Friday, 23 February 2007
Another week...
How the time has flown and the work piles up. Today I went back into the classroom for my first relieving teaching of 2007. I had forgotten how much I enjoy being with young people and what a wonderful array of personalities and energies. It was great to ground myself in the realities of school life after four weeks of negotiating virtual and theoretical spaces. Feeling refreshed and refocused. Waiting with curiosity to see what school I am going to be sent to for my first teaching experience.
Sunday, 18 February 2007
Homer was onto it
Enlighten me now O Muses,
tenants of Olympian homes
For you are goddesses,
inside on everything, know everything
But we mortals hear only the news
and know nothing at all.
The Illiad
tenants of Olympian homes
For you are goddesses,
inside on everything, know everything
But we mortals hear only the news
and know nothing at all.
The Illiad
Iraq is in our minds...what are our children really learning about every day?
Terrorism is the ultimate crime. Not only does it destroy buildings and lives. The divisive social climate of mistrust and fear it creates, intentionally, destroys trust and causes people to turn upon each other in anger and frustration.
The poisonous atmosphere of revenge, recrimination, and hysteria fed by fear and frustration created by the terrorist attacks in the USA in two days had reached NZ. 48 hours after the attacks took place, the NZ Race Relations Conciliator had to make a public appeal for tolerance and calm after Moslem citizens were subjected to assaults and death threats. Five years later, we seem to have entered an era of seige mentality and high security, where we seem to be justified in fearing everything that outside our door. The limits to our freedom, physical, psychological and social, are subtle and yet immense.
In such a climate, talk of peace seems futile, even naive. The Hobbesian model of humans as selfish and predatory seems to be confirmed and any appeals to our innate sociality seem utopian and misguided.
Therefore I believe that, as educators, it is crucial that allour actions are directed towards cultivating a culture of peace and understanding in our relationships, classrooms, homes and communities.
The poisonous atmosphere of revenge, recrimination, and hysteria fed by fear and frustration created by the terrorist attacks in the USA in two days had reached NZ. 48 hours after the attacks took place, the NZ Race Relations Conciliator had to make a public appeal for tolerance and calm after Moslem citizens were subjected to assaults and death threats. Five years later, we seem to have entered an era of seige mentality and high security, where we seem to be justified in fearing everything that outside our door. The limits to our freedom, physical, psychological and social, are subtle and yet immense.
In such a climate, talk of peace seems futile, even naive. The Hobbesian model of humans as selfish and predatory seems to be confirmed and any appeals to our innate sociality seem utopian and misguided.
Therefore I believe that, as educators, it is crucial that allour actions are directed towards cultivating a culture of peace and understanding in our relationships, classrooms, homes and communities.
Saturday, 17 February 2007
http://www.radionz.co.nz/podcasts/ninetonoon.rss
15 Feb : Listen to Derek Fox's provocative take on Professor Russell Bishop's analysis of school leavers which showed that 53% of Maori boys left school in 2005 without any educational qualification. Derek Fox's opinion is that the failure is not on the part of Maori kids but lays it clearly at the feet of the education system which has been funded with milllions of dollars over the years to teach kids properly. He states that teachers are fail to engage their Maori students and thought the Minister should resign since they were clearly failing to properly use the millions of dollars in Vote Education.
Listen and post a response:
15 Feb : Listen to Derek Fox's provocative take on Professor Russell Bishop's analysis of school leavers which showed that 53% of Maori boys left school in 2005 without any educational qualification. Derek Fox's opinion is that the failure is not on the part of Maori kids but lays it clearly at the feet of the education system which has been funded with milllions of dollars over the years to teach kids properly. He states that teachers are fail to engage their Maori students and thought the Minister should resign since they were clearly failing to properly use the millions of dollars in Vote Education.
Listen and post a response:
Educational Issues of the Day
What do you think about the debate over SCHOOL FEES : if you'd like some more information to help you think through the issue listen to http://www.radionz.co.nz/podcasts/ninetonoon.rss
A journey of a thousand smiles....
Not all of us were smiling that day. My first fishing trip was another's death sentence. Barracouda - when I saw how beautiful you were, I never went fishing again. 
(We will forgive him his gendered myopia in the interests of not making a sic mess of the quote).
He also said "to be natural is such a very difficult pose to keep up".
I got those quotes from last Sunday's Star-Times. They intrigued me (as all Wilde's gay witticisms do) and I wanted time to reflect on the points he was making.
Oscar Wilde once said that
"man is least himself when he talks in his own person.
Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth."
(We will forgive him his gendered myopia in the interests of not making a sic mess of the quote).
He also said "to be natural is such a very difficult pose to keep up".
