Tiamat's Day

The Mixed Ability Class

2011-03-04T19:29:00.005+11:00

My class of 22 children is classed as "mixed ability" - that is, students were not selected for the class based on their academic ability or lack of ability.

As a result, "mixed" is a very good term. I have now finished the beginning of the year testing, and find in different subjects that the ability range is:

Reading: My poorest reader reads at the level of an average child leaving kindergarten. He struggles with words with more than 4 letters, and words that can't be directly sounded out are beyond him. Finding reading material is a challenge - if he can read it, it is far below his interest level (which is much the same as any 11 year old boy in our community - motor bikes and footie). On the other end of the spectrum, I have a boy and girl both reading at an adult level. Both have read all of Harry Potter, the girl has read all of Twilight and is now exploring Austen, and the boy currently has Huckleberry Finn and Ash Road on his desk.

Spelling: We give all students the South Australian Spelling Test, which is a test of 70 words, ranked in difficulty. The first word is "on", the last is "seismograph". Where they start making mistakes gives their "spelling age". My poorest speller (not the same as the lowest reader) fell apart at word 5 "Jam", giving her a spelling age of less than 5. My best spellers, by contrast, made their first mistake at word 61 "Mortgage" and their errors from that point still lead to readable, understandable writing, even though their spelling was incorrect. Their spelling age is 16+, or adult level.

Maths: Range from struggles with single digit addition to comfortable working with fractions, decimals, and large number calculations.

Teaching this range of ability levels is common in our primary schools, and one of the biggest challenges we face. With the push for good results in the NAPLAN testing, I sometimes feel I am throwing my good students under the bus - they will achieve in NAPLAN regardless of what I do, but oh, how I wish I sometimes had the time and opportunity to really work with them and to extend them even furtherl.

This range of abilities and achievements

How old are you, Miss?

2011-02-28T19:05:00.002+11:00

R: How old are you, Miss?
M: Yeah, how old? My mum's 42, but I don't think you're that old.
Me: You'd be surprised.
R (speaking to M): I reckon she's in her 20s. (to me) Are you in your 20s, Miss S?
Me: No, a little older than that.
M: Thirties?
Me: No.
R: You're not. You're not in your 40s. That's older than my Mum!!!
M: You can't be in your fifties. That's old and you're not old.
Me: Well ....
R: Really? 50? 51?
Me: You got it.
M: Wow (awed voice). You don't seem that old!

Swings and roundabouts

2011-02-26T16:10:00.003+11:00

My class is beautiful. I have radiant, lively, intelligent children, who are keen to learn, to be involved, and to have fun. I'm loving this year, and my class and my classroom.

But then there's B1. There is also B1's identical twin, B2, but he's in another class, thank goodness, and not my problem.

I'm keeping a behaviour journal on B1. This is a slightly expanded version of the entry for yesterday. We use a version of Assertive Discipline in our school and each cross next to his name on the board earns him a further consequence.

B entered the classroom well and did his spelling test. However, when the handwriting lesson started, he "fell asleep", snoring loudly on his desk. This got his name on the board for disrupting the class. He pulled his shirt over his head "so you can't see me" and refused to work. He then echoed everything I said, either to him or the class. He got a cross on the board and said "So you want to play that game, do you?".

He then started taunting another student with a crude variation of his name. This got a second cross and a reminder than a third cross means he leaves the room and takes his work to the classroom next door. He calmed down for the rest of the session and went to lunch.

Unfortunately, our system requires that each session of the day is a "fresh start", so he has the option to start again with the nonsense.

After lunch, he refused to join the class but wandered the room. He picked up J's watch which had been left on his desk (bad move on J's part, I know) and refused to give it back, either to J or to me. "I stole is, so it's mine". Eventually, he threw the watch across the room; luckily another child caught it and returned it to J undamaged. Name on board. When students went to their desks to start work, he flicked R on the face with a ruler. X on board.

We then had a whole school assembly, at which he was mostly fairly settled. However, after our last break of the day, he took A's homework sheet from her desk and refused to return it. He told me it was none of my business and destroyed it. He chose not to join the lesson at all and made it as difficult as possible for the others to work.

B1's mother is a part time aide in our school and knows the behaviour system intimately. Our principal is a little scared of this woman (hell, so am I) and we can't do anything with either of her children unless every little piece of paperwork and recording is in place. If he is taken out of the room before the three crosses are given, she is in the office demanding to know why. If he is in trouble on the playground, she has to know why. Nothing is ever the boys' fault - usually it's the teacher's fault. I am working with the principal to develop strategies to deal with this child, but he is very resistant to everything that is tried, and knows that his mother is on his side.

However, there are pluses as well. This morning before school, one of the girls in my class was in the room and helping me get organised for the day. We were chatting, as you do, and she started asking about my family.

She comes from a large Samoan family and found my lack of relatives a little strange. Okay, extremely strange. She asked about my parents and I told her they both died some years ago (apparently, I should say "passed away", 'died" isn't nice). She looked at the photo in my wallet and said, very seriously, "You know that they still love you and are watching you all the time from heaven, don't you?".

I don't believe that, but I do love that child. What a sweetheart.

A New Year, A New Start

2011-01-28T16:19:00.004+11:00

Today is the first day of the school year. It's hot. 40C (about 104F) hot. It's always this hot when our school year starts. It's as though summer is taunting us "I'm still here, and you have to go back to work!". If our school was located 5km west, we would be entitled to an extra week of summer holiday (the "heat week" that western New South Wales schools get). 5km.

My teaching world is changing this year. After two years of boredom and dissatisfaction, I am leaving ESL behind (at least temporarily) and taking on a mainstream class. I am ready. My classroom is ready. I am Year 5. On Monday morning, 25 9 and 10 year old children will be looking at me as their teacher for the year . It's exciting.

And, as I think about my Year 5, my mind drifts back about a million years to when the dinosaurs roamed the earth and I was in Year 5. My Year 5 teacher was Mr Anderson (and my Year 4 teacher, and my Year 6 teacher; that's what happens in small schools). I loved him. Not the way I loved my parents, but as a mentor and teacher who opened the world up to a little girl from the bush in a way nobody else had. He guided my reading in a way that helped me to learn so much about the world, to develop ambitions and the will to fulfil them. He answered my questions, and made me memorise poetry, and helped me find answers to my questions that he couldn't answer.

Mr Anderson's class was a group of fifty (yes, I know, wouldn't be allowed today) children of wildly varying ability, background and ambition. I don't know how he managed it, but he made us feel special and individual; we were never just one of the crowd to him.

When we were in Year 6, he organised an excursion for us. Three days away from home, on a bus, going to Canberra and to see snow. For most of us, the first time ever. And, helping supervise, was his wife. That was certainly above and beyond the call of duty for both of them, but especially for her. Such trips were a very new thing at the time, although routine now.

Many years later, I was at a school function with my children, and one of the fathers was, by extreme coincidence, one of my classmates from Mr Anderson's class. We immediately fell into playing a game with the children. One of Mr Anderson's games. It came automatically - twenty years after leaving him, we were still Mr Anderson's kids.

Mr Anderson died when I was in high school. Almost the entire class of Mr Anderson's kids (we were his last class, he retired when we left Year 6) attended the funeral. Mr Anderson's kids to the end.

Wherever you are, Mr Anderson, you did good, and you are remembered and loved.

What is Reading?

