Firm but caring are the words used by a former student to describe long-time educator Dr. Charlotte Suzanne Furbert Ming.

When Dr. Ming was interviewed by the she never noticed that she was sitting right next to Lifestyle?s reporter Ren? Hill.

It?s understandable Dr. Ming might forget a few since she?s been teaching for over 40 years.

Miss Hill, who is in her 30s remembered the firm discipline that kept her and her classmates in line, but she also remembered the books that Dr. Ming read to her West Pembroke students on a daily basis.

Dr. Ming has taught hundreds of Bermudians from primary school through to secondary school. After retiring from her post as principal of Clearwater Middle School last December she is now teaching other teachers in a course at the Bermuda College and occasionally substitute teaching.

?I am teaching folks who want to be teachers on Tuesday nights,? said Dr. Ming. ?The course I am teaching at the moment is Individual Differences in Learning. It is a mandatory course for the associate degree at Mount Saint Vincent University in Canada. I am enjoying that.?

The programme helps teachers to take into account the different learning styles of their students. Some people are visual learners while others are auditory, kinaesthetic, or tactile. For example, one person may remember a telephone number by physically writing it down, while another person will need to see it, or hear it spoken.

Dr. Ming said, as one might expect, teachers are actually easier to teach than students.

?They are easy because they want to be at the college,? she said. ?These are mature ladies. Some of them have grandchildren and they are trying to better themselves.

Dr. Ming received her doctoral degree in instructional leadership and supervision in education from St. John?s University in Queens, New York in May 2004.

?I was at Clearwater and I heard about the doctoral programme at St. John?s and instructor Dr. Rita Dunn has been to Bermuda several times. She and her husband devised a learning style programme.

?She came to Bermuda to introduce that. Then other lecturers came. I decided I would take all the courses too. Before I knew it all the course work was over and I just had to write my dissertation.?

Her dissertation looked at the effectiveness of traditional teaching compared to the use of programmed learning sequences, a system that takes into account different learning styles.

?I looked at the use of traditional teaching verses the programmed learning sequence in an M2 classroom at Clearwater Middle School,? she said. ?I had to make up all the programmed learning sequences so the children could use them.?

The sequences were delivered in the form of a book. The children looked at a page, and then turned it to answer questions on the back.

?If they get the question on the back of the frame correct then they are encouraged to go on,? said Dr. Ming. ?It is a great learning tool. It took me hours to make up all of these programmed learning sequences.?

Dr. Ming found that the students? test scores were higher when they used the learning sequences, than when they were taught with the classic ?chalk and talk? method of teaching.

The materials and methods were so successful that they were implemented into the Clearwater Middle school classroom.

Teachers were also required to take a test to find out their own learning styles.

She said that nowadays teachers need all the help that they can get in the classroom.

?It is hard now for teachers,? she said. ?Teachers deserve everything they get. It is stressful now. These days we aren?t getting the same level of support from parents that we used to get. Some parents come to the school and they are in denial. They say ?It can?t be my Johnny or whoever?. I have three children myself and not one of them was an angel.?

She said it is harder to get today?s children to stay focused and pay attention.

?I am finding more and more that children don?t listen to the teachers,? said Dr. Ming. ?I have noticed just recently, I am doing a little bit of substitute teaching, children don?t listen. I call them and they don?t hear me.

?There are so many distractions. Children have all the games possible. It is a materialistic society. Many parents feel that if they are not providing their children with the latest game or the latest pair of sneakers the child will not feel loved. There are other ways to show love. ?Read them a book. Help them with their homework. Attend a PTA meeting. As children get older not too many parents are seen at the PTA meetings.

?That is sad because that is when children need their parents even more. There are so many distractions and they are at the age when they can be easily led to do the wrong thing.?

She said it is important for parents to spend quality time with their children, even if it is just 15 minutes at a time.

Literacy is one of her particular concerns. She said that literacy starts in the home.

?Nowadays not as many parents are spending time with their children,? she said. ?Fewer people sit down and read with their children. It starts from when they are in your arms. That is why teachers are finding it so difficult to teach literacy.?

Dr. Ming said teaching is a challenge even without modern social pressures, and if it hadn?t been for her religious faith she is not sure she would have made it through.

?Teaching is stressful and being a principal is even more stressful,? Dr. Ming said. ?There is a lot of work to do. I would never have reached this point without my belief in God. If I didn?t believe in God I would have been finished a long time ago. I have just kept on striving. ?Whatever I have done and wherever I have been I expect excellence from my teachers and my students. They know where I am coming from.

?All the teachers I have ever hired have risen to the occasion and done their best. Most of them have done over and beyond the call of duty. Teaching is not a 8.30 a.m. to 3.30 p.m. job. Teachers take home books to mark. They have lesson plans to work on.?

Dr. Ming said despite the challenges of the teaching life, she has always wanted to be a teacher.

?I have wanted to be a teacher ever since I was a little child,? she said. ?My mother use to say that I would line the neighbourhood children up and practice-teach on them. That is why I am still out there although I retired in December.?

As a teacher, Dr. Ming readily admits that she was very strict.

?I don?t play,? she said. ?I was very strict. You have to be because all children need boundaries in which to grow and work. If you don?t have any rules then everything falls apart.

?As a principal I tried to ensure that there was consistency amongst the staff, so the rules were enforced by everybody. That is very important.?

As a principal, she also tried to make her entire school, even the very halls conducive to learning.

?The whole school should be a visual place so children are learning all the time even when they are walking down the corridor,? she said. ?I insist that the walls are covered in any school that I have been in. It is amazing what a child can learn just walking to the bathroom. If you put something on the wall they will have a look.?

When asked if she thinks teachers are born rather than made, she answered ?a bit of both?.

All three of Dr. Ming and her husband?s ? retired Bermuda College culinary arts instructor Fred Ming ? children have followed their parents into education. Their son Shawn has taken over the culinary department at the Bermuda College, and teaches the culinary arts the same way his father did before retirement.

Their daughter Tamara Adderley is a learning support teacher at Clearwater Middle School, and their son Robert runs a nursery school with his wife in down-town Manhattan, New York.

The Mings have three grandchildren.

Unfortunately, a few months after Dr. Ming received her doctoral degree she had to take an early retirement from Clearwater Middle School because her husband was in a bad car accident.

?I had to stop because I couldn?t honour my post at Clearwater and look after him at the same time,? Dr. Ming said. ?We were away for nearly four months. He was in intensive care here for a month.

?Therefore, I came home at Christmas time and met with the permanent secretary for education and I was given early retirement. My last day was December 31, 2004.?

Mr. Ming has now fully recovered from his injuries and is back to his old life, even driving his van again.