When schools are closed

Media

Part of The Young Citizen: The Magazine for Young People

Title: When schools are closed
Creator: Panlasigui, I.
Language: English
Year: 1941
Rights
Fulltext: THE YOUNG CITIZEN WHEN SCHOOLS ARE CLOSED March is the end of our school-year. March closes the schools. MARCH, 1941 School children have their vacation and rest from school activities-no more books, homework, compositions, nor recitations. Schools are closed and classrooms are also closed. · · · And what shall we do during vacation time? People in Manila want to go outside of the city for their vacation. People in the provinces want to come to Manila or elsewhere~ Some of them close their homes during the summer vacation. They close the windows arid lock the doors so that nobody may go into the house during their absence. Pieces of furniture are covered with canvas-the piano, the·tables, and the chairs. For two or more months the house is tightly closed. No one is allowed to go into it. When vacation is over the people return home. They open the doors. They open the windows. And what do they see? Dust eve'rywhere--on the floor, on the covered furniture, on the window sills. Cobwebs on the ceiling, -cobwebs under the chairs, cobwebs under the tables, cobwebs everywhere. Dead insects, cockroaches and perhaps rats. The rooms smell damp, dusty, and musty. The whole house needs a general cleaning! Shall we close our mind-the house of our learning 1 as it were-during the vacation time? Shall we stop studying or learning new things because schoolhouses· and classrooms are closed during the vacation? Of course not. If we did, something would happen to our minds. Dust, cobwebs, dead insects, cockroaches, and rats, would be found in our minds. · We should continue to learn many things, not i~ classrooms but in the new places where we spend our vacation. Make new friends, look for new plants, flowers, birds. Closed schools should not mean closed minds. · -·DR. l. PANLASIGUI