Reflection #04 - Home Visit

In Jhemar Taborada’s world, studying is always the last thing on his mind. First, Jhemar wasn’t even there. Where was he? The answer: playing basketball with his friends. After we called him out, he guided us to their home and we met his grandmother. Jhemar’s parents were separated, she told us. He was born when his mother was only in her teens. Unable to fully support all her children, the mother asked Jhemar’s grandmother to raise him. We think that because of this unfortunate separation of family ties, Jhemar was unable to fully experience life with his parents at a young age. Their house was very small. It was part of a series of small apartment-like homes in the area. It was behind a small gate, where other houses were very close to it. Inside, the refrigerator, wooden chair, kitchen and bedroom could be seen already. That was how cramped inside the place was. When we talked about Jhemar’s progress, we found out that the root cause of his failure in school is the common ailment, laziness. “Katamaran, sa wikang Pilipino.” Every now and then, he would go home, play basketball, watch TV, get tired and drift away into slumber. Homework? Not done. No time left. Sleep was the essence of the moment. After we and his grandmother lectured him about the hardships of life and how to deal with difficult schoolwork, the answer was to always at least practice or do the homework right away. After homework, he could play. That simple. We do hope that Jhemar learns from the home visit so that he can arrange his priorities. It would definitely be a big plus for his grandmother. We then went to the third house which was a lot nearer to the school than Jhemar’s. Theirs was a long walk away from St. Mary’s.