Writing my previous post about Parent Teacher Interviews, Mark 2, I felt that I'd come to the end of the loop re writing about my teaching life. It was a variation on a theme; same horse, different jockey. Think the earlier parent-teacher post was probably better; less cynical, perhaps.
A couple of my colleagues have mentioned they've noticed a change in my attitude at school. They're right. I seem to be channeling bitter much more than I'd like.
Thought it might be time to branch off in a different direction in my lazy writing. Thus, I've started a new blog, in which I'll try to develop my writing about other stuff, the minutiae of my other, equally significant life away from school. No doubt there'll be some overlap, because just as I can't switch off being all those other things I am, I can't switch off being a teacher either.
I've linked to it in the side-bar, if you're interested.
Meanwhile, I love holidays during which I've got times to think about such things. Of course, I'll also continue to write about teaching, as and when the mood takes me, in this blog.
Cheers.
Thursday, April 14, 2011
Monday, April 04, 2011
Fifty-four parent teacher interviews: the bitter sweet excremental excruciation that keeps on taking.
The steps and path leading to the hall are lined with parents and kids getting in early. Lots of undisguised staring as we descend the steps. I am on a stage, it seems. Or am I running the gauntlet? Take a photo. It’ll last longer.
We have a different, somewhat ironic seating arrangement this year. Young Rick and I are sitting back to back. Trust we have each other’s. I’m flanked by two other colleagues. One I know. The other looks about seventeen. I don’t know his name. He seems to be coping. Perhaps his open laptop affords some protection, creating a bit of a screen. Must have a good battery, given that the interviews go for seven hours. Other teachers range around the walls of this glary echoing sports’ centre. Their backs are against the wall. Seventy or so teachers are here. It’s like a market. The place is quickly crammed with milling families, shouting above the racket, catching up with friends, children running around. Seated, I feel vulnerable.
I’ve been teaching all morning and have sacrificed my two free periods to this afternoon’s proceedings.
Our tables are organized alphabetically. I don’t know where I’m sitting, but needn’t have worried because, despite me being five minutes early, I already have customers who wave and beckon me over to my seat.
I place my mark book on the table before me and we’re off.
It’s speed dating without the bells or the promise of romance.
I teach about a hundred students. I’ve been working with them for eight weeks and in that time I’ve learned something, some little, of each. There’s this quick dip into my head as each family sits, smiles, frowns, occasionally weeps, and waits for some news. In that process, my brain quickly scrambles. My head feels tight after about eight families. Swig some water and press on.
It’s mostly positive.
During a brief hiatus, I twist around in my chair to see how Rick’s going.
He leans back, stretches his legs, cups the back of his head in his hands and chuckles. He’s in his second year of teaching and has found his stride.
“I can’t get over how some of them play out their domestics in front of me.” He’s laughing, incredulous. He’s about to say something else but he has another customer and so do I. Ahead of me a couple of families compete for the seats. I check the list to see who’s first but Ms Billet is already determinedly seated.
“Ms Donald is actually next,” I say as Basil Fawlty obsequiously as I can to Ms Billet, but Ms Donald is happy to concede her place.
“You go ahead,” she says. She waves at Ms Billet, who’s terribly grateful, as am I, to have avoided an unpleasant queue dispute. In about three minutes, Ms B has been dispatched, given her daughter is the model student, and Ms Donald and son, Dwayne, assume the position.
Ms Donald is beige looking, with short, grey-brown hair, nondescript except for a few blonde highlights. With a medium build, jeans and top, she’s an ordinary middle aged woman.
I had been grateful for her earlier forbearance. Little did I know. Seems she is the bad fairy, waiting her turn to curse me. And I did not see it coming.
Next to her, Dwayne is wearing dark sunglasses. He’s in year 12, and is extremely weak in English. Nine out of 30 for his SAC. In class, he’s told me he has no idea how to complete an essay. One to one, I’ve directed him to the relevant sections of the textbook, told him to read through, to look at the annotated model answers and to just have a go. I’ve even given him the starting sentences.
“But no one’s ever shown me how,” he’s whined. “Can’t you just show me what to do?”
“Well, yes, but first I need to see your attempt. It’s early days. We’ll get there.”
“But I don’t know what to do. My teacher last year did nothing.”
“Look, I’ve told you what to do. It’s your first piece of work. The marks aren’t going anywhere. But you need to try or I can’t help you.”
But he doesn’t want to do the work. This was at the beginning of the year and it was the same for lots of students, complaining about the inadequacies of their year 11 teachers who didn’t show them how. No doubt these teachers were also faced with the same passive aggression. These kids just don’t want to try. It’s a familiar litany
Dwayne’s mother and I have introduced ourselves. I eagerly lean forward better to hear mum amidst the background din in the hall. Ms Donald also leans in. She’s sitting at the corner of the desk, stevedore-like, with her legs spread around the leg of the table. Dwayne folds his arms and leans on the table, a slight smirk on his face. I cannot see his eyes.
“What’s with the sunglasses?” I ask.
“They’re prescription,” he says. “Left my other glasses in the car.”
It’s disconcerting. I avoid looking at his blank dark stare. He seems focused on me but for all I know he could be napping behind his shades.
“I wanna know why you haven’t been teaching my son.” And there it is, the ball that comes out of left field to strike me in the head.
“Sorry?” I’m not sure I’ve heard correctly. It takes me a while to process. This is, after all, perhaps my fifteenth interview.
“My son’s told me that on at least two occasions, he’s asked for your help and you’ve refused.”
“What?” Deep breaths. Calm. “That’s not true.”
I can imagine the scenario at home. This is how Dwayne keeps mum busy; keeps her attention. Act helpless and make out it’s the teacher’s fault. And she responds. I’ve seen it many times over the years. The kid’s learned that if you blame someone else, you’re off the hook. Way to get ahead in life. And who knows what feeds the anger and self-righteous ignorant indignation of the mother? Probably goes back generations. Have these people never thought that their kids might be spinning them a line?
“What did I get for my SAC?” Dwayne’s awake. He’s demanding; aggressive now, something I haven’t seen the vaguest hint of in class. He’s been reluctant to try, but otherwise innocuous and polite, even friendly. “Remember? I was away when you gave everyone their marks and I asked you the other day what mark I got but you never told me.” So there, he seems to be saying. Here’s your proof.
“You have to remind me.” I say, “I’ve got other things going on in class.”
With that, I found the mark. “Nine,” I said.
“Out of what?” spat Ms Donald, perhaps trying to expel the bad taste I’d left in her craw.
“Thirty.”
“Yet you refuse to teach my son. What sort of a teacher does that?” She was menacing, getting closer; in my face.
I leaned away from the table at this stage, wrapping my arms around the back of my chair, same din continuing around me but her invective poking me hard in the chest nonetheless. Happily the adrenaline kicked in. I chose fight.
“That’s it. Interview over!” I shouted to be clear. “I’ve got about forty more parents to see. Don’t speak to me. The pair of you are extremely aggressive and I’ve had enough!” I reached fever pitch. “And as for you, sitting there in your dark glasses so I can’t see your eyes… Make an appointment with the coordinator. Next!” Was that the Soup Nazi? No. It was me.
“How dare you?” she spluttered, standing. “Well! I’m seeing the principal! Right!”
“Feel free. She’s not in ‘til five, but go for it.”
I may have sounded in control, but as soon as she’d stamped off, Dwayne trailing behind her like a blind man, tears of frustration and rage sprouted from my eyes. I turned to my nearest colleague, who’d heard nothing, so engrossed was he in his own line of parents – he saw sixty-two families that day.
There was no one to tell. No one to care. A few members of Prin Class were swanning around beatifically in their Sunday best, but none handy. Besides, I had a queue, the first parent of which had kindly waited. “Thought you might need a minute,” she said, smiling, slowly sitting.
Later, at meal break, another colleague confided a similar story. Another weak student; another parent blaming the teacher who was in her second year of teaching this girl. Clearly, it was all the teacher’s fault, according to the parent. Nothing to do with any other environmental, genetic or socio-economic factors. This gentle teacher is heart-sloughed. Because she does care and goes to extraordinary lengths for this girl and all her students to ensure the best possible learning outcomes.
My dilemma remains. How to continue to do my best for Dwayne tomorrow, first period, knowing my words will inevitably be twisted. No doubt there’ll be a summons to the principal to explain.
Wonder if Dwayne will be wearing his sunnies. Perhaps I’ll wear mine.
We have a different, somewhat ironic seating arrangement this year. Young Rick and I are sitting back to back. Trust we have each other’s. I’m flanked by two other colleagues. One I know. The other looks about seventeen. I don’t know his name. He seems to be coping. Perhaps his open laptop affords some protection, creating a bit of a screen. Must have a good battery, given that the interviews go for seven hours. Other teachers range around the walls of this glary echoing sports’ centre. Their backs are against the wall. Seventy or so teachers are here. It’s like a market. The place is quickly crammed with milling families, shouting above the racket, catching up with friends, children running around. Seated, I feel vulnerable.
I’ve been teaching all morning and have sacrificed my two free periods to this afternoon’s proceedings.
Our tables are organized alphabetically. I don’t know where I’m sitting, but needn’t have worried because, despite me being five minutes early, I already have customers who wave and beckon me over to my seat.
I place my mark book on the table before me and we’re off.
It’s speed dating without the bells or the promise of romance.
I teach about a hundred students. I’ve been working with them for eight weeks and in that time I’ve learned something, some little, of each. There’s this quick dip into my head as each family sits, smiles, frowns, occasionally weeps, and waits for some news. In that process, my brain quickly scrambles. My head feels tight after about eight families. Swig some water and press on.
It’s mostly positive.
During a brief hiatus, I twist around in my chair to see how Rick’s going.
He leans back, stretches his legs, cups the back of his head in his hands and chuckles. He’s in his second year of teaching and has found his stride.
“I can’t get over how some of them play out their domestics in front of me.” He’s laughing, incredulous. He’s about to say something else but he has another customer and so do I. Ahead of me a couple of families compete for the seats. I check the list to see who’s first but Ms Billet is already determinedly seated.
“Ms Donald is actually next,” I say as Basil Fawlty obsequiously as I can to Ms Billet, but Ms Donald is happy to concede her place.
“You go ahead,” she says. She waves at Ms Billet, who’s terribly grateful, as am I, to have avoided an unpleasant queue dispute. In about three minutes, Ms B has been dispatched, given her daughter is the model student, and Ms Donald and son, Dwayne, assume the position.
Ms Donald is beige looking, with short, grey-brown hair, nondescript except for a few blonde highlights. With a medium build, jeans and top, she’s an ordinary middle aged woman.
I had been grateful for her earlier forbearance. Little did I know. Seems she is the bad fairy, waiting her turn to curse me. And I did not see it coming.
Next to her, Dwayne is wearing dark sunglasses. He’s in year 12, and is extremely weak in English. Nine out of 30 for his SAC. In class, he’s told me he has no idea how to complete an essay. One to one, I’ve directed him to the relevant sections of the textbook, told him to read through, to look at the annotated model answers and to just have a go. I’ve even given him the starting sentences.
“But no one’s ever shown me how,” he’s whined. “Can’t you just show me what to do?”
“Well, yes, but first I need to see your attempt. It’s early days. We’ll get there.”
“But I don’t know what to do. My teacher last year did nothing.”
“Look, I’ve told you what to do. It’s your first piece of work. The marks aren’t going anywhere. But you need to try or I can’t help you.”
But he doesn’t want to do the work. This was at the beginning of the year and it was the same for lots of students, complaining about the inadequacies of their year 11 teachers who didn’t show them how. No doubt these teachers were also faced with the same passive aggression. These kids just don’t want to try. It’s a familiar litany
Dwayne’s mother and I have introduced ourselves. I eagerly lean forward better to hear mum amidst the background din in the hall. Ms Donald also leans in. She’s sitting at the corner of the desk, stevedore-like, with her legs spread around the leg of the table. Dwayne folds his arms and leans on the table, a slight smirk on his face. I cannot see his eyes.
“What’s with the sunglasses?” I ask.
“They’re prescription,” he says. “Left my other glasses in the car.”
It’s disconcerting. I avoid looking at his blank dark stare. He seems focused on me but for all I know he could be napping behind his shades.
“I wanna know why you haven’t been teaching my son.” And there it is, the ball that comes out of left field to strike me in the head.
“Sorry?” I’m not sure I’ve heard correctly. It takes me a while to process. This is, after all, perhaps my fifteenth interview.
