Most Inspiring Tamil Teachers' Award

Find out how Mdm Subbu Suba Sakthidevi won the Most Inspiring Tamil Teachers' Award 2022 by bringing Tamil culture to life through poetry, traditional games, and hands-on activities.

Last updated 2 July 2026

Two photos: a woman receiving a trophy on stage, and a group of eight adults and a child posing together at an event.

Very often, students tend to focus on the learning of subject content knowledge in their classrooms. However, for Mdm Subbu Suba Sakthidevi, a Tamil Language teacher in Outram, she makes it clear to her students that learning Tamil is not for its own sake. Rather, it is part of learning a tradition. She infuses her lessons with poetry lessons, henna painting, Kolam drawing and traditional games like Chotangal in her classes. For her extraordinary ways in making the Tamil Language come alive in the classroom, Mdm Subbu Suba Sakthidevi was presented with the Most Inspiring Tamil Teachers’ Award 2022 by Dr Janil Puthucheary, Senior Minister of State, Ministry of Communications and Information & Ministry of Health on 17 September 2022.

Mdm Subbu Suba Sakthidevi has been teaching in Outram Secondary School since 2019, and is recognised for her culturally lively, meaningful, and passionate Tamil lessons that not only teaches the Tamil language, but also engenders a deep love and appreciation for the beautiful Tamil culture, lifestyle, family, and community life in her students. She does this by facilitating engaging and thought-provoking lessons with the use of many learning apps such as Padlet, Flipgrid, WiXapp, Blooket, Quizziz.

Mdm Subbu Suba Sakthidevi also gives students first-hand learning experiences such as receiving guests in their homes, preparing and presenting home-cooked Indian food. She deepens their aesthetics appreciation in Tamil fashion by having them draw henna and Kolam, and weave beautiful flower garlands. They learn the Tamil dance, and play traditional games such as Chotangal. She even had her students interview their parents about their younger days, a gesture that they appreciated because it enabled them to spend quality time with their parents.

Mdm Subbu Suba Sakthidevi is recognized within and beyond our MOE fraternity as a strong classroom teacher whose Differentiated Instruction lesson was selected by AST/MTT to be featured in the new Tamil Syllabus Launch Dissemination workshop, and added as a resource in the MOE Gallery. As a poet, she won the Golden Point award, with published poems in Tamil Murasu. Mdm Subbu Suba Sakthidevi also represented Singapore at the 2019 Tamil Language World Conference in Chennai on ‘Tamil Idioms & Phrases using ICT’.