2010-11-27T16:22:00.001+11:00

Reading Recovery is an excellent programme, designed to assist children who have made a slow start in reading to catch up with their peers. It involves one-on-one tuition, and a very structured lesson plan, delivered every day. The success rate is high, and many participants continue to do well as they move up the school. Reading Recovery is only available to students in Year 1, after they have completed a year of schooling.

However, when a child comes to our school from another country, with no English and enrols in Year 1, they are immediately eligible to go on the Reading Recovery programme, and the programme’s procedures put them on as soon as possible.

It’s useless at that time. They may learn to “read” – to decode text – but reading is so much more than just decoding text. Comprehension is the major part of reading. After all, I can have a reasonable “go” at reading French. My pronunciation might be off (as is these children’s) but I can “read” it. I can’t understand it, though.

And comprehension doesn’t happen without an understanding of the language. Putting these children in the Reading Recovery programme is a waste of resources – they need a lot (at least a year, sometimes more) of oral language development and understanding first.

You can’t read and comprehend what you can’t say and understand.

Worries from Kindergarten

2010-11-25T19:11:00.001+11:00

I have two kindergarten students who now, at the end of the year, are still worrying me. Their peers, who also had little English in February, are now confident communicators, chatting happily in English and well on the road to literacy. While they still need help, they are on the way and I don’t have long-term concerns about them.

These two boys are different. O. has been sent to school too young. However, I doubt another year at home would have made a different. He is the third child in his family; the older two are doing well in Year 1 and Year 3. O doesn’t speak. He understands no English, but copes in the classroom by sometimes copying his classmates, and sometimes waiting to be physically moved into place. He also doesn’t speak or understand Tongan – when asked, his brother communicates by showing him what to do or physically moving him into place. He does seem to hear – he responds to his name and to bells.

Of course, a hearing check is needed, but the parents don’t see a problem and won’t do it. We can get free hearing tests for Aboriginal students but not for others. So O. goes on his way, understanding little in either language, and learning nothing.

Z is the other child I am concerned about. Z lives in a happy, happy place – but it isn’t the real world of school. he seems to have no awareness of why he is here or what he is meant to be doing. He needs watching constantly as he doesn’t respond to bells, routine or instruction and can be found almost anywhere if not watched. He doesn’t follow his classmates at all, hasn’t yet learnt to write his name and can’t really hold a pencil. He doesn’t seem to have grasped that these are things he might one day do, or that we want him to do, or even that other people do. Hearing is a concern but, again, a test isn’t happening. So Z continues in his happy place (he is a happy, placid child), but not yearning anything.

A counsellor assessment done recently tells us that both boys are of average intelligence (tested how, exactly?) and being ESL is their only problem.

Hmmm….

A Shameful Past

2010-11-16T19:12:00.001+11:00

Because we are a school with a significant Aboriginal enrolment (about 25%) we receive considerable extra funding from the Government to improve the educational outcomes for our indigenous students (like the educational talk?). Part of the responsibilities that come with this is that we have an extra School Development Day each year which is devoted to Aboriginal culture and awareness.

Usually this day is not particularly looked forward to. This year’s however, turned out to be quite interesting. Part of the presentation was about Aboriginal men who served in the Australian Army in World War I and World War II and the way they were treated when they returned home.

During the wars, the Aboriginal soldiers were treated equally with their white mates. During World War I, they were not actually allowed to enlist as Aboriginal men, but many were so keen to serve that they told the recruiters they were Indian (or anything else) so they could enlist. Once they were in they received the same pay, did the same work, and took the same risks. My late father-in-law served with several in World War II, and always spoke highly of them.

He also spoke of the shameful way they were treated at the end of both wars. At the end of World War I, returned soldiers were entitled to a grant of farmland to enable them to establish homes and families, and to develop new areas. Much of this area is “soldier settlement” land and some farms are still held and worked by the direct descendants of the men who were granted them 90 years ago. However, even though this land was taken from the Aboriginal tribes (and the tribes moved onto mission stations), the Aboriginal soldiers were not entitled to receive a soldier settlement grant.

As well, Aboriginal returned soldiers were not allowed to join the RSL, not allowed to participate in Anzac Day and Armistice Day marches and celebrations, not allowed to join their mates for a drink in the pub; generally not allowed to participate in society at all.

Aboriginal people were also subject to the provisions of the Aborigines Protection Act 1909, which gave the Aboriginal Protection Board power over their lives, where they lives and what they did. It enabled children to be removed from parents (the Stolen Generation), Aboriginal people to be forced onto reserves, and many other controls over their lives.

Unless, of course, they obtained a General Certificate of Exemption. This allowed the holder to

Leave the reservation or mission at which they live to go to work.

It also conferred additional benefits, including

Walk freely through town without being arrested (note: Curfews apply)

Enter a shop or hotel (you may or may not be served – at proprietor’s discretion)

However, there were also special conditions which must be strictly adhered to:

Speaking in native language – Prohibited

Engaging in dance, rituals, native customs – Prohibited

Associating with fellow indigenous people (including family) – Prohibited

This Certificate gave the Aboriginal man the chance to

Assimilate into the wider community. If all conditions are met with and satisfactorily upheld, you may also be eligible to live in town unsupervised. Note: Strictly segregated housing areas. This is your chance to be free of the Aboriginals Protection Act and live like a white man.

Ancient history? Not so much, really. The copy certificate I have (and have quoted from) is dated 1951, and such certificates were issues into the 1960s.

An interesting day indeed.

Why would you do this to your child?

2010-10-31T16:19:00.000+11:00

Why do parents do things, seemingly deliberately, that put their children at a big disadvantage at school.

Despite letters, notes and personal visits, both home and through the Churches, asking otherwise, our Pacific Islander parents ignore the starting day of kindergarten in January, and the preparation beforehand, and instead bring their child to school for enrolment on its fifth birthday, regardless of when in the year this is. Thus, we have brand new starters up to halfway through the year (we can’t enrol them after July; they are just too young at that point and must wait until the next year)..

Islander children don’t go to pre-school. They rarely watch television, and do no early education type activities. They are well loved and cared for, but develop little facility in language, either their home language or English. Their needs are met, and they aren’t encouraged to talk. Many have siblings who speak excellent English but it never seems to occur to them to encourage their younger siblings to learn..

So, we get new children at school after routines have been taught and established. They have no understanding of what school is, how it works or why they’re there. They are often found in places they shouldn’t be, due to not being aware of bells and what they mean or safe and unsafe areas. Explaining rules in Samoan or Tongan has little effect as these children aren’t used to being instructed in any language.

Of course, they are behind academically. They have never seen a book or held a pencil. They have no concept of reading or writing, or even of sitting still and listening. Some can’t even handle a spool or feed themselves a sandwich.

Many end up having to repeat kindergarten just to try and give them the skills they need. Many are so far behind that even that doesn’t do it, and they go into Year 1 still behind.

Why do parents set their children up for failure?

The sweet taste of success

2010-10-29T16:18:00.000+11:00

Two years ago, a boy arrived in our school. As is common, A spoke no English. As was less common, A came from the Philippines, not one of our usual countries, and he speaks Ilokano, not a majority language even in that country. There was nobody in the school that he could talk to. A was enrolled in Year 2 and began the daunting task of adapting to Australian school life and learning English.

I quickly learnt that A is fiercely bright and has a huge drive to know and understand … everything really. After six months in the country, at the end of Year 2, A was topping his class in Maths, and writing understandable paragraphs in English – outstanding progress. He continued his academic progress in Year 3, again topping his grade in most areas. He is also a popular young man with his peers, and is starting to act as interpreter for newly-arrived Filipino children, who are beginning to trickle into the school.

