The good habit of maintaining cleanliness starts from school

In Malaysian schools, every class has a duty roster for keeping the classroom clean and tidy. Each day, certain pupils are assigned jobs such as rubbing the board, sweeping the floor, arranging the desks and chairs.

The surprising thing is there will always be paper and sweet wrappers on the floor for the duty boy or girl to clear the rubbish.

One year, in my former school, a new Principal came. He was so fed up of pupils dirtying the floor with pieces of paper and tissue papers and sweet wrappers. What he did was to take away the waste-paper basket in each class. The pupils were told that the school would go paperless as far as classrooms and the school surroundings were concerned. Each pupil was responsible for the rubbish he or she was going to throw. He or she could pocket the paper and threw it into a big rubbish tong placed at a specific place in the school. Hence, in the duty roster no one would be assigned the job of sweeping the floor.

To me the above measure is a good method to make the pupils realize the importance of not dirtying the environment, classroom included.

If pupils know how to maintain cleanliness, it will be easier for them to do so when they out in public places. That is why I say that the good habit of maintaining cleanliness starts from school.