What's the worst learning experience you can remember?

This week I’ve been attending a workshop on inclusive education. A very good workshop, I might add: one which leaves room for the possibility that there may be valid objections to inclusion, and which, when it talks about gender, actually means ‘gender’ and not ‘women’.

At the start of the week, we were asked to think back to our own childhood, and to remember a positive learning experience, either in or out of school. (For some reason, the moment that came to mind was when my Dad let go of my bike’s saddle when I was learning to ride in the park.) Once we had discussed what had made those experiences so positive, we were then asked to think back to a negative learning experience.

The best I could come up with was when a primary school teacher repeatedly failed to correct my spelling of Saturday in exercise books. Surrounded by stories of inexcusably poor teaching, of ritual humiliation, of flogging – and the worst experience I can remember from my school days is when a teacher didn’t correct the spelling of a word. Sure, there were things from my schooldays that have left their mark on me – bullies, friendship fall-outs, unrequited loves; but in terms of the actual education part, I can barely remember a difficult learning experience, and certainly nothing traumatic. Even in the lessons of the positively vile teachers (actually, The Vile Teacher), whom I loathed, I actually learnt a lot.

It was a humbling realization. I suddenly felt incredibly lucky to have had access to such a high quality – and safe – education. But more than that: I felt guilty. White Man’s Guilt. Surrounded by mainly Nigerians (and those from the wealthier end of Nigerian society), it was embarrassing that, through no effort on my own part, I had been able to have an education where the worst thing that happened was I thought the day before Sunday was spelled ‘Satday’.