We are now halfway though his Year 4. A no longer gets ESL support, so I am not working with him as closely, although I do still watch his progress.

Every year, one student from each grade has the opportunity to participate in the Multicultural Public Speaking Competition, giving a three minute prepared speech on a topic chosen from a list of multicultural subjects given by the Department of Education in Sydney and a one minute impromptu speech, on a local topic not known beforehand.

A was our chosen representative for Year 4. Our speech teacher knew his prepared speech was outstanding. He chose the topic “Being Bilingual” and spoke about what this means to him. He spoke his introduction in Ilokano, and described being bilingual as “a gift from God”. However, the impromptu speech is hard, especially for a relatively new English speaker.

On the day of the competition, competing against students from ten other local schools, A gave his prepared speech with confidence, bringing tears to the eyes of many in the audience, including both his parents. On that section, he seemed like a clear winner.

The impromptu topic was “Making My Place Better”. A spoke well, better than we expected, about ways to make out town better. His speech lasted for the one minute minimum, but included some hesitations and stumbles. However, so did many others’.

In the final results, A came in second. The judge agreed that his prepared speech was moving, well-delivered and a clear winner. However, the impromptu let him down a little. She is looking forward to seeing him again in Year 5 and Year 6.

His parents? Are busting their buttons with pride in their son. This is what they came here for – well, not specifically, but the opportunities he wouldn’t have had if they’d stayed in the Philippines.

A seems unconcerned. He says it was fun, and he’d like to do it again.

Kindergarten children are very small

2010-10-29T16:17:00.001+11:00

Sometimes, when times are desperate, and we are very short of teachers, I am asked to take a class for a day in place of their teacher. These days are always interesting and usually fun. Usually there is at least one child who is surprised to learn that I am a “real” teacher and not just a helper. This is one of the many frustrations of my job as it is now.

This week, I spent a day with one of our kindergarten classes. I am not a natural kindergarten teacher, but a day here and there is fun. The children are small but,more than halfway through the year, know their routines and have developed the confidence to show their personalities.

This kinder room has several notable personalities, including:

C: There is a little girl like this in every infants’ room (never a boy, for some reason). They know their teacher’s routine and that Routine. Is. Law. For their own teacher, they are a delight, but a visiting teacher can cause complete meltdown. A variation as simple as doing news before the weather is a catastrophe of unparalleled magnitude. She was always at my elbow, telling me what I was doing wrong, and making sure I did the next thing right. Made for a long day for both of us.

J: J is the baby of his large Fijian family. And he is truly the baby. Before coming to school, he had never had to do anything for himself. Even eating lunch without help was beyond him and he had obviously never taken himself to the toilet. He is improving, but a long way behind still.

JM: Newly arrived ESL. This I can deal with. 5 years old and in a new country with a new language has to be frightening, though.

B: She’s an interesting one. He brother is the “naughtiest” boy in our difficult school and is often suspended. He says of his little sister “She’s really naughty, you know”. He’s right, too – B is very hard to stay ahead of.

T: No preschool. No previous social interaction. No siblings to copy from. No English. I think this child was kept in a box before coming to school. No skills at all. And, of course, a long way behind.

Despite these challenges, we negotiated literacy, numeracy and PMP (Gross motor skills programme) with some success. The children finished the day happy, had hopefully learnt something, and not been too stressed by a different face at the front of the room.

Me? I went home and put my feet up.

A Refugee Family

2010-02-01T18:18:00.001+11:00

The S family has been in Australia for some years now, and it might be interesting to see how the various members have adapted, and are living their lives in their new world.

The father has been here for eight years. He left his wife and four young children in Afghanistan to escape the Taliban, who had him in their sights. Eventually, he made his way to Indonesia and then to Australia as one of the boat people. He spent time in a detention centre and, when he was granted refugee status, immediately began working and saving to bring his family here. He was sent to this town, with many others, to work, and he likes living here. His English is good and he has established himself in the community.

At the end of 2005, he was able to bring his wife and children to Australia. Mrs S is uneducated, like to many Afghani woman, and spoke no English at the time. As soon as her children were at school, she enrolled at TAFE to learn English and, while not fluent, she is able to talk about her children, shop, and join in at playgroup.

The four children have very different personalities and ways of dealing with things.

The oldest boy, A, is in high school now, but I taught him for two years and know him well. A is laid back and relaxed almost to the point of unconsciousness. He will never be an academic, and could quite possibly be the laziest child I have ever taught. He ahs acquired a working level of English and doesn’t seem to be interested in learning more. He is a popular, likeable boy, and will, I think, do well in life.

The second boy, E, is a fish of a completely different kettle. He is now in Year 6 and is bright, determined and driven to succeed. He sees the Taliban as the people who stopped him from learning. He has a strong desire to learn and understand, in both academic and cultural areas, and this sometimes leads him to ask fairly inappropriate questions (asking a teacher why she never fell in love with anyone enough to marry them is inappropriate). He is devastated if his curiosity and drive leads him into trouble, and it is far more effective to take him aside and discuss than to punish these incidents. I have no doubt E will end up with a University degree.

The third boy, R, is the one we worry about. R, in Year 5, is an angry young man. Angry with his family, the war in Afghanistan, Australia, his peers, school in general and the English language. Despite counselling, he is constantly in trouble, and fights physically and aggressively. When he is calm, he is a lovely boy, but these moments are few. His family share out concerns and we work together to try to help him. He resists learning English (although he has an outstanding vocabulary of profanity) and, of course, his academic work is poor. The refugee process has left this child the most damaged I have seen and I am afraid for his future.

Three boys, very different in personality, more different than most families, I think. The fourth child, a daughter, is different again.

N is in Year 4 and has just turned 10. This is the age at which a good Afghani girl begins to wear the headscarf and learn the skills of being a wife and mother in preparation for the marriage which may not be too far away. N, with four years of Australian school behind her, has other ideas - “I’m not doing that Afghani stuff. I’m Australia and I’m going to University and be an engineer and build things.” She has the ability and her father ir right behind her – education is what he wanted for his children. Mum? Well, Mum is surprised. This is outside her experience of how a daughter behaves. However, she accepts that this is a new country with new ways and is okay to go with that.

There is a fifth child, their “little Aussie sister” – born in Australia with Australian citizenship and now 2 1/2 years old. At the moment, she appears to be a very normal toddler – it will be interesting when she comes to school.

Adventures of a House-Husband Part II

2010-01-19T16:58:00.001+11:00

My father’s adventures in housework during my mother’s illness continue. This was originally published in the Village Journal, Rosebank, NSW, Australia (Circulation 250) in July 1987.

WASHING: Having mastered the art of trolley shopping at the Square, following a severe dressing down by the invalid and a further two forays of shopping, I decided that the accumulated washing was next on my list.

Now, our washing machine is of the wringer type, as my better half has not caught up with the modern age of automatic machines.

Having retrieved the washing baskets and the dirty clothes from the laundry, I proceed to separate these into loads as per instructions given from the bedroom – whites, coloureds, etc, etc. Now back to the laundry to start, and decide to treat myself to a five minute rest while I work out my plan of attack.

First the machine is filled with hot water and a little bit of cold to bring it back to warm, then add the complete washing system powder and some bleach. What for I don’t know, as the system contains bleach, or so it says on the box. Well, it looks like everything is set to go, so I switch the machine on at the power point and then at the machine. Then it is time to get the first basket from outside the laundry and put the contents in the machine. My first catastrophe – I had switched the machine to “pump” instead of “wash” even though I had turned my back for only five seconds, the pump has really done its job. The laundry is completely covered with soapy, slushy water. At this point I decide that it would be better to change from slippers and long trousers to wellington boots and shorts. What a mess, and not even the smallest piece of washing on the line after 45 minutes. Oh, well.