“My son’s told me that on at least two occasions, he’s asked for your help and you’ve refused.”
“What?” Deep breaths. Calm. “That’s not true.”
I can imagine the scenario at home. This is how Dwayne keeps mum busy; keeps her attention. Act helpless and make out it’s the teacher’s fault. And she responds. I’ve seen it many times over the years. The kid’s learned that if you blame someone else, you’re off the hook. Way to get ahead in life. And who knows what feeds the anger and self-righteous ignorant indignation of the mother? Probably goes back generations. Have these people never thought that their kids might be spinning them a line?
“What did I get for my SAC?” Dwayne’s awake. He’s demanding; aggressive now, something I haven’t seen the vaguest hint of in class. He’s been reluctant to try, but otherwise innocuous and polite, even friendly. “Remember? I was away when you gave everyone their marks and I asked you the other day what mark I got but you never told me.” So there, he seems to be saying. Here’s your proof.
“You have to remind me.” I say, “I’ve got other things going on in class.”
With that, I found the mark. “Nine,” I said.
“Out of what?” spat Ms Donald, perhaps trying to expel the bad taste I’d left in her craw.
“Thirty.”
“Yet you refuse to teach my son. What sort of a teacher does that?” She was menacing, getting closer; in my face.
I leaned away from the table at this stage, wrapping my arms around the back of my chair, same din continuing around me but her invective poking me hard in the chest nonetheless. Happily the adrenaline kicked in. I chose fight.
“That’s it. Interview over!” I shouted to be clear. “I’ve got about forty more parents to see. Don’t speak to me. The pair of you are extremely aggressive and I’ve had enough!” I reached fever pitch. “And as for you, sitting there in your dark glasses so I can’t see your eyes… Make an appointment with the coordinator. Next!” Was that the Soup Nazi? No. It was me.
“How dare you?” she spluttered, standing. “Well! I’m seeing the principal! Right!”
“Feel free. She’s not in ‘til five, but go for it.”
I may have sounded in control, but as soon as she’d stamped off, Dwayne trailing behind her like a blind man, tears of frustration and rage sprouted from my eyes. I turned to my nearest colleague, who’d heard nothing, so engrossed was he in his own line of parents – he saw sixty-two families that day.
There was no one to tell. No one to care. A few members of Prin Class were swanning around beatifically in their Sunday best, but none handy. Besides, I had a queue, the first parent of which had kindly waited. “Thought you might need a minute,” she said, smiling, slowly sitting.
Later, at meal break, another colleague confided a similar story. Another weak student; another parent blaming the teacher who was in her second year of teaching this girl. Clearly, it was all the teacher’s fault, according to the parent. Nothing to do with any other environmental, genetic or socio-economic factors. This gentle teacher is heart-sloughed. Because she does care and goes to extraordinary lengths for this girl and all her students to ensure the best possible learning outcomes.
My dilemma remains. How to continue to do my best for Dwayne tomorrow, first period, knowing my words will inevitably be twisted. No doubt there’ll be a summons to the principal to explain.
Wonder if Dwayne will be wearing his sunnies. Perhaps I’ll wear mine.
Monday, March 28, 2011
Sickie.
About 3.38 am I'm writhing in my sheets, greasily sweltering in the cool bedroom air. Doona off. Kick. Fling myself over. Now I'm too cold. Now something's crawling on my hand. Flick it off. No, something really is crawling on my neck. Frantic slapping and jerking. Light on. 'Can't see anything,' says the old man, who's up on one elbow assisting with the insect inspection. He drops back onto his pillow and almost immediately the gentle, but fucking annoying, not quite snoring resumes. (Happily I can't hear myself snore. Apparently I regularly reach motor mower on a Sunday morning proportions. In case anyone's interested.)
Why am I thinking about students, at, what is it now, 4.25 am? Haven't been back to sleep, just continued the hot cold twisting, thumping head on the pillow, first this side, then that. To no avail. I'm thinking about how immature these two rangy Bobsy twins are, swanning in late with immaculate foundation and hair swinging, to every lesson. My faultless peripheral vision picks up their incessant signals to each other from their 'seating plan' seats on opposite sides of the room. Why don't I just sit them together and cut out the middle man, me? They're disruptive anyway. Let them sit together and giggle their thirteen year old hearts out about the tricks they've played on 'the hobo' at Watergardens. Suppose they're allowed to be immature at thirteen. But why are they in my head at, what is it now, 5.13? The joys of the red eyed digital clock keeping an exact watch on my insomnia.
I'm not feeling well. I feel positively queasy and belly-cramped. No. I can't be sick. I've got four-on. The year 12s - I've got both classes today - need to get their third Creating and Presenting SAC topic. The Bobsies will ruin the substitute teacher's day. The writing class has got work due in. And it's parent-teacher night on Thursday and I won't get their work marked in time. And we've got to do the change over for the second SAC marking. The year 8s will be all right. They can just go on with English Basics. And I was going to miss last period anyway because I'm going to the Skin Cancer Foundation to get this BCC off my face. The year 12s can just start preparing their next SAC. What are the writing class going to do? Journal writing? They're getting sick of that. Geez, my guts hurt. Doubles up in pain before staggering off to the smallest room, grabbing yesterday's "M" along the way.
Curiously, no matter how ill I am, I still have to read. I usually put the newspaper, book or magazine down when heaving, of course, but it's generally there on standby. A trip to the toilet without a text is a wasted opportunity. At times, caught short, I'll even 'delay' until some tolerant family member can fling some reading material - junk mail, anything - through a crack in the door. In desperation, I've even read the back of my watch. Actually, the iPhone has made staying in camping grounds so much more amenable. It fits discreetly into a pocket. So much reading material.
Where was I?
Will I or won't I? Seven-thirty-three. Decision is made. I can't work today. That's it. Why do I feel so guilty? I leave an apologetic message on the school's answering machine, adding that I'll email my lesson plans before school starts. This is obligatory at our school, for what it's worth. The kids never do the work anyway, but it looks good in the marketing. On occasions, I've been at the computer making up vague plans for my classes, with a bucket handy at my side. Today, I'm hunched over the laptop, hugging my abdomen as I tap out four lesson plans with one finger. Never get a return email thanking me for sending plans through.
The upside? By about 10.24 I'm still in bed but feeling a bit hungry. Showered, I definitely feel better. The sun's breaking through the clouds, and having worked on Saturday, I have no marking to sully the remains of the day. An unexpected plus? I'm at home when my twenty-four year old son gets a phone call telling him he's got his first professional job. Whoo hoo.
Why am I thinking about students, at, what is it now, 4.25 am? Haven't been back to sleep, just continued the hot cold twisting, thumping head on the pillow, first this side, then that. To no avail. I'm thinking about how immature these two rangy Bobsy twins are, swanning in late with immaculate foundation and hair swinging, to every lesson. My faultless peripheral vision picks up their incessant signals to each other from their 'seating plan' seats on opposite sides of the room. Why don't I just sit them together and cut out the middle man, me? They're disruptive anyway. Let them sit together and giggle their thirteen year old hearts out about the tricks they've played on 'the hobo' at Watergardens. Suppose they're allowed to be immature at thirteen. But why are they in my head at, what is it now, 5.13? The joys of the red eyed digital clock keeping an exact watch on my insomnia.
I'm not feeling well. I feel positively queasy and belly-cramped. No. I can't be sick. I've got four-on. The year 12s - I've got both classes today - need to get their third Creating and Presenting SAC topic. The Bobsies will ruin the substitute teacher's day. The writing class has got work due in. And it's parent-teacher night on Thursday and I won't get their work marked in time. And we've got to do the change over for the second SAC marking. The year 8s will be all right. They can just go on with English Basics. And I was going to miss last period anyway because I'm going to the Skin Cancer Foundation to get this BCC off my face. The year 12s can just start preparing their next SAC. What are the writing class going to do? Journal writing? They're getting sick of that. Geez, my guts hurt. Doubles up in pain before staggering off to the smallest room, grabbing yesterday's "M" along the way.
Curiously, no matter how ill I am, I still have to read. I usually put the newspaper, book or magazine down when heaving, of course, but it's generally there on standby. A trip to the toilet without a text is a wasted opportunity. At times, caught short, I'll even 'delay' until some tolerant family member can fling some reading material - junk mail, anything - through a crack in the door. In desperation, I've even read the back of my watch. Actually, the iPhone has made staying in camping grounds so much more amenable. It fits discreetly into a pocket. So much reading material.
Where was I?
Will I or won't I? Seven-thirty-three. Decision is made. I can't work today. That's it. Why do I feel so guilty? I leave an apologetic message on the school's answering machine, adding that I'll email my lesson plans before school starts. This is obligatory at our school, for what it's worth. The kids never do the work anyway, but it looks good in the marketing. On occasions, I've been at the computer making up vague plans for my classes, with a bucket handy at my side. Today, I'm hunched over the laptop, hugging my abdomen as I tap out four lesson plans with one finger. Never get a return email thanking me for sending plans through.
The upside? By about 10.24 I'm still in bed but feeling a bit hungry. Showered, I definitely feel better. The sun's breaking through the clouds, and having worked on Saturday, I have no marking to sully the remains of the day. An unexpected plus? I'm at home when my twenty-four year old son gets a phone call telling him he's got his first professional job. Whoo hoo.
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Behold! For I am Fraudster, queen of procrastinators!
Saturday, eight am. Wake up and spend about twenty minutes' side-splitting time reading David Sedaris’ Naked. Back to bed for...first pile of marking of several discrepant Creating and Presenting SACs. Riveting.
Next, cheap home hair dye to make me less like someone who should be advertising Australian Pensioners Home Insurance. My old man assists with the back of the head so I don’t end up looking like a greying Blondie. With gummed up hair, flying around my house in a protective plastic cape, get first load of washing in.
Call to my mum to arrange her eightieth birthday bash. “Oops! Gotta go, mother. Gotta rinse.”
Not a bad dye job, but, interestingly, think I’d still get the APIA gig; perhaps even more so.
The old man cheerfully accepts that he’ll be doing the Saturday shop alone, cos Fraud’s got marking, as per usual. Off he goes as I settle to start the batch of thirty-eight ‘analyses’ - I wish; most were summaries - of the language use in a Mark Seymour piece from last year’s Age. Click. That’s the washing machine door telling me the first load of washing is done. Delighted, I spring up from my desk to hang it out and get the next one in. Gives me a welcome break from the marking I haven’t yet begun. Find myself inspecting the laden apple tree while I’m out there. Using the legs of a pair of pegged up jeans as a bird hide, for about ten minutes I study a couple of king parrots eating the apples. Bit of a dawdle around the back garden. Still haven’t marked a paper, but I confess to having actually picked up the red pen and removed the lid, before replacing it, and drifting through my autumn house into the bathroom for a quick eyebrow inspection.
I’m not one for obsessive eyebrow plucking, but it seemed an opportune time to peer at them. Have to get up really close due to special combo short and long-sightedness. I have perfect visual acuity, without the aid of contact lenses or spectacles, provided whatever I want to look at is exactly four inches from my eyes. That is, my left eye. My right eye is, well, fucked. Consequently, only the left eyebrow got plucked. God knows what’s happening on the right side of my face.
Back to the marking. Think I assessed about three papers before replacing the dangling deodoriser in the dunny. Seemed like a good idea. Yes, the eyebrows were still there. Well, one of them. I checked. Really must get stuck into the marking.
The old man returns with the shopping and I’ve barely started.
And thus I proceed through my day, desperate to sweep up leaves on my back porch, to inspect grouting, to weed pot plants, to clean out the fly zapper, to read Sedaris – fluent, witty, correctly spelt and punctuated, as opposed to my students’ labours. And they really have tried hard. Their efforts exude from their awkwardly expressed convoluted prose as they dip inappropriately into their thesauruses. There are some who’ve nailed it, and I sail through these. It’s the others that take their toll. (Hey, I’m full of clichés too.)
Marking is the curse of the English teacher, but for me it’s worse because I am the queen of procrastinators. If I’d just got on with it, I’d have finished it in three hours. Instead, I took about nine.
Next, cheap home hair dye to make me less like someone who should be advertising Australian Pensioners Home Insurance. My old man assists with the back of the head so I don’t end up looking like a greying Blondie. With gummed up hair, flying around my house in a protective plastic cape, get first load of washing in.
Call to my mum to arrange her eightieth birthday bash. “Oops! Gotta go, mother. Gotta rinse.”
Not a bad dye job, but, interestingly, think I’d still get the APIA gig; perhaps even more so.