I got those quotes from last Sunday's Star-Times. They intrigued me (as all Wilde's gay witticisms do) and I wanted time to reflect on the points he was making.
But they have lain on my desk neglected while I spent the next few days with doctors, acupuncturists and ACC. And now I am a week behind as well as in considerable pain and unable to sit. I am writing this on my knees.
Will the mask of blogger anonymity allow me to tell the truth about my riding the waves and troughs of academic life and practical teaching realities when I know my assessors are reading this. hmmm...
The theory is fine - as a sociologist of some 20 years tertiary experience, I am comfortable with absorbing lots of written information quickly. There are many points of crossover with contemporary educational or pedagogic theory. What is stretching me is coming to terms with the architecture of the online course and how to manage the maze and its seemingly endless demands. As I spend hour after hour coming to grips with it all, a little voice in the back of my head is yelling - "I thought you'd enroled part-time - this is meant to be PART time, not all of your time". Yeah whatever.
Learning something new is such a valuable lesson. To remember what it feels like NOT KNOWING. Until 'the penny drops', and 'the light comes on', it's impenetrable and demoralizing. "How can I be this thick? Everyone else seems to get it but me?" But after some days of exposure - a series of mini 'eureka!'s replace the churning frustration. The panic transforms into enthusiasm and an inability to tear oneself away - (its 2 am and I should be asleep. But wait - there's more.... hesitant to start I now find it hard to stop).
We are in an era of life long learning whether we like it or not. Here I am, 52, with a three degrees under my belt and training yet again. For a couple of years there, I though I had retired, but after travelling and trekking in India and Thailand, and having all day to walk the length of Waihi beach, I realized I missed the shared learning environment. Some relief teaching at the secondary schools in Wanganui after I moved here with my fiance in 2005 showed me a world where I could make a difference. I love the energy of the young. One of the reasons I left university was because of the emphasis put on our research outputs. Students became a liability as spending time with them was time you should be writing up your research, the most important performance criteria. Yet it was the teaching and the contact with the students that I had loved about being an academic.
As teachers we need to be constantly learning, not only because there is always so much new research to engage with, but also for that precious understanding of the fragile subjectivity of the learner that enables the committed teacher to nurture the nascent spirited imagination of an emergent young adult.
Will the mask of blogger anonymity allow me to tell the truth about my riding the waves and troughs of academic life and practical teaching realities when I know my assessors are reading this. hmmm...
The theory is fine - as a sociologist of some 20 years tertiary experience, I am comfortable with absorbing lots of written information quickly. There are many points of crossover with contemporary educational or pedagogic theory. What is stretching me is coming to terms with the architecture of the online course and how to manage the maze and its seemingly endless demands. As I spend hour after hour coming to grips with it all, a little voice in the back of my head is yelling - "I thought you'd enroled part-time - this is meant to be PART time, not all of your time". Yeah whatever.
Learning something new is such a valuable lesson. To remember what it feels like NOT KNOWING. Until 'the penny drops', and 'the light comes on', it's impenetrable and demoralizing. "How can I be this thick? Everyone else seems to get it but me?" But after some days of exposure - a series of mini 'eureka!'s replace the churning frustration. The panic transforms into enthusiasm and an inability to tear oneself away - (its 2 am and I should be asleep. But wait - there's more.... hesitant to start I now find it hard to stop).
We are in an era of life long learning whether we like it or not. Here I am, 52, with a three degrees under my belt and training yet again. For a couple of years there, I though I had retired, but after travelling and trekking in India and Thailand, and having all day to walk the length of Waihi beach, I realized I missed the shared learning environment. Some relief teaching at the secondary schools in Wanganui after I moved here with my fiance in 2005 showed me a world where I could make a difference. I love the energy of the young. One of the reasons I left university was because of the emphasis put on our research outputs. Students became a liability as spending time with them was time you should be writing up your research, the most important performance criteria. Yet it was the teaching and the contact with the students that I had loved about being an academic.
As teachers we need to be constantly learning, not only because there is always so much new research to engage with, but also for that precious understanding of the fragile subjectivity of the learner that enables the committed teacher to nurture the nascent spirited imagination of an emergent young adult.
I HAVE A DREAM .....
TO FILL THEM WITH A LOVE OF LEARNING
- A FEEL FOR THEIR POSSIBILITIES
- RAMPANT CURIOSITY
- TOOLS TO FIND, DISCRIMINATE, AND CRITICALLY EVALUATE INFORMATION
- FINDING THE CONFIDENCE TO DISCOVER THEIR VOICES, THEIR IDENTITIES- AS INDIVIDUALS, AND AS CITIZENS.
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