Start again, and this time, after cleaning up the laundry and reaching the same stage of the battle, making sure the machine is on “wash”, and the clothes for the first load safely in the machine, a rest is indicated, helped by a can of my favourite beer and ten minutes break before the next operation. Back to the fray, and now I find that maybe too much of the complete cleaning system has been used, because when the lid of the machine is removed, I am engulfed with suds and lovely bubbles. This doesn’t deter me, even though I am now ankle deep in suds and water, mainly because whoever had laid the concrete floor in the laundry did not have a spirit level, and the water runs to the back wall instead of out the door. But I battle on regardless.

Now the clean clothes have to be rinsed by passing them from the machine, through the wringer, to the tub filled with water. This is called the first rinse. Everything is now going to plan until half way through shoving the clothes between the rollers, the emergency release on the rollers let go with a hell of a bang, and I find that my invalid’s best blouse has rotated round and round the rollers and sprung the emergency. This necessitates dismantling the rollers, pulling the blouse out and reassembling everything, and continuing as if nothing unusual has occurred. The clothes now have to be passed back between the rollers to a washing basket, ready for what is called the second rinse, which only means that Comfort or Cuddly is added to the water. Here I must mentioned that we only have one stainless steel tub in our laundry. This operation is completed with nonchalant ease as I now feel that the machine has been mastered and knows who is the boss. Now the next snag is that due to the extra complete washing system powder used it is found that a further rinse is required to remove the remainder of the soapy suds still clinging to the washing. Here I decide that a rest is again required and another cool can. Back again for the next load – I feel that if anything goes amiss with this one the experience already gained will help me out.

Now a cry from the bedroom - “Wouldn’t a cup of coffee be lovely?” Here I am, ankle deep in soapy suds and water, my wellingtons half full, wet to the skin, and a cup of coffee is required! A can of beer is offered instead but declined. I have to undress, put my dressing gown on and make coffee and biscuits for the invalid, who is sitting up comfortably in bed, with my two pillows as well as her own, and reading. “Why are you doing the washing in your dressing gown and without shoes on, etc?”

The reply is “Don’t you worry about that, dear, everything is under control”.

Like hell it is.

The following loads go quite smoothly if you disregard the fact that the emergency release only goes off twice, and that each time it occurs I console myself with another cool can. Everything is now set for hanging on the line, after wiping spider webs, assorted insects and such off the line. Now I am starting to feel more confident of completing this task without further mishaps (probably due to the cool cans consumed), but I am mistaken. While carrying out the first basket, our cat (not sighted all morning) makes an appearance and dashes straight in front of me, tripping me head over heels on the lawn and spreading the washing and basket all over the ants’ nests which have sprouted up after the recent mowing. The cat promptly (and wisely) disappears and I have to gather the washing up and rinse again. This whole exercise is becoming like the start of World War II.

The washing is finally hung out to dry, and as I am pegging the last item on the line the first clouds seen for two weeks start to appear. Tough luck, but another rinse from rain won’t go astray, and as far as I am concerned, they can stay on the line until they are dry. Another cold can before cleaning up. After pumping out the washing machine, six nice coloured buttons are found in the strainer, together with a buckle from a dress belonging to the boss. This I decide not to mention as it could upset her convalescence, and that I certainly do not want to do. Now clean the machine, mop up the laundry, and everything, except myself, is back to normal. May as well sit down, enjoy a cool can and watch the dark clouds start to roll up.

Resolutions decided upon after this experience:

1.Purchase a further carton of cool cans.

2.Enquire re automatic washing machines

3.Ring doctor as to when invalid will be able to take over again.

4.Find the local launderette.

The invalid wants to know how I could possibly end up half sloshed just from doing the washing. How would you answer that one? And, for anyone reading this:

NO, I WILL NOT BE TAKING IN WASHING!!

Col Strathearn

School’s out for Summer

2010-01-17T12:32:00.001+11:00

While school is off for a few weeks, I don’t have any stories about school but, in packing to move I found three stories that my father had published in a local newspaper in the late 1980s. I’d forgotten I had them, and enjoyed them, so thought I would give them a wider audience. So, here, for your amusement, is:

EXPERIENCES OF A HOUSE HUSBAND

(First published in The Village Voice, Rosebank, NSW, Australia, May 1987. This newspaper had a circulation of 250, according to the masthead).

Recently, and unfortunately, my good wife had to undergo a major operation. As we have no children at home who would automatically supersede me as “boss of the house”, I found myself elected to do certain household tasks normally confined to the female member of the establishment. What follows is my experience with one of these simple day to day tasks.

SHOPPING: The first step is to go through all the kitchen and bathroom cupboards, plus the refrigerator and freezer, and find what you need for a week, and make a neat list (called a shopping list). This list is essential in starting off but, after you are finished, you still arrive home and find you have missed most of the essential items. Now you approach the dethroned boss about money (also essential). “Just transfer the money from my purse to your wallet” is the advice given, “unless you want to go through the Square swinging a handbag”. Maybe she is enjoying this.

Off I go full of confidence to the Shopping Square, after making a cup of coffee for my boss, and receiving numerous instructions and advice (instantly forgotten). Parking at the square is no trouble. After parking I make my way to the New World shopping market. My first task is a shopping trolley. After searching and trial running about 40 trolleys and having a stand-up fight with a little old lady (I lost), I select my trolley and away I go. Here I must admit that trolley shopping in a supermarket is the same as driving a car in Sydney in peak-hour, no quarter is asked and none is given. If a shopper stops in front of you, don’t hesitate or stop, just keep going, and never, never give way or show signs of weakness, or you will be treated with scorn.

Now I have to find the things on my list. My better half, snug at home drinking coffee, forgot to tell me that the signs indicating which articles are in each aisle are above my head. Consequently my shopping seems to take three times as long as it normally takes. I also discover that it is very hard to purchase one of anything. Things are packed in packets. For example, toilet soap (packs of four or more), toilet rolls (packs of four); razor blades (five or ten); etc. We have a small battery operated alarm clock, which takes one pencil battery. Now I have enough batteries to keep it going into the next century.

After covering about eight miles and surviving approximately twelve minor altercations with other more experienced shoppers, I approach the checkout with my laden trolley, which by now has only one wheel that wants to go in the same direction as I do. Here I decide that the purchases will have to go to the pick-up, and after paying, and spelling my name four times to the packer, I tell her to send it down marked “Bill Smith”. It is here that I must admit that my first purchase at the supermarket was a carton of two dozen Tooheys 2.2 Lite cans, because somehow I have the idea that they will be welcome during the convalescence of the patient awaiting me at home. Besides, Scotch is a bit dear, I think.

Now I am all set to travel home after collecting my shopping, and being told at the collection point that I am the third Bill Smith so far today.

At last I arrive home just as the patient (now on her fourth cup of coffee) is about to ring the Base Hospital to see what ward I have been admitted to, to which I promptly tell her that she would be better off ringing the nearest nut-house.

The shopping is safely home and packed away, and a new list compiled of the items I have missed. While I sit in the loungeroom, tired (exhausted would be a better word), this plaintive advice issues from the bedroom, just as I am having my first gulp from a can of Tooheys - “Just put the change back in my purse.”