The old man cheerfully accepts that he’ll be doing the Saturday shop alone, cos Fraud’s got marking, as per usual. Off he goes as I settle to start the batch of thirty-eight ‘analyses’ - I wish; most were summaries - of the language use in a Mark Seymour piece from last year’s Age. Click. That’s the washing machine door telling me the first load of washing is done. Delighted, I spring up from my desk to hang it out and get the next one in. Gives me a welcome break from the marking I haven’t yet begun. Find myself inspecting the laden apple tree while I’m out there. Using the legs of a pair of pegged up jeans as a bird hide, for about ten minutes I study a couple of king parrots eating the apples. Bit of a dawdle around the back garden. Still haven’t marked a paper, but I confess to having actually picked up the red pen and removed the lid, before replacing it, and drifting through my autumn house into the bathroom for a quick eyebrow inspection.
I’m not one for obsessive eyebrow plucking, but it seemed an opportune time to peer at them. Have to get up really close due to special combo short and long-sightedness. I have perfect visual acuity, without the aid of contact lenses or spectacles, provided whatever I want to look at is exactly four inches from my eyes. That is, my left eye. My right eye is, well, fucked. Consequently, only the left eyebrow got plucked. God knows what’s happening on the right side of my face.
Back to the marking. Think I assessed about three papers before replacing the dangling deodoriser in the dunny. Seemed like a good idea. Yes, the eyebrows were still there. Well, one of them. I checked. Really must get stuck into the marking.
The old man returns with the shopping and I’ve barely started.
And thus I proceed through my day, desperate to sweep up leaves on my back porch, to inspect grouting, to weed pot plants, to clean out the fly zapper, to read Sedaris – fluent, witty, correctly spelt and punctuated, as opposed to my students’ labours. And they really have tried hard. Their efforts exude from their awkwardly expressed convoluted prose as they dip inappropriately into their thesauruses. There are some who’ve nailed it, and I sail through these. It’s the others that take their toll. (Hey, I’m full of clichés too.)
Marking is the curse of the English teacher, but for me it’s worse because I am the queen of procrastinators. If I’d just got on with it, I’d have finished it in three hours. Instead, I took about nine.
Friday, March 18, 2011
Me and John Proctor
In 1973, when I completed my HSC, I had a brief respite from mediocrity during my English classes, and, happily in the final exam. I’ve had several shining moments since, in terms of writing, but quite often I struggle because I just can’t take it seriously enough; can apply neither the intellect, nor the endurance – one of the many reasons I consider myself to be a fraud.
It’s probably why I have a couple of recurring dreams. In one, somehow I’ve slept through an alarm, or forgotten to turn up on the first day of school. I flap around under the shower, usually fully clothed, trying vainly to rinse suds out of my hair. I stumble late into a room packed with year 12 students and unsuccessfully attempt to wing the lesson. (Actually, this isn’t far from the reality on occasions, but I usually manage to divest myself of my clothes while showering.) In the other dream, I’m sitting in a silent exam hall doing my year 12 English exam. And I’m caught out. I can’t do it. Consequently, my life is a sham. I simply fluked it back in ‘73, and I shouldn’t even have been admitted to my lesser Melbourne State College B. Ed. course; shouldn’t even have got in by the back door, which is what my father pronounced when I didn’t get into Melbourne University – for which I hadn’t even applied, by the way. My acceptance into La Trobe didn’t impress him at all. It was common knowledge that you could get in there if you could play three chords on a guitar.
Which is all a rather rambling lead up to me trying unsuccessfully to write an imaginative response to a prompt for that part of VCE Units 3 and 4 English called Creating and Presenting. Our Context, with a capital C, is Encountering Conflict. (I’ve been doing a bit of that lately. I like to think I’m John Proctor from The Crucible, but I’m not sure I’d die to save my name.)
This is the prompt. Think it’s from the 2008 exam. “In times of conflict ordinary people can act in extraordinary ways.” And this is what happened, and why, once again, I’m the fraud who’s been up the front of the classroom for thirty-one and a quarter years.
John Proctor languishes in gaol, awaiting execution. I’m trying to capture the tone of Proctor’s thoughts back in 1692. Here goes:
Their lying, their pretence, has conjured a demon. Though it be invisible, though it be wrought from the girls’ demented minds, it has risen up and has taken men’s senses. They quake in fear as that whore cries witch. Though I believe not in these incubi and succubi I see that something has taken hold in Salem. It be not born of goodness. It be born of fear, lies and vengeance. (Thought that wasn’t too bad, then ensued my own descent into the pit.)
In Salem we were a hardworking community, not given to idleness. Not three months gone we were united. Aye, one had not time nor strength for aught else. How did such mayhem arise from such mischief?
Indeed. How? Fucked if I know what Proctor was thinking when he sacrificed himself. Extraordinary indeed. He had nothing left but his name, and, as he said, ‘leave me my name...I cannot have another’. What drove him to such lengths? Would anyone fall on the sword like this? Evidently not. Ordinary people meld into the group. Reminds me of those Arctic or Antarctic penguins flocking together against the cold, occasionally taking their turn on the outside but nonetheless clinging to the warm mass. To leave the group is sure death. But that’s penguins and we aren’t really concerned with the behaviour of the ‘animal kingdom’.
I don’t find humans surprising at all. I find them very predictable. A percentage will show altruism, will give of themselves and bequeath extraordinary gifts to humankind. I recall an episode on Australian Story. A young Australian girl adopted a number of homeless Cambodian children, raised funds and ran her own orphanage and school. It’s as if there are certain people who are wired in some way to commit these extraordinary acts when they see a need. Were such people ever ordinary?
John Proctor, from the outset, struck me as different. By being his own true self, he inadvertently made others, the Parrises and Putnams, feel their inadequacy. Or perhaps, like my students, I’m just confusing the ‘novel’, as they say, with the ‘movie’. Perhaps I just like the look of Daniel Day Lewis with his twinkling eye/teeth combo, striding across the fields, no grim reaper, in his baggy britches.
I rest my case.
It’s probably why I have a couple of recurring dreams. In one, somehow I’ve slept through an alarm, or forgotten to turn up on the first day of school. I flap around under the shower, usually fully clothed, trying vainly to rinse suds out of my hair. I stumble late into a room packed with year 12 students and unsuccessfully attempt to wing the lesson. (Actually, this isn’t far from the reality on occasions, but I usually manage to divest myself of my clothes while showering.) In the other dream, I’m sitting in a silent exam hall doing my year 12 English exam. And I’m caught out. I can’t do it. Consequently, my life is a sham. I simply fluked it back in ‘73, and I shouldn’t even have been admitted to my lesser Melbourne State College B. Ed. course; shouldn’t even have got in by the back door, which is what my father pronounced when I didn’t get into Melbourne University – for which I hadn’t even applied, by the way. My acceptance into La Trobe didn’t impress him at all. It was common knowledge that you could get in there if you could play three chords on a guitar.
Which is all a rather rambling lead up to me trying unsuccessfully to write an imaginative response to a prompt for that part of VCE Units 3 and 4 English called Creating and Presenting. Our Context, with a capital C, is Encountering Conflict. (I’ve been doing a bit of that lately. I like to think I’m John Proctor from The Crucible, but I’m not sure I’d die to save my name.)
This is the prompt. Think it’s from the 2008 exam. “In times of conflict ordinary people can act in extraordinary ways.” And this is what happened, and why, once again, I’m the fraud who’s been up the front of the classroom for thirty-one and a quarter years.
John Proctor languishes in gaol, awaiting execution. I’m trying to capture the tone of Proctor’s thoughts back in 1692. Here goes:
Their lying, their pretence, has conjured a demon. Though it be invisible, though it be wrought from the girls’ demented minds, it has risen up and has taken men’s senses. They quake in fear as that whore cries witch. Though I believe not in these incubi and succubi I see that something has taken hold in Salem. It be not born of goodness. It be born of fear, lies and vengeance. (Thought that wasn’t too bad, then ensued my own descent into the pit.)
In Salem we were a hardworking community, not given to idleness. Not three months gone we were united. Aye, one had not time nor strength for aught else. How did such mayhem arise from such mischief?
Indeed. How? Fucked if I know what Proctor was thinking when he sacrificed himself. Extraordinary indeed. He had nothing left but his name, and, as he said, ‘leave me my name...I cannot have another’. What drove him to such lengths? Would anyone fall on the sword like this? Evidently not. Ordinary people meld into the group. Reminds me of those Arctic or Antarctic penguins flocking together against the cold, occasionally taking their turn on the outside but nonetheless clinging to the warm mass. To leave the group is sure death. But that’s penguins and we aren’t really concerned with the behaviour of the ‘animal kingdom’.
I don’t find humans surprising at all. I find them very predictable. A percentage will show altruism, will give of themselves and bequeath extraordinary gifts to humankind. I recall an episode on Australian Story. A young Australian girl adopted a number of homeless Cambodian children, raised funds and ran her own orphanage and school. It’s as if there are certain people who are wired in some way to commit these extraordinary acts when they see a need. Were such people ever ordinary?
John Proctor, from the outset, struck me as different. By being his own true self, he inadvertently made others, the Parrises and Putnams, feel their inadequacy. Or perhaps, like my students, I’m just confusing the ‘novel’, as they say, with the ‘movie’. Perhaps I just like the look of Daniel Day Lewis with his twinkling eye/teeth combo, striding across the fields, no grim reaper, in his baggy britches.
I rest my case.
Wednesday, March 09, 2011
My ongoing relationship with Lockie Leonard, Human Torpedo
Last year, I began my crusade to have Lockie Leonard, Human Torpedo, removed from our book list. I've 'taught' the text for the last ten or so years. In some ways, it's kept me young. I put it down to being immersed, for a couple of hours each week, in the fug of pubescent hormones emanating from twenty-five excited students. I should be grateful. It's evidently helping me to ward off osteoporosis, facial hair, night sweats and the other scourges of the menopausal.
I'm not bothered that Lockie and Vicky get sexy. I'm more concerned that Winton gets preachy. There's one line in the text where Lockie tells the Sarge, his dad, that the Sarge could never be a teacher because he's got too much going for him. Really hate reading that line. Every year I hate it.
I also dislike Winton's stereotyping of rich kids and their parents, of the kids at the church youth group, the bogans, and yes, the teachers. However, it usually leads to worthwhile discussion about the positives and negatives of stereotyping.
Almost every year that I was coordinator, I received complaints from parents, concerned about their precious children reading about sex. One poor kid, forbidden from participating in any class on Lockie, had to suffer the ignominy of sitting in my office, wading through The Sun on the Stubble - a novel of which his mother, a rabid Christian, approved. Interestingly, she thereby guaranteed that Jimmy, a bright and curious kid, read all three Lockie Leonard books, perhaps with a torch under his bedsheets.
So why is Lockie still doing us, despite the protestations of an oldish former English Coordinator who wouldn't mind aging gracefully?
Basically, most students love it. I even received a petition from one group last year who'd heard from their loose-lipped teacher that we were considering dropping it. So Lockie stayed. Can't fight that.
My students read Lockie aloud in a sort of 'readers' theatre'. One person reads the 'narrator' and other students take the various parts. There's great competition to read the 'rude' bits. This year, two boys desperately wanted to read the first nipple section. With a coin toss, we sorted out who would read. 'Fair enough,' conceded the losing contender, after another had tossed a dollar into the air and called heads. He was crest-fallen but placated by my promise that he could read the next rude bit.
I teach my year 8s in the period before lunch each day. A couple of weeks ago, so enthralled were they with what they were reading, they begged to be allowed to stay in at lunchtime to finish the chapter. I kid you not. They stayed in for seven minutes, and even though I had a full teaching day, I didn't care because I don't think that's happened before. Engagement with reading is what it's all about for us English teachers. I felt really good.
It's been interesting observing my students this year. They're more sophisticated than last year's group. They pick up lots of unintended innuendo. They cracked up at the men holding their sausages in the water-skiing scene. Neither have I received any complaints. I suppose I am teaching in the world of Two and a Half Men.
I do wonder though, what Winton thinks of Lockie Leonard, Human Torpedo from the perspective of twenty years. Wonder if he cringes. Wish I'd written it.
I'm not bothered that Lockie and Vicky get sexy. I'm more concerned that Winton gets preachy. There's one line in the text where Lockie tells the Sarge, his dad, that the Sarge could never be a teacher because he's got too much going for him. Really hate reading that line. Every year I hate it.
