern Navy at the time as well as the tonnage of the cruiser Zhiyuan and the firepower it possessed etcetera...therefore, I think that it would not be too outrageously wrong. The deviation between the statistic of 246 and the true number should lie within three people.”

Xu Tingsheng supplemented a lance, a lance that...with great cracking noises, again shattered the self-esteem of everyone here, which had only just been pieced back together, “How is it not an arbitrary answer again? Deduction, based on deployment, tonnage of military cruiser and possessed firepower...this...his mother, it’s even more monstrous than having coincidentally seen it before and then remembered it...deviation of three people at most?...There’s no way to live anymore.”

…

No one asked anything further. Xu Tingsheng questioned them twice further, but there were indeed no further questions.

Whoever asked was a sucker.

“Since you have no further questions, let’s go on with...interaction. What I wish to interact with everyone on is a type of autonomous learning model. I have christened this method as autonomic learning.”

At this time, the concept of ‘autonomic learning’ that would be extremely popular a few years later had still not yet been officially proposed and proliferated. Many students were at a loss upon hearing this term, while the teachers had only vaguely heard of something similar before. Honestly speaking, it was something that left many of them unhappy, “Autonomic learning-what’s the meaning of that? Are you treating us teachers as extraneous?”

Doubt and dissatisfaction left many teachers’ faces ugly.

Xu Tingsheng continued, “What then is autonomic learning? First, it has to be made clear that it is not self-learning. The most important principle of autonomic learning is that it has to be done under the guidance of the teachers. Otherwise, we’d all fall into a trench, the Mariana Trench.”

The students laughed, and the expressions of the teachers turned radiant as sunlight once more.

“My meaning is that when we are revising our work, we must learn to reflect on it under the guidance of our teachers’ teachings as we autonomously sort them out. In simple terms, we should look from the standpoint of teachers in terms of looking at and dealing with knowledge.

“Why do teachers have a better grasp on knowledge than us?...Foundation is one reason, while methods and techniques are another, key factor. When sorting out knowledge in preparation for lessons, teachers have to search for a proper order of logic as well as means of expression in order to transmit that information. As I see it, this is actually the most perfect method of learning. Whether it is in the aspect of memory or understanding, it is the most perfect method, whilst also being the most efficient.”

“Therefore, it is our teachers whom we have to emulate.”

Other than the students here who had been rendered wide-eyed and tongue-tied, many of the teachers present had already unconsciously began taking notes, because a portion of them had already discovered that Xu Tingsheng’s viewpoint could actually already form a thesis, an education thesis that could very possibly generate massive upheaval.

Xu Tingsheng continued, “For example, in the previous month, my two best friends helped me in revising Mathematics, and everyone knows how well that turned out. They guided my results down, while guiding their own results up...why is that?...it’s because they are bastards.”

Amidst the laughter that erupted, Huang Yaming and Fu Cheng threw the caps of their pens onto the stage, “The hell, how shameless, still acting pitiful and tricking a meal out of us.”

Xu Tingsheng pocketed the two pen caps, continuing, “That was just a joke. I believe that many of you here have understood my meaning. Their improvement was precisely because of them having unconsciously stood from a teacher’s standpoint in diligently guiding me, sorting out and gathering together the required knowledge as they searched for patterns and techniques in order to explain to me better. In this process, they themselves benefited very greatly, as greatly as this.”

Xu Tingsheng spread his arms wide, as though opening up his embrace. Huang Yaming and Fu Cheng exchanged glances. They knew that what Xu Tingsheng said was true.

“Since today’s interaction subject is History, I will give an example on this, a complete autonomic learning process, demonstrating to you all the method that I speak of. The topic I have chosen is Diplomacy of New China.”

Xu Tingsheng turned and wrote the title on the blackboard. His writing was smooth and elegant, his movements like flowing water.

The teachers down below seemed all to be in a bit of a trancelike state at this moment. Looking at Xu Tingsheng on the stage, it felt as though they were looking at a colleague, an extremely competent colleague who doing a familiar job relaxedly and with ease. From the beginning till now, in terms of the grasping of rhythm, the moderation of the class’s atmosphere, the organisation of speech as well as his bearing on the stage-all of these had been performed perfectly and without flaw.

One must know that this interaction had begun with him a student under suspicion of cheating. Now however, the situation was already fully within his grasp. For such to have been achieved...very difficult, countless times more difficult for one who was not a teacher.

However, Xu Tingsheng had managed to do it.

“It would be a real pity if this student of yours didn’t become a teacher, but it would be even more of a pity if he really did become one. I feel that he could become a great orator.”

“It is not at all strange that such a child saw great improvements. Whoever still suspects anything must really have problems with their brains.”

The two teachers sitting beside Old Zhou said such to him. In a joyful mood, Old Zhou laughed heartily.

The feelings of the students present were somewhat more complicated. Some people had already completely fallen into a trance.

“Teacher…” someone raised his hand.

Xu Tingsheng was taken aback for a moment as numerous emotions assailed him, “I am not a teacher...do you have any questions?”

“Ah...faint,” the student scratched his head, “About that, teacher...Student Xu, can you wait a while before beginning? I want to head back to my classroom to take my notebook.”

“I want to go too.”

“Me too.”

“Us as well, please wait for a bit.”

…

Nothing had more persuasive power than all these voices. Many of the people present had only come here due to the nature of the occasion, wanting to see a joke take place or purely because they wanted to support or make things difficult for Xu Tingsheng. As such, they had come here empty-handed, all of them regretting it now.

Luckily, Xu Tingsheng still understood his position as he did not make decisions beyond his authority, sending an enquiring gaze to the group of teachers present, Vice-Principal Lou amongst them slapping the table, “You have five minutes; you’d best hurry up.”

The doors of the media classroom opened, a huge crowd of people filling up the area outside.

About to begin hurrying back, those students hesitated. If they made a trip back, wouldn’t their places be snatched away when they had returned?

“That someone; I’ll take your notebook for you. You help me to keep my place.”

“Right.”

Finally, a win-win proposal was thought up.