Change? WHAT CHANGE?

By the way, the little old lady is a better trolley fighter than I am, but I would like a re-match.

If the editor of this illustrious Journal is foolish enough to print this, maybe next issue I could tell you about my experiences with the washing.

COL STRATHEARN

(I am. You may. - Ed.)

Hope you enjoyed!

Done and dusted

2009-12-21T18:47:00.001+11:00

The 2009 school year is over, for good or ill.

I have moved into a new classroom, made my plans for decorating it, met the new Principal, and am generally looking forward to next year.

Have a wonderful holiday - summer/winter/religious of your choice.

See you in February!

Celebrate!!

2009-12-04T18:11:00.001+11:00

At the end of the school year, we celebrate our achievements for the year, and pave the way for the new school years.

The main event in this is Presentation Day, which is a big deal at our school. We hire the Regional Theatre (seating capacity 600) and fill it to capacity to acknowledge the year’s achievements.

Those achievements are many. An academic award is given to the highest academic achiever in each class from Kindergarten to Year 6. This leads to the presentation of the School Dux award to the academic leader of Year 6. Each class teacher also selects three other, non-academic awards – the Teacher’s Award (selected for any reason they choose), an Application award (the child who always does their absolute best), and the Citizenship Award (a well-rounded student, and a good citizen of the school and community).

Sporting achievement is also acknowledged, with those who have represented the school at Riverina level or higher receiving awards, leading to the presentation of the Sportsperson of the Year trophy. Usually this goes to a Year 6 child.

Special awards are also given, for a range of different things. Principal’s Awards, Education Director’s Award, ESL Award, the list goes on. My favourite award is the Shiralee Carter Memorial Award, presented every year in memory of a little girl who passed away while in Year 5 at our school. Her parents presented this award to a “well-rounded, likeable girl in Year 5” and it is highly coveted amongst the girls.

Teacher’s achievements are also recognised – this is the time of year when Teaching Certificates (for those completing their first year of teaching in the public system) are presented, as well as Service Certificates, for those who have given many years of service to the Department. This year we had two Teaching Certificates, two 20 Year awards and one 30 Year award.

In between the serious business of the morning are performance items. The choir sang several songs, Year 2 performed a dance called “Simon Says” and Year 6 also danced to “I Believe in the Future”.

With the formality of Presentation Day behind us, we can now move on to the serious fun of the end of year. Excursions are on nearly every day. I am going with Year 3 and 4 to the Licorice Factory at Junee, then swimming at Narrandera .

Behaviour awards happen next week. Platinum (the highest behaviour level – for perfect students) go to the Zoo ( a rare treat, as it’s a private zoo). Gold (next highest) have a day at the Lake and Silver (lowest positive level) play in the sprinklers at school. Those below Silver stay in their classrooms while this happens.

Year 6 graduation to high school happens with dinner and dancing, and Year 2 move from infants to primary with a special assembly.

On the last day, Year 6 are farewelled into their new, grown up lives as high school students with a mass farewell and “clap out” of the school gates.

End of year is busy, draining and demanding. And, most of all, fun!

Of course, the idea that teachers work 9am to 3pm is completely shot to pieces at a busy time like this. I don’t see anyone coming much after 7.30am and we are all there until at leats 5pm. These events don’t organise themselves, and during the day, the children are there, requiring teaching and attention.

I am Definitely Getting my Life Back!

2009-12-02T17:47:00.001+11:00

Next year, I’m going to be teaching ESL properly. No mucking about in the library, no more sitting uselessly in the back of somebody else’s classroom. Real work, with real kids, and, on paper at least, real collaboration.

Hot damn! I get to be a teacher!

Flag Parade

2009-12-02T17:35:00.001+11:00

This town takes great pride in its multicultural population and heritage, and sometimes we are asked to join in multicultural events as the “multicultural school” of the area.

Last Saturday was the Community Cultural Festival and we were asked to provide a Parade of Flags, with children in national dress for the opening ceremony.

We agreed, as always, and the last two weeks have been a scramble to organise children for a Saturday event, ensure they have national costumer, find clothes for those who don’t (we have a bulging costume room), ensure the clothes fit, organise and transport flags, poles and signs to the venue, and plan how it would be performed. I’m sure the community doesn’t realise, but I would guesstimate 15-20 hours of out-of-school hours work across three teachers (not to mention our time actually on Saturday!).

Anyway, on Saturday morning it all came together. We provided flags with two children each for:

Australia (children in immaculate school uniform).
Australian Aboriginal (no idea if they wear a traditional costume as such, but the costumes are approved by the Wiradjuri elders).
Torres Strait Islander (we have no TSI students, so the Aboriginal children also do this – political correctness demands that we include them).
New Zealand.
Afghanistan.
Cook Islands.
Western Samoa.
Tonga.
Fiji.
The Philippines.
Turkey.
India.
Italy.
Netherlands.
China.
Pakistan

all represented by at least one child from that country (most by two). Our school captains filled in the few gaps.

Being a “multicultural” school has many challenges, as so many different cultures, backgrounds and religious beliefs learn to accept each other and live together, but it has huge rewards, too.

Hearing the crowd oooh and aaaah at our beautiful children is definitely a reward.

A Positive Meeting

2009-11-30T16:08:00.000+11:00

There is nothing worse for a school child than being called to the Principal’s office. Sometimes, for a teacher, that summons is just as much dreaded.

This much dreaded meeting actually went quite well. We were abler to talk calmly about what had gone wrong this year (plenty, as far as I’m concerned), and what had gone right (precious little!) and look constructively at what we might be able to change. We came up with a model we are both happy with, involving a balanced mix of withdrawal and team teaching, covering the whole school reasonably effectively. He is now taking it to the executive to see if they agree (fingers crossed, please).

Of course, our Principal is moving on at the end of this year, and we will have a new Principal in the New Year. Whatever is decided now, may well change in January.

My First ESL student

2009-11-29T19:05:00.000+11:00

When I was twelve years old, I went to a suburban high school in Sydney. Diversity was not a feature of our area, and the school was full of blue-eyed blondes of British descent. ESL was an unheard of term.

Until, early in 2nd Year, an Italian girl enrolled in the school. An Italian girl straight from Italy, without a word of English. ESL teaching remained unheard of and, somehow, she and I were paired up.

We spent a lot of that year together, starting with basic words and moving on to more complex language and all without noticeable teacher support or assistance. I was sometimes told I was doing a good job, but it was very clear it was my job, and that of my friends, and not the school’s or the teacher’s, to teach her English.

By the end of that year, she was participating in most classes and, by the end of 6th Year, sat and passed the Higher School Certificate with no special accommodations.

Through those years, we were best friends, growing up together, enjoying many of the same things, and negotiating cultural as well as language differences. I will never forget my long-suffering father escorting a group of 16 year old girls to the Royal Easter Show. He, and everyone else’s parents, were happy for us to go as a group, but a good Italian girl didn’t go out without an adult escort (a male adult, at that), so Dad came with us. There were many similar outings through our school years, with somebody’s Dad tagging along.

This was known as the “sink or swim” method of language learning or, more formally, “immersion”. It worked well for some children, less well for others. In this situation, where it was true immersion, with no first language speakers in the school, it worked well.

I cannot begin to imagine, though, how difficult my friend found those high school years, in a strange country, learning a new language, and dealing with very different cultural expectations of teenage girls.

This weekend, our suburban high school turned 50. The school now has girls from many different nationalities, and ESL is an important part of the school’s curriculum and daily life.