I also dislike Winton's stereotyping of rich kids and their parents, of the kids at the church youth group, the bogans, and yes, the teachers. However, it usually leads to worthwhile discussion about the positives and negatives of stereotyping.
Almost every year that I was coordinator, I received complaints from parents, concerned about their precious children reading about sex. One poor kid, forbidden from participating in any class on Lockie, had to suffer the ignominy of sitting in my office, wading through The Sun on the Stubble - a novel of which his mother, a rabid Christian, approved. Interestingly, she thereby guaranteed that Jimmy, a bright and curious kid, read all three Lockie Leonard books, perhaps with a torch under his bedsheets.
So why is Lockie still doing us, despite the protestations of an oldish former English Coordinator who wouldn't mind aging gracefully?
Basically, most students love it. I even received a petition from one group last year who'd heard from their loose-lipped teacher that we were considering dropping it. So Lockie stayed. Can't fight that.
My students read Lockie aloud in a sort of 'readers' theatre'. One person reads the 'narrator' and other students take the various parts. There's great competition to read the 'rude' bits. This year, two boys desperately wanted to read the first nipple section. With a coin toss, we sorted out who would read. 'Fair enough,' conceded the losing contender, after another had tossed a dollar into the air and called heads. He was crest-fallen but placated by my promise that he could read the next rude bit.
I teach my year 8s in the period before lunch each day. A couple of weeks ago, so enthralled were they with what they were reading, they begged to be allowed to stay in at lunchtime to finish the chapter. I kid you not. They stayed in for seven minutes, and even though I had a full teaching day, I didn't care because I don't think that's happened before. Engagement with reading is what it's all about for us English teachers. I felt really good.
It's been interesting observing my students this year. They're more sophisticated than last year's group. They pick up lots of unintended innuendo. They cracked up at the men holding their sausages in the water-skiing scene. Neither have I received any complaints. I suppose I am teaching in the world of Two and a Half Men.
I do wonder though, what Winton thinks of Lockie Leonard, Human Torpedo from the perspective of twenty years. Wonder if he cringes. Wish I'd written it.
Saturday, February 26, 2011
Whew!
"Finally read your blog." That's Reggie, older sister talking. "All it'd take is one phone call," she says, warning. "It'd be a spectacularly mucky end to a brilliant teaching career. Is that how you want to be remembered?"
Of course she won't make that call. But someone else might, out of the goodness of its heart, in my school's best interest, naturally. And perhaps because I'm a smart-arse who's had it coming and they've been waiting for just this opportunity.
I've been sobered - well, not literally - and sphincter-clenching since I read a brief report in this week's Age about Natalie Munroe who was suspended from teaching because of her blog. Of course, this was in the US, and in Oz we're a bit more relaxed, but I just got this feeling. Sounded like her blog was remarkably similar to my own, perhaps minus the expletives, which I thoroughly enjoying writing. (Oh-oh. Done it again.) Munroe got hung out to dry for far less, from what I can tell.
I've also noticed that one of my followers (and you know who you are, my witty friend!) is only a couple of clicks away from inadvertently betraying my precious anonymity. Thought I'd get done a few years back when one of my posts was published in a national teaching magazine. Happily, no one twigged to that one and my secret remained safe.
As I've said before, blogging is therapy and writing all that nasty stuff and turning it blackly humorous is illicitly thrilling - graffiti taggers get the same thrill, I'm told, as they darkly dart around defacing our burbs with their stupid black scrawl. That's not a bad analogy, actually, because while I'm venting, I'm also betraying my colleagues. And okay, they sort of deserve it, but I'd be mortified, and probably sacked, if I hurt such well-meaning, albeit boring people by lampooning them for my own psycho-therapeutic purposes.
So, unlike Hamlet, I've made a decision. I've deleted the blogs that could get me sent down. I dare say there will be others, cos the teaching world keeps throwing shit my way, and I have to deal with it somehow.
I'm not ready for retirement yet, dear sister Reggie. I'd miss the cut and thrust which abounds at my school.
And for anyone who cares to trawl back through the archives, there's still some stuff there, and if a certain person reads it and recognises his/herself therein, perhaps he/she will finally get the message and piss off.
Of course she won't make that call. But someone else might, out of the goodness of its heart, in my school's best interest, naturally. And perhaps because I'm a smart-arse who's had it coming and they've been waiting for just this opportunity.
I've been sobered - well, not literally - and sphincter-clenching since I read a brief report in this week's Age about Natalie Munroe who was suspended from teaching because of her blog. Of course, this was in the US, and in Oz we're a bit more relaxed, but I just got this feeling. Sounded like her blog was remarkably similar to my own, perhaps minus the expletives, which I thoroughly enjoying writing. (Oh-oh. Done it again.) Munroe got hung out to dry for far less, from what I can tell.
I've also noticed that one of my followers (and you know who you are, my witty friend!) is only a couple of clicks away from inadvertently betraying my precious anonymity. Thought I'd get done a few years back when one of my posts was published in a national teaching magazine. Happily, no one twigged to that one and my secret remained safe.
As I've said before, blogging is therapy and writing all that nasty stuff and turning it blackly humorous is illicitly thrilling - graffiti taggers get the same thrill, I'm told, as they darkly dart around defacing our burbs with their stupid black scrawl. That's not a bad analogy, actually, because while I'm venting, I'm also betraying my colleagues. And okay, they sort of deserve it, but I'd be mortified, and probably sacked, if I hurt such well-meaning, albeit boring people by lampooning them for my own psycho-therapeutic purposes.
So, unlike Hamlet, I've made a decision. I've deleted the blogs that could get me sent down. I dare say there will be others, cos the teaching world keeps throwing shit my way, and I have to deal with it somehow.
I'm not ready for retirement yet, dear sister Reggie. I'd miss the cut and thrust which abounds at my school.
And for anyone who cares to trawl back through the archives, there's still some stuff there, and if a certain person reads it and recognises his/herself therein, perhaps he/she will finally get the message and piss off.
Friday, December 10, 2010
More VATE conference reflections
VATE 2010
The VATE conference reached my expectations this year; provided stimulus to kick start my thirty second year of teaching.
1. It was really good getting away from school for two days.
2. I had a like-minded colleague – and driver - to hang out with.
3. Saw a couple of my writing idols, Shaun Carney and Catherine Deveny.
4. Participated in an intimate master class led by Deveny.
5. Got some new insights into Elia Kazan and On The Waterfront.
1. The end of the school year is invariably fraught. The senior students, in many ways my raison d’etre, have gone. I’m left with my small dose of year 7 and 8 students, most of whom are yet, through no fault of their own, to reach ‘the age of reason’. I have to watch myself to avoid encounters like this:
Scene: I’m showing the DVD of Holes using laptop and data projector. The DVD is damaged – unbeknown to me prior to starting the lesson. The DVD keeps freezing. The only remedy is to eject it, insert it and try again in a different place. Kayla, a sullen, usually benign 14 year old, is telling me, repeatedly, how to fix the computer, as only a 14 year old who knows everything can. Like I’m an idiot. Other students, from their vantage point of strength in numbers in a dark room, join in the meddlesome, unhelpful chorus. I’m equally frustrated by the faulty DVD as I’m leaning over my laptop, peering at the dimly lit keyboard, vainly trying to find a solution. The patronising adolescent know-it-all non-advice is getting right up my wick. I lose my temper. Oh-oh. I ask the stupid question. “Kayla, do I look like a complete moron?” “Yes,” she titters, delighting her friends.
And then there are the replacement classes which one picks up. Mostly hell. Reports are being finalised. People are leaving, some against their wishes. Positions of responsibility are being assigned for good or bad for the following year, and at our place, some bad decisions have gone down. It’s good to have time out at a conference.
2. My “driver” – KD, a colleague - picked me up at eight for a nine o’ clock start. An effortless drive, well, for me anyway. As he negotiated the peak hour traffic for an hour, I allowed my inner monologue out and KD listened and contributed appropriately. This luxury seemed to add to the whole package. He probably had to hug a tree at the end of it all, but what the hey?
3. My writing idols. Too much to say. It’s a personal thing.
4. Perhaps Catherine Deveny was, for me, the most stimulating person at the VATE conference. I attended her master class on Tuesday morning. I saw a different person from the person I’ve seen before. (I’ve attended Deveny’s book launch, seen her God is Bullshit show and have relished her writing in The Age until her infamous sacking.) Suppose it was a more intimate and personal setting. She was enthusiastic; full of passion and good ideas; extremely generous and personable. “Perfection is the enemy of good,” she said, amongst other things. This is her exhortation to just get on with one’s writing. She’s rarely satisfied with her writing, she says, but it doesn’t stop her getting on with it and getting it out there. Wish I could be more like Deveny. She bounces back. Things that would have made me livid and ready to attack or retreat don’t seem to faze her. Deveny spoke on a panel following the master class. She was witty and commanded the audience. Obviously riled some participants including ‘Dr Glenn McLaren’, another panel member. “Unlike Catherine,” he said, beginning his speech, “I want to make people think.” Prick. He certainly made people bristle. Such an insult – from an adult - would have rendered me impotent. I’d have been unable to function. But not Deveny. She evidently registered the remark but continued to listen respectfully, even throwing in a ‘hear, hear’ when he mentioned something about increasing teachers’ salaries. I’m so impressed by this resilience; this boldness that allows her to damn the torpedoes and get her ideas out there.
5. The final session I attended on the second day was led by Rachel Kafka. It was called Kazan’s America. This woman had a tough gig. People are tired after long days of concentrating. Some don’t even make it to the final session. I was just about keeling over with exhaustion. Happily, this presenter was great; erudite, lively, well prepared, passionate about her subject. What’s more she generously emailed her PowerPoint the next day.
I'm not sure I write so well when I'm being positive. Seem to do cynical better. But it's only fair to pay credit to VATE when it's due.
The VATE conference reached my expectations this year; provided stimulus to kick start my thirty second year of teaching.
1. It was really good getting away from school for two days.
2. I had a like-minded colleague – and driver - to hang out with.
3. Saw a couple of my writing idols, Shaun Carney and Catherine Deveny.
4. Participated in an intimate master class led by Deveny.
5. Got some new insights into Elia Kazan and On The Waterfront.
1. The end of the school year is invariably fraught. The senior students, in many ways my raison d’etre, have gone. I’m left with my small dose of year 7 and 8 students, most of whom are yet, through no fault of their own, to reach ‘the age of reason’. I have to watch myself to avoid encounters like this:
Scene: I’m showing the DVD of Holes using laptop and data projector. The DVD is damaged – unbeknown to me prior to starting the lesson. The DVD keeps freezing. The only remedy is to eject it, insert it and try again in a different place. Kayla, a sullen, usually benign 14 year old, is telling me, repeatedly, how to fix the computer, as only a 14 year old who knows everything can. Like I’m an idiot. Other students, from their vantage point of strength in numbers in a dark room, join in the meddlesome, unhelpful chorus. I’m equally frustrated by the faulty DVD as I’m leaning over my laptop, peering at the dimly lit keyboard, vainly trying to find a solution. The patronising adolescent know-it-all non-advice is getting right up my wick. I lose my temper. Oh-oh. I ask the stupid question. “Kayla, do I look like a complete moron?” “Yes,” she titters, delighting her friends.
And then there are the replacement classes which one picks up. Mostly hell. Reports are being finalised. People are leaving, some against their wishes. Positions of responsibility are being assigned for good or bad for the following year, and at our place, some bad decisions have gone down. It’s good to have time out at a conference.
2. My “driver” – KD, a colleague - picked me up at eight for a nine o’ clock start. An effortless drive, well, for me anyway. As he negotiated the peak hour traffic for an hour, I allowed my inner monologue out and KD listened and contributed appropriately. This luxury seemed to add to the whole package. He probably had to hug a tree at the end of it all, but what the hey?
3. My writing idols. Too much to say. It’s a personal thing.
4. Perhaps Catherine Deveny was, for me, the most stimulating person at the VATE conference. I attended her master class on Tuesday morning. I saw a different person from the person I’ve seen before. (I’ve attended Deveny’s book launch, seen her God is Bullshit show and have relished her writing in The Age until her infamous sacking.) Suppose it was a more intimate and personal setting. She was enthusiastic; full of passion and good ideas; extremely generous and personable. “Perfection is the enemy of good,” she said, amongst other things. This is her exhortation to just get on with one’s writing. She’s rarely satisfied with her writing, she says, but it doesn’t stop her getting on with it and getting it out there. Wish I could be more like Deveny. She bounces back. Things that would have made me livid and ready to attack or retreat don’t seem to faze her. Deveny spoke on a panel following the master class. She was witty and commanded the audience. Obviously riled some participants including ‘Dr Glenn McLaren’, another panel member. “Unlike Catherine,” he said, beginning his speech, “I want to make people think.” Prick. He certainly made people bristle. Such an insult – from an adult - would have rendered me impotent. I’d have been unable to function. But not Deveny. She evidently registered the remark but continued to listen respectfully, even throwing in a ‘hear, hear’ when he mentioned something about increasing teachers’ salaries. I’m so impressed by this resilience; this boldness that allows her to damn the torpedoes and get her ideas out there.
