When Pauline Chia walked into Faith Kindergarten to start her new job, she wasn’t expecting to recognise anyone. And she didn’t.

“Pauline Hoo!” She was shocked to hear her maiden name ring out.

“You were my student, remember?” said the woman with a bob.

“I’m sorry, the only teacher I remember was one with long hair who brought me home,” said Chia.

“Yes, that’s me!” said Iris Tan, who’s been teaching in Faith Kindergarten since 1973, and was Chia’s K2 teacher.

Chia, 50, joined Faith Kindergarten as a teacher in December 2005 – exactly 30 years after she left as a child. And the teacher who held her hand as a child became her mentor as an adult. Today, Chia is the vice-principal of the preschool.

“My heart searched for it”

When Chia first went into early childhood education, after three years as an accountant, she knew she wanted to teach at Faith Kindergarten and to have her child study there. This was even before she had children.

A few years later, she did up her resume and sent it to the kindergarten but was told there was no vacancy. Disappointed, she taught elsewhere.

Pauline Chia (first row, fourth from left) graduating from K2 at Faith Kindergarten in 1975. Photo courtesy of Pauline.

In 2005, with her daughter Joann turning two, Chia wanted to move on but had not started looking for new opportunities. Out of the blue, she received a call from Faith Kindergarten asking her to go for an interview, based on the resume she sent in a year ago.

“It was going to be a pay cut but I knew it was where I want to be, and where I want to put my daughter in,” Chia told Salt&Light. “It’s really the hand of God, I wasn’t looking for a job but my heart searched for it.”

And who would end up teaching Chia’s daughter? “Miss Tan”.

Teaching two generations

According to Tan, 69, it isn’t uncommon for her to end up teaching the children of her former students. And it’s always something very special for her.

“Every time we have one, I feel really happy,” she adds. “It means we’re doing something right, that’s why they want to send their children to our kindergarten again.”

Are the children quite different from their parents or does the apple not fall far from the tree?

Iris Tan (centre) taught both Pauline (left) and her daughter, Joann (right). Photo courtesy of Pauline Chia.

Remembering Chia as one of her favourites, she muses: “Pauline was very chatty and asking a lot of questions. She’d follow me around, go to the office with me. She was very attached to me and we had a very close relationship.

“Joann is different. She enjoys playing with her many friends, so she’s not that attached to teachers.

“In the past, life was very simple and the children were not so exposed to the modern world. But now, the children are exposed to technology, they are smarter and more confident.”

“I’m so touched you’re saved”

Meanwhile, Theresa Pereira, 72, another long-time teacher at Faith Kindergarten, was having a high-profile reunion of her own. Her former student is none other than the chairman of the preschool, Liaw Chun Huan.

Liaw Chun Huan (third from left) said he was “a terror” in Theresa Pereira’s class. Photo courtesy of Liaw Chun Huan.

Neither of them had recognised each other despite having interacted through the years in their respective roles.

It was only when Liaw, 49, showed principal Elsie Yee a photograph of his kindergarten years at YWCA Child Development Centre that she recognised Pereira in the photo. Liaw would remember calling her “Miss Pelela” because the children couldn’t pronounce her name properly.

When they met up later, the first thing Pereira said to Liaw was: “Chairman, I’m so touched you’re saved.”

Pereira has a habit of praying for her students, especially the “active” ones. Liaw, who confessed to being “a terror and very talkative” in his tender years, was just as inspired by the encounter.

“’I was very moved to know that she was praying for me and that I’m an answer to her prayer,” says Liaw, who is also part of the Methodist Preschool Education Taskforce that is looking into the challenges faced by church-based kindergartens.

A lasting impact

For preschool teachers like Tan and Pereira, their work goes beyond teaching the ABCs or 123s. For them, it’s a chance for them to love the children and train them up in the way they should go (Proverbs 22:6).

To them, the biggest joy and reward is knowing that their charges are “walking in the Lord” when they grow up although it’s not often they know the result of their sowing.

The writer (third from right) was also taught by Iris in 1982. Photo courtesy of Jane Lee.

“Education is good but the most important thing is that they walk in the Lord, because when you’re in the Lord, everything will be covered and you’ll do everything right,” says Pereira emphatically.

And for the children, sometimes it’s the love that the teachers have shown them that’s stayed with them through the years.

Chia’s hazy memories of her kindergarten days revolved around her “being bossy” and enjoying the Ovaltine biscuits but the one thing she always remembered was “Miss Tan” comforting her and walking her home on the day her mother didn’t pick her up after school as she was ill.

Both Tan and Pereira have literally influenced thousands, having each taught more than 1,500 children in their long years of service. While Pereira has scaled back on teaching, Tan is pushing ahead – after 47 years.

“This is a calling. I’d really wanted to be a tailor but God called me to work in the church,” says Tan. “I simply enjoy the children. If my health permits, I will go on teaching.”