As my Italian friend and I reconnected after many years apart, I reflected on this. She was a trailblazer for non-English students at our school and, just maybe, the start of my interest in teaching English to our new arrivals?

Kindergarten and Me

2009-11-18T17:54:00.001+11:00

I am not by nature a Kindergarten teacher. I am trained K-6 and can certainly teach kindergarten, but my happiest place is with older children – they can be reasoned with, and they laugh at my jokes.

With a re-shuffle caused by the loss of the part-time ESL teacher, I now have a kindergarten group four mornings a week. They’re small. Very small. They’re kinda cute. But small.

I’m having to change my teaching style considerably to work with these little ones – they have much shorter attention spans than I’m used to, they don’t get my jokes, my classroom routines and rewards aren’t geared to this age.

It’s a challenge. A fun one, I think, for this last few weeks of the year, but definitely a challenge.

Did I mention that they’re small?

The Zoomobile

2009-10-30T18:12:00.002+11:00

A snake! A snake is loose in the hall!

Normally, this would be the cue for panic, but not today. Today, we were visited by the Zoomobile, an outreach programme of Taronga Park Zoo in Sydney, to bring a better knowledge of native animals to isolated children. Most of our children are very knowledgeable about the animals they see around the school – lizards and birds, mostly, and many are used to caring for them in the aviary.

Today was different. The animals are ones we don’t see often, and they came with professional knowledge and information.

We met Annabelle the stick insect, about 6” long and very active – climbing happily all over one delighted child. Despite all the activity, one boy was convinced the whole thing was a trick, and it was really a stick – maybe with a battery.

Then came Nathan the ringtail possum. Nocturnal and sleepy, Nathan allowed himself to be patted by about ninety children without protest, before going peacefully back to sleep in his portable nest.

Bunyarra the diamond python wasn’t cute or cuddly, but fascinating in her own way. Two metres long, exploring the fl0or of the hall. The children are wary (our children are raised from infancy to be wary of snakes) but fascinated. They were able to stroke her and one girl allowed the snake to be draped over her shoulder – although she did protest when its tail went up under her dress and started investigating her knickers!

Our last visitor was Brian the echidna. Echidnas are one of only two egg-laying mammals (monotremes) and very interesting creatures. Although their spines are sharp, if they are stroked the right way, they are surprisingly soft. Brian, who should apparently be re-named Brianna, a phlegmatic little creature, happily trundled his own way around the entire circle to be patted and enthused over.

Programmes like this, that bring the convenience and resources that city schools take for granted, to us in the bush, are vital. Our isolated country children often lack an awareness that there is anything ore to the world than their home town. We have to extend their horizons and these things help us t o do it.

The Tale of the Volunteered Part 2

2009-10-21T18:51:00.000+11:00

So, three weeks after our initial shock win at the local League Tag carnival, we embarked, after a mad scramble to organise transport, on the two hour drive to Wagga Wagga. The girls I had in the car were beside themselves with excitement.

The intervening weeks had been filled with training and practice. We roped in anyone we could find to help (one teacher thought my son was serving some particularly harsh punishment, the amount of time he was spending at school!) and practised nearly every day.

Several of my team are not natural footballers. This was not an event that was taken seriously at school, by those who are into sport (either students or teachers), so the sporty girls were not involved. All the girls were volunteers, and not selected for their ability. Most are unlikely to ever represent their school in a sporting event.

Half the team is Aboriginal girls. All are good runners, but League, even Tag, is a contact sport and strength helps. The Koori girls tend to be thin and small, with spindly arms and legs. Wiry, rather than muscular. In addition, there is an Indian girl, so think she makes the Koori girls look sturdy, a girl with severe asthma, who is hospitalised several times a year, a girl with petit mal epilepsy and one with anger management problems (not good in a contact sport).

Basically, I read up on my first aid, packed the inhalers and crossed my fingers.

My other adults on this trip were the mother who drove the other car (bless her!) and my daughter, who came for the fun of seeing her mother and a football in close contact.

Our fist game in this carnival was against a serious, well-trained team of very large, very threatening girls. Their coach was a very, very scary lady, who was taking this far more seriously than most National Rugby League coaches! She had trained her girls to scream in the opposition’s faces any time they got close.

We (the adults) worked hard to convince our team that they were being ridiculous and looked stupid. We didn’t get them laughing, but nobody lost their temper, which was a plus. We lost that game 5-0.

Our second game was against a team a little more like us. Their teacher (they had also already played the first team) came up to me and said “You look normal. Maybe the girls can have fun this game?” They did, too, and it was a much closer game played in a better spirit. We won, just, 3-2, and the girls had smiles back on their faces.

We didn’t make the finals of the day, but had a consolation game against a third school. They were also “normal”. We lost that one 2-3.

We stopped at Macca’s on the way home and shouted the kids an ice cream and delivered them back to their parents at about 5pm. I’m sure they all slept very well that night – I know I did!

It was a long, but successful in my mind, day. The girls spent the trip home planning next year’s campaign. Apparently, I’m in charge again.

Sigh – I hate football.

Some thoughts on the tail end of the year

2009-10-19T18:46:00.001+11:00

Today is the first day of the last term of the year. With only nine weeks of a very difficult year to go, what have I learnt?

1.Classroom teaching is my Proper Job. I am miserable when taken away from it.

2.The way ESL teaching is moving – away from the classroom and towards a collaborative or administrative role – makes it unsuitable for me.

3.I still love teaching. I enjoy the children and love being in a busy school.

4.I do not want to spend my working days in somebody else’s classroom, allowed to teach something as a special favour. I need to teach for real. I need ownership of what I do.

5.Still less do I want to work in an office on the administrative side of the job.

6.I love this school, with all its problems. I am comfortable and at home here.

With all this in mind, I have asked to be given a full-time class of my own after Christmas. I do not wish to continue in the ESL position. A class of my own is very unlikely to happen, as I was appointed here as ESL teacher, and am the only person on staff who is qualified. If a class of my own doesn’t materialise, I will have to consider applying for a transfer to another school.

I really and truly don’t want to do that, but I didn’t spend six years at University, and move halfway across the State, uprooting my family to do it, to be this unhappy with my work.

The Tale of the Volunteered

2009-10-15T14:38:00.001+11:00

Early in the term I was asked if I minded going to a football carnival to help supervise the children (Year 3 and 4 boys and girls). The boys were playing League (tackle) and the girls League Tag (no tackles). I agreed, commented that I knew less than nothing about football, noted the date in my diary and gave it no further thought.

Until two weeks before the Carnival, when I was hauled up for not having my team organised, and what was my training plan exactly?

Team? What team? Training plan? Ummm…. I don’t have one of those either. I know less than nothing about this game. I’m going as supervision, remember? No, nobody apparently remembered that bit or it had changed (and I hadn’t been told) or something. I was now in charge of the girls’ League Tag team. The boys team, being more important and considered to have a chance of winning something, remained in the care of the sports co-ordinator. So - “Here are the rules. You need ten girls. Balls and tags are in the sports shed.”

Which balls? What tags? And I didn’t understand the rules – they were written for somebody with a basic knowledge of what was going on. A desperate plea for help produced my teenage son, ready to come and help with training and a group of girls, two of whom knew how to play. Our training sessions were … interesting … to say the least.

So, on the morning of the Carnival, we took ourselves to the local oval, where schools from all over the district had gathered. Some of them even looked like they knew what they were doing. My only hope was that we didn’t look completely ridiculous.