5. The final session I attended on the second day was led by Rachel Kafka. It was called Kazan’s America. This woman had a tough gig. People are tired after long days of concentrating. Some don’t even make it to the final session. I was just about keeling over with exhaustion. Happily, this presenter was great; erudite, lively, well prepared, passionate about her subject. What’s more she generously emailed her PowerPoint the next day.
I'm not sure I write so well when I'm being positive. Seem to do cynical better. But it's only fair to pay credit to VATE when it's due.
Thursday, December 09, 2010
Random thoughts on VATE 2010
Arriving at Deakin Uni, my colleague, KD, and I headed straight into the keynote. No time for coffee. First, the inaugural Ian Maxwell address delivered by his grandson, Roland. Nicely nostalgic and anecdotal. And brief. Breathed a sigh of relief thinking this was it. But this was the Jubilee Conference; a self-congratulatory name-dropping conference, it seemed, when our revered speaker took the podium, striding out confidently in frock, blazer and high heels, despite the prodigious weight of her CV. Down hill from there. Aunty Doreen’s quasi-religious gumleafy earnest Welcome to Country had already given me a push. It’s just me. I’m irreverent.
The incredibly well-credentialed keynote speaker read, and misread, a tedious potted history of VATE. Her misreading and subsequent apologising was almost punctuation. Couldn’t see from my seat whether or not she was wearing reading glasses. If she wasn’t, she should be. If she was, time for an upgrade. Was a bit surprised that she seemed to have written in her speech “And now perhaps with my principal’s hat on”. Thought those remarks were off the cuff. Apparently not.
It was about this time that someone in the control booth turned on the massive slideshow so we had Deakin Uni spruiking its stuff behind her. Maybe she flicked a switch herself to wake us up. It was a bit hard to concentrate, even though I know it’s important that VATE has achieved all this stuff. At this point I opened my notebook and started focusing on the woman in front of me in her puff sleeved beige patterned shirt with a Christmas decoration pinning up her hair. Quite diverting watching her fumbling to get a rattly Eclipse mint from her little tin without making a noise. KD was playing with his iPhone and around me people were poking through the contents of their show bags.
The only way to proceed after this was up. I wasn't disappointed. More later, perhaps.
The incredibly well-credentialed keynote speaker read, and misread, a tedious potted history of VATE. Her misreading and subsequent apologising was almost punctuation. Couldn’t see from my seat whether or not she was wearing reading glasses. If she wasn’t, she should be. If she was, time for an upgrade. Was a bit surprised that she seemed to have written in her speech “And now perhaps with my principal’s hat on”. Thought those remarks were off the cuff. Apparently not.
It was about this time that someone in the control booth turned on the massive slideshow so we had Deakin Uni spruiking its stuff behind her. Maybe she flicked a switch herself to wake us up. It was a bit hard to concentrate, even though I know it’s important that VATE has achieved all this stuff. At this point I opened my notebook and started focusing on the woman in front of me in her puff sleeved beige patterned shirt with a Christmas decoration pinning up her hair. Quite diverting watching her fumbling to get a rattly Eclipse mint from her little tin without making a noise. KD was playing with his iPhone and around me people were poking through the contents of their show bags.
The only way to proceed after this was up. I wasn't disappointed. More later, perhaps.
Monday, October 18, 2010
Writing a memory
I teach a Year 7 creative writing class and occasionally I write while my students are writing. I was using Andy Griffiths' Swinging on a clothesline and the word 'parka' in one of his pieces sparked my memory.
Parkas were in fashion in 1969. Eventually, I got one, probably after lots of pleading. We bought it one Saturday morning at Victoria Market. This was the only place to get a bargain, or so it seemed, back then. There wasn’t the plethora of markets and shopping precincts that we have now. This was before Highpoint, before the late Moonee Ponds Market, now a sleek overpriced shopping complex. This was way back. Shops closed at 5.30 on Friday nights and at noon on Saturdays. Absolutely no trading on Sunday; a day of rest, church for lots of families, followed by Sunday roasts. So Saturday morning was a bum’s rush of driving from Avondale Heights to North Melbourne through Kensington - no freeway back then - Spanish donuts, sacks of potatoes and spruikers of vegetables. And my mum worked full-time , so this shopping time was precious. It would have been an extra effort to fit in a shop for a parka for her middle daughter, but somehow she managed it.
The thigh length parka was navy blue with criss-cross quilting. It had a zip detachable hood with a white fur edging, side slit pockets and long sleeves. I loved it. It was winter so I wore it to school. I was in Form 2 at high school. An outer overcoat was forbidden over our grey gym tunics, grey jumpers and blazers but nonetheless I was wearing it one recess in the B Block corridor by the grey metal lockers. We were hanging around inside at the end of B Block where the Form 2 girls’ lockers were, outside the needlework room and opposite the laundry where I had my violin lessons. (No dedicated music rooms back then.)
Somehow the girls and I got into some stupidity that involved me tucking the sleeves of my parka inside, making a straight jacket of sorts, and putting the jacket back on and getting back into my jacket with my arms pressed to my sides. One girl then zipped me up to my neck. Still in the mood of hysterics, giggling and teasing, they decided to put me in a coat locker. How small I must have been.
I had ceased enjoying the experience but was trying not to show it. I protested but I was still pushed into the grey metal hole. I was helpless in my straightjacket.
I was distressed, almost crying but trying to play along bravely as if I didn’t care; I felt, well, trapped and humiliated.
Friends were very important and one could be ousted from a group on less than a whim.
I begged to be released. And then the bell sounded. Still laughing, my friends grabbed books and headed to class. We were more afraid of authority in 1969. Lateness was forbidden.
The corridor had cleared a few minutes later, when our young and highly respected history teacher, freed me. She didn’t rebuke me. She didn’t need to. I was a combination of relieved and deeply embarrassed to appear such a fool in front of a teacher I held in such high regard.
I wonder if I would have been so embarrassed had I been a thirteen year old in 2010.
Parkas were in fashion in 1969. Eventually, I got one, probably after lots of pleading. We bought it one Saturday morning at Victoria Market. This was the only place to get a bargain, or so it seemed, back then. There wasn’t the plethora of markets and shopping precincts that we have now. This was before Highpoint, before the late Moonee Ponds Market, now a sleek overpriced shopping complex. This was way back. Shops closed at 5.30 on Friday nights and at noon on Saturdays. Absolutely no trading on Sunday; a day of rest, church for lots of families, followed by Sunday roasts. So Saturday morning was a bum’s rush of driving from Avondale Heights to North Melbourne through Kensington - no freeway back then - Spanish donuts, sacks of potatoes and spruikers of vegetables. And my mum worked full-time , so this shopping time was precious. It would have been an extra effort to fit in a shop for a parka for her middle daughter, but somehow she managed it.
The thigh length parka was navy blue with criss-cross quilting. It had a zip detachable hood with a white fur edging, side slit pockets and long sleeves. I loved it. It was winter so I wore it to school. I was in Form 2 at high school. An outer overcoat was forbidden over our grey gym tunics, grey jumpers and blazers but nonetheless I was wearing it one recess in the B Block corridor by the grey metal lockers. We were hanging around inside at the end of B Block where the Form 2 girls’ lockers were, outside the needlework room and opposite the laundry where I had my violin lessons. (No dedicated music rooms back then.)
Somehow the girls and I got into some stupidity that involved me tucking the sleeves of my parka inside, making a straight jacket of sorts, and putting the jacket back on and getting back into my jacket with my arms pressed to my sides. One girl then zipped me up to my neck. Still in the mood of hysterics, giggling and teasing, they decided to put me in a coat locker. How small I must have been.
I had ceased enjoying the experience but was trying not to show it. I protested but I was still pushed into the grey metal hole. I was helpless in my straightjacket.
I was distressed, almost crying but trying to play along bravely as if I didn’t care; I felt, well, trapped and humiliated.
Friends were very important and one could be ousted from a group on less than a whim.
I begged to be released. And then the bell sounded. Still laughing, my friends grabbed books and headed to class. We were more afraid of authority in 1969. Lateness was forbidden.
The corridor had cleared a few minutes later, when our young and highly respected history teacher, freed me. She didn’t rebuke me. She didn’t need to. I was a combination of relieved and deeply embarrassed to appear such a fool in front of a teacher I held in such high regard.
I wonder if I would have been so embarrassed had I been a thirteen year old in 2010.
Monday, September 27, 2010
Holiday. Celebrate.
Interesting how many of my English teaching Facebook friends have posted about doing piles of marking during the holidays. I have an aversion to this particular holiday torture, but despite working double time for the last week of term, I inevitably end up with at least one pile of marking that needs my attention during the break. This time I had two, unfortunately, but I dealt with them by putting my school bag at my bedside and doing a few hours marking on the first Saturday morning of the hols. My thinking was that if I did the work before I got out of bed, it wouldn't impinge on my holiday time. That is, my holiday wouldn't commence until I got out of bed on the Saturday. Mental. But who wouldn't be after thirty years of this?
Our school has also got with the zeitgeist of making the year 12s do their trial exams during the break. The idea is that the dedicated teachers will dash in, tongues hanging out, to collect the exams and get a head start on term 4 by beginning it with all the exams marked. Well, they can stick that up their jacksy.
Or are you one of those teachers who take extra lessons during the school holidays? I was a little that way inclined back in the day. Not now. If I haven't taught the course effectively during term time, with all those classes and all that extra-curricular counselling/tuition that I do, not to mention 24/7 availability on line, I'm evidently not efficient enough. As such, I get a little miffed when inevitably, at briefing at the start of the new term, 'prin class' thanks those 'more dedicated' teachers who gave up their own time to run classes during the vacation.
For me it's been a bit of travelling/cycling and some light holiday reading. Just finished 'Petite Anglaise', an appealing looking true story that I found amongst the remaindered items in a local book store. It's about an expat English womah blogging, famously (and I thought inappropriately) about her life in Paris. Oh to have a personal life to blog about. Clearly, she's not an English teacher.
Actually, it's not that bad. I did manage to steal a little carefully organised leave this year, without inconveniencing my students too much. Spent a blissful five weeks cycling in France.
Our school has also got with the zeitgeist of making the year 12s do their trial exams during the break. The idea is that the dedicated teachers will dash in, tongues hanging out, to collect the exams and get a head start on term 4 by beginning it with all the exams marked. Well, they can stick that up their jacksy.
Or are you one of those teachers who take extra lessons during the school holidays? I was a little that way inclined back in the day. Not now. If I haven't taught the course effectively during term time, with all those classes and all that extra-curricular counselling/tuition that I do, not to mention 24/7 availability on line, I'm evidently not efficient enough. As such, I get a little miffed when inevitably, at briefing at the start of the new term, 'prin class' thanks those 'more dedicated' teachers who gave up their own time to run classes during the vacation.
For me it's been a bit of travelling/cycling and some light holiday reading. Just finished 'Petite Anglaise', an appealing looking true story that I found amongst the remaindered items in a local book store. It's about an expat English womah blogging, famously (and I thought inappropriately) about her life in Paris. Oh to have a personal life to blog about. Clearly, she's not an English teacher.
Actually, it's not that bad. I did manage to steal a little carefully organised leave this year, without inconveniencing my students too much. Spent a blissful five weeks cycling in France.
Monday, August 09, 2010
Ultraflop
Seventy plus teachers and ancillary staff head to various computer rooms for Ultranet training. And thus it begins, entirely as expected. No one can access the Ultranet. But like dutiful children, we persist. No doubt, so do the other thousands of teachers across the state, trying to log onto the system at 9.05 this morning.
Eventually, IT guy gives us a twenty minute break for coffee and asks us to meet in the library for a bit of a lecture on the capabilities of the wonderful Ultranet. During the lecture, which is very hard to follow because we can't access the system, I - and everyone else illicitly checking their in-boxes - receive an Edumail message from DEECD IT support informing us that the Ultranet is not functioning. Hilarious.
