I knew that my story with Tibetan students had already begun from the first day when I walked into Beijing Tibet High School.

I teach two classes , and I love the pure eyes and positive attitude of those tibetab kids, which always makes me happy.

A girl with big eyes in the front rows caught my attention. She always sat there and listened to me very carefully. Nevertheless, she didn’t earn good marks in the first monthly test. I asked all my students to hand in study summary reports so that I could read hers and get what was going on with her.

"Mrs. Dou," She said in the report, "finally I can speak my mind to you. My last math teacher often punished me in class, and as a result, I would always get nervous once I am learning math…… "

Then I learnt that she was from a remote area of Tibet where the teaching level lagged far behind that of most inland schools. Some of her teachers even used physical punishment to force students to study. From then on, learning math had casted a shadow on the heart of those students. They didn’t want to talk to teachers, and they don’t believe in themselves.

Therefore, I wrote a letter long enough to encourage her to look math as a happy thing. And I hope to be a friend of her.

She became even more industrious in learning. Once when I explained to these Tibetan students a pretty tough question in math and asked if they understood me or not, some of them stared at the blackboard, some of them were taking notes while others tightened their eyebrows, trying to figure out this question, but she muttered to herself something.

I asked her to stand up to speak up her confusing part, and she started to ask me a lot questions. I was delighted that she could speak up and I called upon everybody to learn from her.

Since then, she raised more questions to me every time when she was confused. And she became more active in answering my questions in class.

One night, I picked up my Tibetan language book after I corrected their homework in my office, as the school organized us in learning Tibetan. It was not easy for me. The pronunciation of Tibetan was kind of tongue-twister.

"Mrs. Dou,"a little girl appeared by the door. I was surprised to find it was her.

"I got some questions in math, and can you explain them to me?" she asked me with a shy smile.

"Sure!" I said happily.

When she was about to leave my office after I answered her questions, she found there was a Tibetan language teaching book on my desk.

"Mrs. Dou, are you learning Tibetan?”

"Yeah, we need to learn Tibetan so that we can communicate with you guys better. But I always make mistakes in pronunciation.”
"That's alright, Mrs.Dou. Let me help!”

I gave my Tibetan book to her, and picked up some Tibetan words which I always mixed up with. She read these Tibetan words to me loud and clear. She was so earnestly that she would repeat every pronunciation to me and correct every tiny mistake I had made.

I became a student immediately in front of her.

"You are doing a great job, Mrs. Dou!”I raised my head and looked at her, smiling. I know that these words clearly for I often use them to praise and encourage her.

As time flies by, we both made great progress in our poor subject. Just as Han Yu, an outstanding proser in Tang Dynasty said in his prose, “pupils are not necessarily inferior to their teachers, nor teachers better than their pupils. Some learn the truth earlier than others, and some have special skills. That is all.”

Most of the time, we teach others by considering ourselves as granted teachers. Most of time, we would forget that "people's shortcomings" are before "presumptuously to lecture people".

Most of the time, we always try to find faults of others with a cavil attitude while forgetting others’ shining points. Most of the time, our eyes do not lack sense of beauty, but lack observation.

That’s what I have learned from my little Tibetan teacher.

From: China Tibet Online

（Editor：黄蓓蓓）