The downside of studying from the back bench

Some studies have found that seating arrangement in the classroom affects the performance of students and those in the back have a disadvantage. I can vouch for that from personal experience.

In 1967, my father, who was in the Army, was transferred to Yol Camp in Punjab. At the new station, I was admitted to class IV of a government school. I had been good at studies until then but lost focus because of the translocation and began to falter. I would often return home with my palm cherry-red having borne the blows of the teacher’s ruler. Worse still, I was sent to the backbenches. As a result, I fell into the "bad company" which quickly convinced me that studies were for the dummies and mischief-making was the real thing. Backbenches were fun for another reason— From there one could see what exactly was going on in the class.

Fortunately, my father, who used to follow my progress, was too busy those days to pay much attention. So, I regressed further. But, one Sunday— that I cannot forget— he found time to catch up with my progress. When he saw the teacher’s adverse remarks in my notebooks, he was upset. Never the one to spare the rod, he restrained himself that day realising that I alone was not responsible for my situation.

He asked me why I was not doing well. I told him the half-truth that the teacher had relegated me to the backbenches from where I could not grasp anything. “I will come to your school tomorrow”, Father said and left me.

The next day, he came directly to my class and seeing that I was at the backbenches, he lost his cool at what he thought was a patently unfair thing. He asked the class teacher sharply why he had sent me to the backbenches. The teacher objected to my father’s interference in the class and a heated argument ensued after which the two went to the headmaster to complain against each other. I was terribly scared and thought I would be thrown out of the school.

There was a lot of respect for military men back then. The headmaster was, therefore, sympathetic. After hearing the two sides, he made my father apologise to the teacher who in turn agreed to let me sit in the front rows on the condition that my father would follow up my studies henceforth. Father agreed and I was saved. Well, within a short time, I recovered the lost ground. But when I look back, I am tempted to advise all teachers to never relegate a student to the backbenches just because he is weak in studies.