Our collective inability to access Ultranet continues for the rest of the day.
IT guy informs me that as the organiser of the day, he'd been directed to forward both his plan for the day with a functioning Ultranet, and a contingency plan, should the system fail.
We all knew it would fail. The My School website crashed on launch day. Myki still isn't working properly.
In the messages from the IT department, reminding us throughout the day that the system wasn't functioning, we were directed, like children when it rains on sports day, to do some other busy work task that didn't rely on the Ultranet.
To borrow from the abbreviated textings of many of my students: LMFAO for much of the morning. But at 1.30 an email arrived from the IT service department telling us the Ultranet was now fully functioning and that we were invited to get on it and do our stuff.
That's when I became frustrated. Because initially I still couldn't get on it. And when I finally accessed my home page, I couldn't move from the home page onto any other site. Like a good girl though, I kept on trying until 3.45.
Meanwhile, our English department has a perfectly well functioning wikispace that already meets all our on line needs. In all the time I've been using it, wikispaces has never failed me. Nor have any one of loads of sites I frequently use that have millions of worldwide users.
But apart from today's Ultranet fiasco, I'm not thrilled with the Ultranet. As head of my department, I've already done some training and have had a play on the site at home. I find it slow and hard to negotiate. When I started using Facebook, I found it easy to navigate. Same with Blogger. All the help readily at hand; really simple to use. So what's the story with the Ultranet, given all the monetary resources that have been thrown at it??
On the positive side, had we not had our abortive Ultranet training day, I would have had a full teaching day, followed by a meeting. And the catered lunch was good. Otherwise, it was an unforgivable waste of time, affecting every state school teacher, and every family with children in state schools. Pretty disgusting all up.
Eventually, IT guy gives us a twenty minute break for coffee and asks us to meet in the library for a bit of a lecture on the capabilities of the wonderful Ultranet. During the lecture, which is very hard to follow because we can't access the system, I - and everyone else illicitly checking their in-boxes - receive an Edumail message from DEECD IT support informing us that the Ultranet is not functioning. Hilarious.
Our collective inability to access Ultranet continues for the rest of the day.
IT guy informs me that as the organiser of the day, he'd been directed to forward both his plan for the day with a functioning Ultranet, and a contingency plan, should the system fail.
We all knew it would fail. The My School website crashed on launch day. Myki still isn't working properly.
In the messages from the IT department, reminding us throughout the day that the system wasn't functioning, we were directed, like children when it rains on sports day, to do some other busy work task that didn't rely on the Ultranet.
To borrow from the abbreviated textings of many of my students: LMFAO for much of the morning. But at 1.30 an email arrived from the IT service department telling us the Ultranet was now fully functioning and that we were invited to get on it and do our stuff.
That's when I became frustrated. Because initially I still couldn't get on it. And when I finally accessed my home page, I couldn't move from the home page onto any other site. Like a good girl though, I kept on trying until 3.45.
Meanwhile, our English department has a perfectly well functioning wikispace that already meets all our on line needs. In all the time I've been using it, wikispaces has never failed me. Nor have any one of loads of sites I frequently use that have millions of worldwide users.
But apart from today's Ultranet fiasco, I'm not thrilled with the Ultranet. As head of my department, I've already done some training and have had a play on the site at home. I find it slow and hard to negotiate. When I started using Facebook, I found it easy to navigate. Same with Blogger. All the help readily at hand; really simple to use. So what's the story with the Ultranet, given all the monetary resources that have been thrown at it??
On the positive side, had we not had our abortive Ultranet training day, I would have had a full teaching day, followed by a meeting. And the catered lunch was good. Otherwise, it was an unforgivable waste of time, affecting every state school teacher, and every family with children in state schools. Pretty disgusting all up.
Saturday, May 15, 2010
Teaching's not all bad!
I often commemorate the crap on this blog. But it's not all bad. In fact it's quite often uplifting, or I wouldn't have pursued this vocation for the past thirty or so years. Here's part of an email I just received from a student's mum:
...Also thanks for going through Em's
story the other day, she really does appreciate your thoughts,
comments. I think that she would really benefit from being in your
class. I am really hoping she has you next year & you can steer her in
the right direction, Em seems to respond well to you. Your the only
teacher that received a gift from overseas - couldn't wait to buy you
something. You must be a fantastic teacher."
This particular student had a burgeoning talent as a writer; something I tried to nurture when she was in my Creative Writing elective. That was eighteen months ago, so I was quite surprised when she turned up at the staffroom the other day with her latest piece of writing, wanting my advice. I didn't know I'd made a difference - thought she'd bought everyone a gift after her overseas trip.
Something to remember when it seems overwhelmingly negative.
...Also thanks for going through Em's
story the other day, she really does appreciate your thoughts,
comments. I think that she would really benefit from being in your
class. I am really hoping she has you next year & you can steer her in
the right direction, Em seems to respond well to you. Your the only
teacher that received a gift from overseas - couldn't wait to buy you
something. You must be a fantastic teacher."
This particular student had a burgeoning talent as a writer; something I tried to nurture when she was in my Creative Writing elective. That was eighteen months ago, so I was quite surprised when she turned up at the staffroom the other day with her latest piece of writing, wanting my advice. I didn't know I'd made a difference - thought she'd bought everyone a gift after her overseas trip.
Something to remember when it seems overwhelmingly negative.
Tuesday, May 04, 2010
Ultrawhinge.
I'm feeling overworked and a bit like packing it in, today. First, yesterday's news.
A stranger was lurking with a clipboard in my classroom yesterday. "I'm just auditing," he said, by way of explanation. Just had to trust that he was official, and not about to filch my purse or my laptop from the office. He seemed congenial.
"Hope I don't have to move out of my room," I told him, as if he cared. "Think I'll have to retire if that's the case."
"Not to worry," said he. "Just an audit!" Yeah, whatever that is.
I did freak a bit though, and shared my paranoia with my office companion. "Not to worry, Jude." He didn't raise his eyes from his Age. He's used to me catastrophising.
Three-thirty, the same day, one of the Assistant Principals wanders into our rooms. "You've got to pack up all your things and clear out of your office and these rooms by Friday," he told us. And FARK said the crow, me.
The department has decided that our asbestos-y ceilings must be replaced. They're pulling the ceilings down and replacing them. Yes, I'm glad I'm being protected from asbestosis - hopefully I haven't picked it up in the last seven years that I've lived and breathed in my poisonous classroom and office. But I hate chaos. And this all comes in the middle of marking and cross-marking the first Creating and Presenting SAC, which I organise for all the year 12 teachers. I'm also on countdown to a well deserved short stint of Long Service Leave. Prior to departing for a bit of swanning along the Danube on a bike, I have to organise the whole faculty to operate smoothly during my brief absence: reports, exams, my senior students, my replacement teacher.
It's fraught, but I know I'll cope, despite a bit of pain between the shoulder blades.
Which leads me to what made me feel like opting out of this teaching lark altogether. At our staff meeting this afternoon, with the sky darkening, wind howling, trees thrashing the windows, IT guy told us, in his dulcet tones, about the Ultranet. Now I've rolled with all the changes incurred in secondary teaching since 1978, including the biggie: the introduction of VCE in 1991. I've adapted to the introduction of ICT when I can still remember us all oohing and aahing over a computer mouse in 1984, wondering whether it would ever catch on. But this whole expensive Ultranet thing really got up my wick.
It sounds as though the department wants us to be drones, accessible to parents at their convenience, not ours. Everything - curriculum, assessment records, comments on students' work - must be on line to allow parent scrutiny whenever.
I'm deeply concerned about teachers' rights and teachers' workload. It's just taking some of the spontaneous joy out of what has been a demanding but worthwhile career.
Hope I'm just negative because I've been up to my elbows in dust and cockroaches clearing out my office. Hope the Ultranet really does improve teaching and learning.
Time to connect with my old man and see what he's got planned for Europe. Lucky one of us has time to plan the trip.
A stranger was lurking with a clipboard in my classroom yesterday. "I'm just auditing," he said, by way of explanation. Just had to trust that he was official, and not about to filch my purse or my laptop from the office. He seemed congenial.
"Hope I don't have to move out of my room," I told him, as if he cared. "Think I'll have to retire if that's the case."
"Not to worry," said he. "Just an audit!" Yeah, whatever that is.
I did freak a bit though, and shared my paranoia with my office companion. "Not to worry, Jude." He didn't raise his eyes from his Age. He's used to me catastrophising.
Three-thirty, the same day, one of the Assistant Principals wanders into our rooms. "You've got to pack up all your things and clear out of your office and these rooms by Friday," he told us. And FARK said the crow, me.
The department has decided that our asbestos-y ceilings must be replaced. They're pulling the ceilings down and replacing them. Yes, I'm glad I'm being protected from asbestosis - hopefully I haven't picked it up in the last seven years that I've lived and breathed in my poisonous classroom and office. But I hate chaos. And this all comes in the middle of marking and cross-marking the first Creating and Presenting SAC, which I organise for all the year 12 teachers. I'm also on countdown to a well deserved short stint of Long Service Leave. Prior to departing for a bit of swanning along the Danube on a bike, I have to organise the whole faculty to operate smoothly during my brief absence: reports, exams, my senior students, my replacement teacher.
It's fraught, but I know I'll cope, despite a bit of pain between the shoulder blades.
Which leads me to what made me feel like opting out of this teaching lark altogether. At our staff meeting this afternoon, with the sky darkening, wind howling, trees thrashing the windows, IT guy told us, in his dulcet tones, about the Ultranet. Now I've rolled with all the changes incurred in secondary teaching since 1978, including the biggie: the introduction of VCE in 1991. I've adapted to the introduction of ICT when I can still remember us all oohing and aahing over a computer mouse in 1984, wondering whether it would ever catch on. But this whole expensive Ultranet thing really got up my wick.
It sounds as though the department wants us to be drones, accessible to parents at their convenience, not ours. Everything - curriculum, assessment records, comments on students' work - must be on line to allow parent scrutiny whenever.
I'm deeply concerned about teachers' rights and teachers' workload. It's just taking some of the spontaneous joy out of what has been a demanding but worthwhile career.
Hope I'm just negative because I've been up to my elbows in dust and cockroaches clearing out my office. Hope the Ultranet really does improve teaching and learning.
Time to connect with my old man and see what he's got planned for Europe. Lucky one of us has time to plan the trip.
Thursday, September 03, 2009
Wiki wiki wiki!
I'm running around the students, with their laptops, like a blue-arsed fly. My year 7 creative writing class numbers twenty-four. Sitting these kids in front of their own computers quickly identifies the really tech savvy, the competent and the passive aggressive borderline personality disorders.
The litany from the sulky kids: "My computer won't work!" (Have a cry, I think.) "I don't know what to do...My computer won't let me log in." Whinge, whinge, slump at the desk, rest head on heel of hand and look miserable. Meanwhile, one female student has logged on and edited my wiki homepage in a way that I don't particularly like. Other students are using the discussion board: "dont u think patrick is sooooo cute!??!" As I rush around the room students, quickly click out of forbidden sites. The creative writing lesson I've planned fails to eventuate except for five students. The lesson is about me trying to appear competent when I'm not. I'm okay on my own; it's a bit trickier managing the entire class. Despite this, I book in for another lesson.
People who teach with laptops and computers may find this pathetic. Me? I pop a couple of paracetamol tabs before my next class, which is, happily, back in my regular classroom.
Between classes I type in all the kids email addresses and invite them to join the class wiki. About four comply, given that if they join they have to do so from their home computer. Sounds too much like homework to the rest.
I consult the IT guy at school to see if there's a better way to achieve what I want: getting all the students signed up to the wiki and publishing their writing on line for the pleasure of the entire class. (BTW, I'm the only one reading the class wiki. Reminds me of my blog!) He suggests I get the remaining students signed up during class and tells me an easier way to do this involving students signing up to wikispaces.com, then requesting membership of the class website and me pressing my 'refresh' key. It is easier.
Kids begin posting links to their work on one page on the wiki. This doesn't work. It's too much of a convoluted process for me to click on the link, open their writing in Word, correct and assess it, then reload the modified work onto the wiki.
IT guy tells me to set up a page for each kid in the class, which I do.
Next lesson in the library computer area, I dole out the laptops to the students, carefully recording which laptop each student has taken, to help prevent vandalism. (Funny how they like to prise the keys off the keyboard and slam the computers around, or carry them around by their lids.) The students log on. They retrieve their work from the 'student share' area and begin writing. They're entering the Write Across Victoria competition and most are keen to participate. They write away happily and then when it's pack up time I tell them to copy and paste their work to their page on the wiki. This is when the internet drops out. Suddenly there's a scramble for USBs - for those students who have brought theirs to class. The rest line up while I pass around my own USB so they can save their work. I'm then the one who ends up emailing all the kids' stories later.