We played our first game … and won it. I wonder how that happened? The opposition must be truly appalling.

We played the second, and won that one as well. Maybe we were on to something here. Meanwhile, the boys had lost both their two games.

Two wins put us in the final for our section. If we won the third game, we got to go to Regional level, which involved a day in Wagga Wagga (nearest big town, a Big Event for these kids).

Surely not? Yep, we won that one, too. Me and my ragtag little team were off to the Big Smoke to play football.

The hysterical laughter you can hear coming from the south? My husband’s reaction to all this.

My Reading Group

2009-10-08T23:10:00.001+11:00

My reading group isn’t all ESL children, but a small group of Year 4 students (9 and 10 years old) who struggle hard with reading and, to be honest, language in general. I have:

L: Half Aboriginal, half Tongan. He struggles with both English and Tongan, and I suspect has language delays that go well beyond living in a two-language home. His spoken English is incredibly poor and hard to understand – he can barely put together a sentence. His reading has never progressed to the point of understanding that letters represent sounds. He can’t read or write, but his mother won’t sign the forms for a full language assessment. But, when we can make time to talk to him in writing time, he has a vivid imagination and a reasonable grasp of story structure. He can talk (sort of ) about Space Exploration, the Solar System, dinosaurs and the last surviving World War I soldiers. Behind the language difficulties, there is an alert little brain.

Z: An Aboriginal girl. Z is the child of an alcoholic mother and an unknown father. She has teenage brothers who get their fun knocking her about. The authorities have been notified many many times, but she remains in the home. Since the death of her grandmother earlier this year, school is her safe place. Reading and learning are low on her list of priorities. I am afraid for her.

T: T is a recently arrived Indian immigrant. He actually reads well, but with little comprehension so far. He should progress well and gives me little cause for concern.

G: A very sweet Samoan boy. His entire life has been spend six months here, six months in Samoa. In Samoa, he doesn’t go to school, so every six months we start afresh with his learning. Although he is a sweetheart, he is never going to be a great success academically. I hope to have him writing his name with consistently correct spelling before he leaves for the islands again.

With these four children, I try to teach that print has meaning, that that meaning doesn’t change randomly, and that reading can be fun. We cook, we explore, we make things (reading directions is reading, right?). The problem is that these are ten year olds – worldly wise ten year olds mostly – with fewer decoding skills than many five year olds. Material they can read is babyish and of no interest. Things they are interested in are completely beyond their reading skills. I have been trying to re-write things of interest to them, to get them reading, but it’s an uphill battle.

They’re an engaging bunch, though. I don’t want to give them up at the end of the year.

A Conference – when you don’t have one of your own

2009-10-05T21:12:00.001+11:00

Waiting for a training and development day aimed at the ESL teacher is a fruitless activity when you live in the western part of New South Wales. There are only two of us in the region and, in many ways, the Department considers us to be on our own – out of sight, out of mind. Any development that might be ESL-focused is in Sydney, usually on a weekend, and usually aimed at newcomers to the game.

So, a couple of weeks ago, I was given the chance to go to the Learning Support Teachers Conference. Our areas of responsibility and ideas overlap in many ways, so it was an appropriate thing for me to go to.

And it was worthwhile. Sessions on reading comprehension, oral language development, reading and spelling could have been aimed specifically at the ESL teacher.

It was refreshing and revitalising to be in the company of teachers with similar interests and concerns, and who are dealing with many of the same issues.

Interestingly, I learnt that in schools without dedicated ESL support, non-English speaking children often become the concern of the Learning Support teacher so, even though I was at the conference under false pretences, so to speak, I actually had much to offer.

An Update On F

2009-09-14T18:13:00.001+10:00

A little while ago, I told you about F, my worrying Samoan girl. Well, she has been making great strides in athletics. On Friday, she represented the school at the Riverina Athletics Carnival, and came 4th in her rate. This morning, there is a new confidence in her eyes. I’m happy.

The Boy Who Could

2009-09-14T18:09:00.002+10:00

Three years ago, I met Y. He was a newly arrived student in year 3. For most of his life, he had been in the refugee system. Born to a large loving family whose father owned a successful business, Y should have had the world at his feet. Unfortunately, Y was also born in Kabul, Afghanistan, to a “religiously and politically” moderate family during the time when the Taliban ruled the country. Y is also a member of the Hazara tribe, a persecuted ethnic minority in Afghanistan.

So, in 2002, the family – father, mother and nine children (aged from late teens down to two – Y is the only boy – left Afghanistan. mother and children stayed in Pakistan in a refugee holding centre, while their father tried to get to Australia. His passage ended on an old fishing boat, travelling from Indonesia to the West Coast of Australia. He was arrested and sent to Woomera Detention Centre, where he spent more than a year, waiting for his application for refugee status to be processed.

Finally, released, with refugee status and a residents visa, he found a job and began saving every cent he could to bring his family to Australia.

At the end of 2006, he achieved that goal, and his family was reunited.

First priority was to enrol the children in school, which happened at the beginning of the 20067 school years. At that time, Y knew no English and had had, at best, very sporadic schooling in a language not his own. He entered a mainstream class, and also got intensive ESL support and tuition, as did his sisters, in both primary and high school, as well as TAFE.

So, three years later, after such a rough start, where is Y?

Academically: We have just received his results from the National Literacy and Numeracy testing (NAPLAN) which was done in May. In English, he received marks which place him in the top 10% of the country in every area but Writing (he does not enjoy creative writing at all). In that area, he was one level down – still well ahead of many of his English speaking peers. In Maths, he scored amongst the best in the country in all areas. In the classroom, he is a deep thinker, mature beyond his eleven years, and always with insight to offer. He enjoys puns and word games enormously – very sophisticated language skills for a boy of his age and background.

Sporting: Y is also excelling in athletics, as a runner. In the recent Regional Athletics Carnival, he came seconde in the 200m run, and is now eligible to travel to Sydney for the State Carnival. He has also represented the school in cricket, soccer and Rugby League and plays soccer for a town team.

Socially: Y has all the makings of a leader. He is his class representative for the Student Council, and is well respected by students and staff. When school leader elections come around in November, he is confidently expected to be a school captain for next year. He has been recognised by the Education Department and the Local Area Command (Police) for his work on the anti-bullying team.

Three years ago, this child spoke no English and was a refugee. Today, he is an Australian citizen, with the world at his feet in every way.

Showtime!

2009-08-10T17:56:00.001+10:00

`”Ocean to the Outback”, put on by a co-operative effort on the part of our school staff and students and the staff and students of our adjoining special school, premieres next Thursday lunchtime. And closes on Thursday evening! Each class is putting on a performance item showing some aspect of life in Australia. From “Octopus’* Garden” (wheelchair ballet with our Year 6 girls and the special school’s 3/4 class), through “Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini (Kindergarten and too cute for words) and “Man from Snowy River” (Year 3/4 and very cleverly staged) right up to “I Am, You Are, We Are Australian” with the Year 6 signing choir and actors (which always makes me cry, but, damn, they’re good), it’s all wonderful.

Hours and hours of preparation and rehearsal have gone into this, and props and costumes are still being finished, and the show is next week. My sewing machine has been running hot (thirteen pairs of bright yellow shorts and twenty cow costumes) and I have also taught a group of Year 3 kids to skip. They were absolutely flabbergasted that an old lady like me can still skip! So, while I don’t have a defined role, I have still definitely had things to do (my suggestion of an item from the ESL classes was met with the sound of crickets chirping, then a hasty change of subject.