See how cleverly I've increased my own workload?
But wait, there's more.
I was feeling quite pleased with my ICT enterprise. All my kids had published their work appropriately on the wiki. Time to assess it. The process went thus: log onto the class wiki; click on each student's page; when page opens; click 'edit'; wait a few seconds for page to load; mark up and underline student's work; make comments in caps in brackets; type encouraging remark and grade at the bottom of the story; click 'save'; wait a few seconds for page to load; click on next student...
Twice during this process, the internet dropped out due to the weather, or whatever! I was craving 'hard copies', highlighter pens and hand-writing. So much easier.
Assessing on line took bleeding ages!
But back for more next week.
The litany from the sulky kids: "My computer won't work!" (Have a cry, I think.) "I don't know what to do...My computer won't let me log in." Whinge, whinge, slump at the desk, rest head on heel of hand and look miserable. Meanwhile, one female student has logged on and edited my wiki homepage in a way that I don't particularly like. Other students are using the discussion board: "dont u think patrick is sooooo cute!??!" As I rush around the room students, quickly click out of forbidden sites. The creative writing lesson I've planned fails to eventuate except for five students. The lesson is about me trying to appear competent when I'm not. I'm okay on my own; it's a bit trickier managing the entire class. Despite this, I book in for another lesson.
People who teach with laptops and computers may find this pathetic. Me? I pop a couple of paracetamol tabs before my next class, which is, happily, back in my regular classroom.
Between classes I type in all the kids email addresses and invite them to join the class wiki. About four comply, given that if they join they have to do so from their home computer. Sounds too much like homework to the rest.
I consult the IT guy at school to see if there's a better way to achieve what I want: getting all the students signed up to the wiki and publishing their writing on line for the pleasure of the entire class. (BTW, I'm the only one reading the class wiki. Reminds me of my blog!) He suggests I get the remaining students signed up during class and tells me an easier way to do this involving students signing up to wikispaces.com, then requesting membership of the class website and me pressing my 'refresh' key. It is easier.
Kids begin posting links to their work on one page on the wiki. This doesn't work. It's too much of a convoluted process for me to click on the link, open their writing in Word, correct and assess it, then reload the modified work onto the wiki.
IT guy tells me to set up a page for each kid in the class, which I do.
Next lesson in the library computer area, I dole out the laptops to the students, carefully recording which laptop each student has taken, to help prevent vandalism. (Funny how they like to prise the keys off the keyboard and slam the computers around, or carry them around by their lids.) The students log on. They retrieve their work from the 'student share' area and begin writing. They're entering the Write Across Victoria competition and most are keen to participate. They write away happily and then when it's pack up time I tell them to copy and paste their work to their page on the wiki. This is when the internet drops out. Suddenly there's a scramble for USBs - for those students who have brought theirs to class. The rest line up while I pass around my own USB so they can save their work. I'm then the one who ends up emailing all the kids' stories later.
See how cleverly I've increased my own workload?
But wait, there's more.
I was feeling quite pleased with my ICT enterprise. All my kids had published their work appropriately on the wiki. Time to assess it. The process went thus: log onto the class wiki; click on each student's page; when page opens; click 'edit'; wait a few seconds for page to load; mark up and underline student's work; make comments in caps in brackets; type encouraging remark and grade at the bottom of the story; click 'save'; wait a few seconds for page to load; click on next student...
Twice during this process, the internet dropped out due to the weather, or whatever! I was craving 'hard copies', highlighter pens and hand-writing. So much easier.
Assessing on line took bleeding ages!
But back for more next week.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Professional Learning Team. Not.
Once a fortnight, in that precious time between 3.30 and 4.30 in the afternoon, when everyone's worn out, after the day's teaching, prep and marking, we teachers assemble for another mandatory inevitable meeting. This one's called, oddly, Professional Learning Teams. I say oddly, because I'm yet to do any professional learning through this forum.
This year, I'm on the Information and Communication Technology team. Sounds good, but it's not. It reminds me of my own Form Six Politics class back in the early 70s, in that I didn't learn much in that class either. The teacher was disengaged and so were we. My loss, I know. Suppose it's the same with this PLT.
This afternoon it is even more hysterical than usual. Outside, winds of unprecedented strength for Melbourne, whip up anything that isn't lashed down. I wonder how I'm going to cope on my cycle home; whether I'll beat the storm. (I didn't, but it was fun anyway.)
And what's more, we rely on the internet in this PLT. But the internet at school hasn't functioned for three days due to storm damage, or some such. Needless to say, we are all led into the ICT room anyway. (No way could we be allowed to spend that hour preparing for classes. No, we must 'meet', dammit, and tick the box for 'professional learning', even if few are learning. Thus the school can report to the region that we have a 'culture of professional learning' and that all staff members are on PLTs.)
Our convenor, hands us reams of printed notes - the photocopier still works, apparently - interpreting VELS for ICT for the assembled group of teachers - about ten of us. Naturally, I began to read the document as soon as I got it. Bad move. Should have waited for our convenor to read it aloud to us. Should have seen that one coming. And wasn't that rivetting.
Our convenor, BTW, is sitting in a zen-like cross legged configuration on his desk top. He's earnestly trying to engage us, with his breathy, cultivated tones, but nobody's listening. I'm trying to be good, but I can't. The whole process just seems like sketch comedy.
One of my colleagues, is leaning back in his chair, eyes serenely closed, balancing his wrist watch along the line of his nose. The rogue art teacher is being deliberately provocative, as is his wont. He's an eccentric man-boy with the emotional maturity of a thirteen year old in his lanky fifty-something frame. He talks over the convenor and contradicts everything. Another colleague is reading an Artemis Fowl book. Others talk amongst themselves.
A colleague gets a call on his mobile. Unapologetically, he drifts out of the room for a couple of minutes and returns to interrupt the proceedings. Can I make an announcement? he says, taking the floor. His wife has called to tell him that the city of Melbourne has been evacuated. It's the end of the world, it seems. There's a brief pause while we process the information. No one seems particularly perturbed. I think it's probably an overreaction, given my husband works in town and I haven't heard of any drama from him. I consider that knowing my old man, he'll probably evacuate from his city office to the local pub. (He does.)
The time ticks slowly towards 4.30 and my cycle home in the 'cyclone'. If I could have skipped the meeting I'd have beaten the storm.
The ICT team again learns nothing. Whose fault? Mine? Yeah, I suppose. I'm an oldie and I should know better. Funnily enough though, I've always pursued my own professional learning without anyone telling me to, even during the eleven years when I was only teaching one evening class for three hours a week. It's what I do. But this school based 'professional learning team' that's been imposed on me, and my colleagues, just doesn't seem to work. Except for a bit of ironic entertainment value.
This year, I'm on the Information and Communication Technology team. Sounds good, but it's not. It reminds me of my own Form Six Politics class back in the early 70s, in that I didn't learn much in that class either. The teacher was disengaged and so were we. My loss, I know. Suppose it's the same with this PLT.
This afternoon it is even more hysterical than usual. Outside, winds of unprecedented strength for Melbourne, whip up anything that isn't lashed down. I wonder how I'm going to cope on my cycle home; whether I'll beat the storm. (I didn't, but it was fun anyway.)
And what's more, we rely on the internet in this PLT. But the internet at school hasn't functioned for three days due to storm damage, or some such. Needless to say, we are all led into the ICT room anyway. (No way could we be allowed to spend that hour preparing for classes. No, we must 'meet', dammit, and tick the box for 'professional learning', even if few are learning. Thus the school can report to the region that we have a 'culture of professional learning' and that all staff members are on PLTs.)
Our convenor, hands us reams of printed notes - the photocopier still works, apparently - interpreting VELS for ICT for the assembled group of teachers - about ten of us. Naturally, I began to read the document as soon as I got it. Bad move. Should have waited for our convenor to read it aloud to us. Should have seen that one coming. And wasn't that rivetting.
Our convenor, BTW, is sitting in a zen-like cross legged configuration on his desk top. He's earnestly trying to engage us, with his breathy, cultivated tones, but nobody's listening. I'm trying to be good, but I can't. The whole process just seems like sketch comedy.
One of my colleagues, is leaning back in his chair, eyes serenely closed, balancing his wrist watch along the line of his nose. The rogue art teacher is being deliberately provocative, as is his wont. He's an eccentric man-boy with the emotional maturity of a thirteen year old in his lanky fifty-something frame. He talks over the convenor and contradicts everything. Another colleague is reading an Artemis Fowl book. Others talk amongst themselves.
A colleague gets a call on his mobile. Unapologetically, he drifts out of the room for a couple of minutes and returns to interrupt the proceedings. Can I make an announcement? he says, taking the floor. His wife has called to tell him that the city of Melbourne has been evacuated. It's the end of the world, it seems. There's a brief pause while we process the information. No one seems particularly perturbed. I think it's probably an overreaction, given my husband works in town and I haven't heard of any drama from him. I consider that knowing my old man, he'll probably evacuate from his city office to the local pub. (He does.)
The time ticks slowly towards 4.30 and my cycle home in the 'cyclone'. If I could have skipped the meeting I'd have beaten the storm.
The ICT team again learns nothing. Whose fault? Mine? Yeah, I suppose. I'm an oldie and I should know better. Funnily enough though, I've always pursued my own professional learning without anyone telling me to, even during the eleven years when I was only teaching one evening class for three hours a week. It's what I do. But this school based 'professional learning team' that's been imposed on me, and my colleagues, just doesn't seem to work. Except for a bit of ironic entertainment value.
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
My space.
I spend fourteen seventy-five minute periods each week in one battered portable classroom, that's happily not going anywhere. I say that because last year, every other movable classroom was actually rounded up and moved down to one of the 'playing fields'. These relocated rooms are too far from toilets and running water for my preferences. The whole set up is often referred to as Siberia, as in, shit I've got an extra in Siberia. One has to allow a good five minutes to get down to Siberia if one is teaching down there. And in our sequestered days, counted out in minutes, that can really add to one's load.
I wanted to write about my work space: what's good about it; what stinks, literally.
My portable classroom is actually half of a double set, with offices and poky storerooms in the middle. As I said, it's battered. I've been teaching exclusively in this room for about six years now. The walls of my room are dirty off white. The room was painted in 2004 because some thoughtful maintenance person found some tins of paint somewhere and my room was next in line for a spruce up. But that paint has flaked off where students rock back against the walls on their green plastic chairs. They also kick them occasionally, as one does I suppose. I've also stopped one student idly picking the paint off the wall with her long finger-nails.
The carpet in my home away from home is putrid grey-brown and pocked with ground-in Blu Tak and chewing gum. There's an unsettling whiff of urine about the room; human not cat. It's concerning. The carpet is allegedly cleaned annually, yet the stench remains. Hope it's not me.
The desks, which I've arranged in an educationally unsound - according to the zeitgeist at our school - horseshoe shape, have brown hacked and scraped wood-grain laminex tops. They're gouged and scrawled upon, despite my regular efforts with methylated spirit and elbow grease. The problem is that other teachers use this space for the six periods that I'm not in there, and they have less of an anal retention problem than I. The desks are also of two different heights, so the whole effect is higgledy-piggledy crap.
My office adjoins my classroom. The office is little more than an overstuffed small rectangular box. All my office furniture is mismatched throw out stuff, appropriated during renovations of other areas of the school. There's a hole in the ceiling that allows access to the occasional wasp. Bit of fun on a hot day. The windows also admit the afternoon sun. No blinds. No air-con. If it's over 25, the office becomes stifling; unuseable.
Even so, I like it.
It's handy having one's office attached to one's classroom. None of that lugging of materials to various locations. I've also got a lockable storeroom for my bike. Very convenient.
I'm working towards the positives - and they far outweigh the negatives - of this space.
Lots of other rooms in the school have been modernised to be open spaces, not unlike fishbowls. In these fresh rooms, the new colourful tables must be grouped in 'islands' to facilitate better teaching and learning. ('Prin class', as they like to be known, get shirty when you move the desks to fit a lecture style of teaching.) In these rooms, the teacher doesn't have his or her own desk because today's teacher should be moving amongst the students, engaging them. Fair enough, but sometimes one needs to allow the students quiet time to actually get on with their own work, without the teacher bothering them, especially in a creative writing or senior English class. (I don't like people watching over my shoulder when I'm trying to write.)
So my room, with its broken mismatched blinds, and politically incorrect desk arrangement, has escaped the desk police. Apart from students and a couple of teachers, no one comes near my learning space. This means I'm missing out on the refurbishments that seem to have happened elsewhere in the school, but at the same time, I'm left alone to do my own teaching thing. Which is good because I know what I'm doing and I do it well.
I wanted to write about my work space: what's good about it; what stinks, literally.
My portable classroom is actually half of a double set, with offices and poky storerooms in the middle. As I said, it's battered. I've been teaching exclusively in this room for about six years now. The walls of my room are dirty off white. The room was painted in 2004 because some thoughtful maintenance person found some tins of paint somewhere and my room was next in line for a spruce up. But that paint has flaked off where students rock back against the walls on their green plastic chairs. They also kick them occasionally, as one does I suppose. I've also stopped one student idly picking the paint off the wall with her long finger-nails.
The carpet in my home away from home is putrid grey-brown and pocked with ground-in Blu Tak and chewing gum. There's an unsettling whiff of urine about the room; human not cat. It's concerning. The carpet is allegedly cleaned annually, yet the stench remains. Hope it's not me.
The desks, which I've arranged in an educationally unsound - according to the zeitgeist at our school - horseshoe shape, have brown hacked and scraped wood-grain laminex tops. They're gouged and scrawled upon, despite my regular efforts with methylated spirit and elbow grease. The problem is that other teachers use this space for the six periods that I'm not in there, and they have less of an anal retention problem than I. The desks are also of two different heights, so the whole effect is higgledy-piggledy crap.
My office adjoins my classroom. The office is little more than an overstuffed small rectangular box. All my office furniture is mismatched throw out stuff, appropriated during renovations of other areas of the school. There's a hole in the ceiling that allows access to the occasional wasp. Bit of fun on a hot day. The windows also admit the afternoon sun. No blinds. No air-con. If it's over 25, the office becomes stifling; unuseable.
Even so, I like it.
It's handy having one's office attached to one's classroom. None of that lugging of materials to various locations. I've also got a lockable storeroom for my bike. Very convenient.
I'm working towards the positives - and they far outweigh the negatives - of this space.
Lots of other rooms in the school have been modernised to be open spaces, not unlike fishbowls. In these fresh rooms, the new colourful tables must be grouped in 'islands' to facilitate better teaching and learning. ('Prin class', as they like to be known, get shirty when you move the desks to fit a lecture style of teaching.) In these rooms, the teacher doesn't have his or her own desk because today's teacher should be moving amongst the students, engaging them. Fair enough, but sometimes one needs to allow the students quiet time to actually get on with their own work, without the teacher bothering them, especially in a creative writing or senior English class. (I don't like people watching over my shoulder when I'm trying to write.)
So my room, with its broken mismatched blinds, and politically incorrect desk arrangement, has escaped the desk police. Apart from students and a couple of teachers, no one comes near my learning space. This means I'm missing out on the refurbishments that seem to have happened elsewhere in the school, but at the same time, I'm left alone to do my own teaching thing. Which is good because I know what I'm doing and I do it well.
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
To Sir With Love Revisited.
It was probably Christmas Day, 1968. I’d just finished my first year of secondary school. At Maribyrnong High School, actually, in case anyone’s interested. My family had joined with another family for Christmas lunch, which we’d already eaten. I was in a group in the suburban back yard, excitedly discussing the film, To Sir With Love, which one of the neighbours, a girl my age, had just seen. Lucky her. She was allowed to see it. I wasn’t. (Nor was I allowed to see The Graduate. Unsuitable for teenagers, according to my parents. It didn’t stop me reading through the racy paperbacks amongst the classics on my parents’ bookshelf.)
Back to the hushed discussion in the back garden. Vicky, the friend who’d seen the film, was telling us about this shocking scene in the film. Mr Thackeray, the Sidney Poitier character, walks into the classroom and finds that one of the female students has put something unmentionable into the fire.
I remember being somewhat incredulous and awestruck at the horror of it all. Periods were strictly women’s business back then.
Fast-forward forty-one years. A few weeks ago, To Sir With Love was on television and I idly watched the last half of the film, as you do sometimes on a weekend. I’d shown the film to students in the early 1980s, but hadn’t thought about it for years, apart from when Tina Arena released a cover of the title song.
Subsequently, I thought it might be interesting to show the film to my current year 8s. I’m always telling them ‘back in the day’ stories, and I thought it might interest them. I’ve shown them two ‘instalments’ of the film so far. (It’s a bit of a bribe that’s working well. If they work well for the first forty-five minutes of the afternoon session, they can spend the last half hour watching this film.)
It’s been fascinating watching these kids watching the film. It’s also been most interesting contextualizing certain scenes for the students. The pause button is handy here.
“Oh my god! Did you hear what he said?” says one of my students. “That is so racist!” Mr Thackeray, meeting his teaching colleagues for the first time, is calmly bearing the brunt of racist jibes from a jaded old teaching colleague. This led to a discussion on racism, and whether anything has changed, and what it was like back then.
Back to the film. To me, it seems almost silly; so dated. The clothes, the dancing, the accents, the attitudes, all seem so twee now. Yet my own students have watched it with considerable engagement. I had to press the pause button to explain the scene where the female ‘unmentionable’ is being inappropriately incinerated. In the film, Thackeray quickly exits the boys so he can talk frankly to the female members of his class, who should be learning that women should have more dignity. I explained all this to my mixed class, who were struggling to understand what was going on in the scene, given that those times are happily well and truly over. Took me right back to the days of the incinerator in the girls’ toilets, back in the day – not a place one wants to go.
The times have changed considerably since those grotty sexist times. Hurrah.
I didn’t expect that the film would generate so much interest. I honestly expected the kids to reject it, and demand something more contemporary. Initially, having a half hour of ‘film study’ Wednesday, last period, really was just a way of trying to engage the students at a time when they are usually totally disengaged. But showing this oldie has been surprisingly ‘educational’.
Back to the hushed discussion in the back garden. Vicky, the friend who’d seen the film, was telling us about this shocking scene in the film. Mr Thackeray, the Sidney Poitier character, walks into the classroom and finds that one of the female students has put something unmentionable into the fire.
I remember being somewhat incredulous and awestruck at the horror of it all. Periods were strictly women’s business back then.
Fast-forward forty-one years. A few weeks ago, To Sir With Love was on television and I idly watched the last half of the film, as you do sometimes on a weekend. I’d shown the film to students in the early 1980s, but hadn’t thought about it for years, apart from when Tina Arena released a cover of the title song.
Subsequently, I thought it might be interesting to show the film to my current year 8s. I’m always telling them ‘back in the day’ stories, and I thought it might interest them. I’ve shown them two ‘instalments’ of the film so far. (It’s a bit of a bribe that’s working well. If they work well for the first forty-five minutes of the afternoon session, they can spend the last half hour watching this film.)
It’s been fascinating watching these kids watching the film. It’s also been most interesting contextualizing certain scenes for the students. The pause button is handy here.
“Oh my god! Did you hear what he said?” says one of my students. “That is so racist!” Mr Thackeray, meeting his teaching colleagues for the first time, is calmly bearing the brunt of racist jibes from a jaded old teaching colleague. This led to a discussion on racism, and whether anything has changed, and what it was like back then.
Back to the film. To me, it seems almost silly; so dated. The clothes, the dancing, the accents, the attitudes, all seem so twee now. Yet my own students have watched it with considerable engagement. I had to press the pause button to explain the scene where the female ‘unmentionable’ is being inappropriately incinerated. In the film, Thackeray quickly exits the boys so he can talk frankly to the female members of his class, who should be learning that women should have more dignity. I explained all this to my mixed class, who were struggling to understand what was going on in the scene, given that those times are happily well and truly over. Took me right back to the days of the incinerator in the girls’ toilets, back in the day – not a place one wants to go.
The times have changed considerably since those grotty sexist times. Hurrah.
I didn’t expect that the film would generate so much interest. I honestly expected the kids to reject it, and demand something more contemporary. Initially, having a half hour of ‘film study’ Wednesday, last period, really was just a way of trying to engage the students at a time when they are usually totally disengaged. But showing this oldie has been surprisingly ‘educational’.
Saturday, July 18, 2009
The Secret River and Encountering Conflict.
Some brief thoughts after second, or third reading of the text. Nothing special. Just some stuff I'll share with my current students to stimulate a bit of discussion and writing, I hope.
Thornhill struggles to recognize the humanity in the aboriginal people even though he sees their intelligence and their similarities to himself. (This isn’t a text response essay, but think of him noticing the shape of the poisoned child’s skull; consider him pondering the ease with which the blacks found the food they needed yet still had time to play with their children. Think of your own prejudices and be honest about them. I’m not going to confess my own here, but I had to bite down on a racist reaction to a woman who won a lot of money on Deal or No Deal during the holidays. BTW, speaking of dumb, I’ve only watched it once in my life – my son had to explain how it worked – and I was recovering from flu.)
Given who Thornhill was, and his lack of opportunity in
So this conflict, however terrible, was unavoidable for the types of people involved, with their very human nature. It changed the world, decimating a race of people. And how many times throughout history has that happened?? It wasn’t so much survival of the fittest as survival of those with superior weaponry, cunning, and immune systems.
Friday, May 30, 2008
Dealing with a difficult parent.
I dutifully returned the call of a parent concerned about her fourteen year old son’s progress in Year 8 English. The previous week, parents had received their child's ‘interim’ reports. Every six weeks, in addition to parent teacher interviews and formal reporting, our school prepares these reports for close to a thousand students.
After telling me she was concerned about her son’s unsatisfactory progress, the call proceeded thus:
Her: My son is only getting Ns in your class.
Me: What are you implying?
At this stage of my career, I’m sick of parents ringing up and thinking they can malign my teaching competence in this way. It’s something I have never done when addressing the teachers of my own kids. It’s simply rude. It’s even more rude given my status within my school and my excellent reputation - no false modesty. But I suppose she’s not to know me from a bar of soap.
Now of course I understand just about the entire psychology of parental investment in their children. Yes, it’s probably an unfathomable body of work, but I’m getting a bit long in the tooth and I know what I know, based on protracted, sometimes excruciating years of experience as a moderately intelligent teacher, and parent of a couple of occasionally ‘ne’er do well’ children to boot. I know how terrible it feels when you know you’ve put in so much as a parent and your kids won’t come to the party and satisfy your parental needs with 'braggable' ENTER scores and virtuosity in the performing arts or rocket science.
I take umbrage at the implication that it is my teaching that is making her boy fail.
This mother assured me that she wasn’t implying anything; she just couldn’t understand why her son was passing in every other teachers’ classes and failing in mine. Again, the castigations.
She wanted more from me, more than the blood I’m already giving.
She was demanding time that I don’t have to spare, given the fact that I’m just about always in the classroom, either teaching, or counselling and consoling year 12 students, or dealing with the occasional recalcitrant who needs a bit of a talking to at the end of a lesson, away from an audience. If I’m not in the classroom, or guarding the yard, I’m in a bleeding hour long meeting after school three afternoons a week. Or on the phone taking shit from caustic parents. I suppose she and her ne’er do well son could catch me for a spot of private tuition after I’ve done my weekly five hours of assessment and correction in bed on a Sunday morning.
The conversation became quite terse:
Her: Well, if you haven’t got the capacity to assist my son…
Me: I beg your pardon. Have you any idea how rude you sound?
But ultimately, despite twenty minutes on the phone, generally biting my tongue and being my political best, I was unable to ameliorate the situation.
And unfortunately, after I hung up the phone I burst into tears of frustration at the unfairness of it all, in front of two of my colleagues, one of whom is only twenty four, a new teacher in the area I coordinate and just embarking on her career. I felt pathetic.
Next day, the parent has followed through with a facetious open email, which borders on harassment, to the school office, which was then forwarded to me and the head of the junior school.
Fortunately, the junior school and year 8 coordinators are well apprised of my abilities as a teacher and have assured me I will not have to communicate with this parent again.
The irony is that it doesn’t matter how many successes I have, it’s these incidents that have the power to overwhelm me; hence the need to vent on a blog that is rarely read, to put it out there to float around unnoticed in the ether forever. But it has more chance of surviving than my volumes of self-absorbed journals, which my daughter, a writer herself, has assured me she will compost as soon as I’m in the nursing home, if not before.
Time for a chardonnay.
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