This morning we took the children to the theatre (this is no school hall production!) for a look around and to stand and walk through their item on the actual stage. It’s called a “Wow” visit because they can all go “Wow” today and hopefully be a little more blasé next week.

The whole school is buzzing with the excitement of the performance and almost all incidental activities have vanished in the rush – including a lot of ESL. I am sitting in my classroom writing this, and listening to the kids who should be with me rehearsing “Sounds of the City” and it’s just as valid a way of them spending their time.

I wish I could post pictures – it’s going to be wonderful.

*If anyone has any input on the possessive plural of octopus I am happy to hear it. Octopus’? Octopuses’? Octopusses? Octopi’s? Spellchecker doesn’t like any of them, but isn’t offering an alternative. Blessed if I know.

And so it goes on …

2009-08-06T17:51:00.001+10:00

I am so tired of ESL being the poor relation in this school. All year, I have been llowed to do very little teaching, with bits and pieces being split among various casuals – all good teachers but not ESL trained or qualified.

Yesterday, I arrived at school to learn that:

1.The current casual has been taken off ESL for the day and put on library. It is much more important that teachers get their release time than that the children learn English. We have a non-teaching Assistant Principal who could take library. Or English for that matter – she’s just as qualified as the casual.

2.There will be no casual at all in 4th term (starting in October). The school can’t afford it, despite having a dedicated, unmovable allowance of 1.4 ESL allocation. That is seven days’ teacher salary and support for every five day week. Where is that money?

3.Somebody has, yet again, been taking furniture from my classroom. I am not shamed to say that thee is now a notice in the staffroom to the effect that the ESL room is a working classroom, not a furniture repository and please to keep your greedy mitts off! The office has also been asked not to hand my key out to people who don’t truly need it.

4.I am to ring Sydney and tell them we have four new arrivals and can I please have more funding!! The nerve of this Assistant Principal is beyond all reason.

On the upside, I ran an assembly this morning celebrating the Cook Islands National Day, with children performing, singing and dancing. It was good.

Now I have to ring Sydney and have a discussion with my Supervisor (who hates when I bother her – she doesn’t like dealing with stuff outside the city) about points 1 to 4 above.

A Damaged Child

2009-07-31T17:45:00.001+10:00

Samoan children are generally easy to deal with at school. They have strong family ties, with large families and extended families. Church connections are strong, and the children are usually stable, well-behaved, eager and enjoyable.

Except for F. F is a 9 year old girl who has been in Australia for two years. Her current situation is typically Samoan, with the large and loving extended family,who all care for her very much.

Her Samoan life was very different. F’s father died when she was five years old. She and her mother and possibly some younger siblings (don’t know how many, the details are confused) lived in a village some distance from the major centres of the islands. A few months after her father died, her mother also left the family. Alone. At about five and a half years old, F was responsible for herself. Other families in the village ensured she was fed, but nobody took on responsibility for the child – to make sure she was clothed, housed and cared for. She speaks of having to sleep on the floor or outside often. She fell through the cracks.

At some point, her father’s sister in Australia became aware of the situation and, at that point, her life became a crusade to bring the child to Australia to be part of her family. Money was sent to Samoa for the child’s benefit, but it is unsure how much actually reached her in terms of practical care and material goods.

Finally, in 2007, when F was 7 years old, a visa was granted and she was brought to Australia, to join her aunt’s family. She was enrolled at our school and, as she spoke little English, came under my care as the ESL teacher. It is rare to have a Samoan child with no English, but she progressed quite well with her English.

In other ways, though, she was and remains a concern. She has an uncontrolled temper, and is a physical danger to others when she has an eruption (I have had bruises from her, and so have many others). We clear classrooms when she breaks out. The reasons for these eruptions are often unclear and unfathomable. When they start, she goes silent and darkness emanates from her. She then starts a rhythmic tapping or banging, on the desk or the wall or anything she can reach. The banging escalates; it’s as if she uses the rhythm and noise to work herself up in the tantrum. Occasionally, she can be talked down at this point, but not often. If it continues, she will throw things – desks, chairs, books, anything she can (which is why we clear the room). She has had to be physically removed from situations, and has on more than one occasion run from the school, climbing a two metre fence in the process and out onto the road.

The aunt she lives with is resistant to the idea of counselling, saying “the bad things are behind her now. Life is good for her here.” She doesn’t understand (or maybe want to admit) that the bad things that happened can have damaged the child.

On most days, she is a sweet child, but it seems her early experiences have damaged her. I only hope she is not broken beyond repair.

Tag-Team Teaching

2009-07-30T20:04:00.001+10:00

Or: What can go wrong will go wrong.

We approached our team-taught Maths session this morning confident that we were prepared and ready for all eventualities. Everything was planned.

Not so much, really.

K (the other teacher) started with a worksheet of magic squares, for the children to consolidate and practice the three and four digit addition they have been working on this week. It quickly became apparent that the squares weren’t working as planned. After O commented that “You’re teaching us wrong things, Miss!” and L was baffled in trying to make six and three add up to seven, she retired defeated to work it out and I took the floor. My “bit” of the lesson was learning about compass directions (Never Eat Soggy Weetbix) and after an introduction, I planned to move to a game I found online (Captain Coordinate – it’s English and really good for this). The introduction went well and we turned to the Smartboard. The game came up, the introduction and instructions play, then the laptop crashed and burned, and nothing we could do would get it going again.

By this time, K had figured out the magic squares and was ready to go, so we turned back to that.

Of course, the children (Year 4), thought it was wonderfully funny, and excellent light relief from the real work of Maths. I have to admit, we were laughing too.

If you don’t laugh, you go crazy.

I’ll try the game again next week, with a different laptop.

‘Among Schoolchildren”

2009-06-19T22:57:00.001+10:00

I just finished reading this book, which is a sociological study written in the late 1980s by Tracy Kidder.

In it, he spent a year shadowing a Year 5 teacher in a lower-status school in Holyoke, Massachusetts, describing her students and her teaching, as well as the school culture and community, the teacher’s background (both family and in teaching) and involving interviews with many of the people involved. It is a fascinating insight into the world of the classroom.

And, twenty plus years later and half a world away, I recognise that world. I feel I would be very comfortable in Christine Zajac’s world, and that she would be in mine.

Despite the geographical and cultural differences, or schools sound, in many ways, very similar. We both have high immigrant populations and work with communities with language barriers and issues of poverty and immigration. Her community was suffering from industrial decline, mine from agricultural decline due to the drought. Both schools are also dealing with children with behavioural, social and mental health problems.

Her teaching methods, as described, would work perfectly well in my Australian classroom. Her children would fit into my classroom. I suspect my methods and children would fit equally well into her school world.

I would like to sit down and have coffee and a chat with Chris Zajac. I think we’d get on.

Autumn in the Riverina

2009-06-01T21:34:00.001+10:00

The grapevines are dying off for the winter:

But the dam is full

and the water tank is green
.
The roses are blooming

and so are the daisies
.
The fruit is ripening

on the tree

and Saavik thinks it's getting cold
.

Celebrate!

2009-06-01T20:45:00.001+10:00

June 1st is the national day of Western Samoa, celebrating its independence from the supervision of New Zealand, which happened in the early 1960s.

We have a large (about 35 children) enrolment of Samoan children, so this morning we acknowledged and celebrated the national day (We try and do this for all the various national days).

With the help of the Minister of the Samoan Methodist Church and his wife (who have children at school), we put together an assembly that involved music, singing and dancing. Several of the Samoan children got up and spoke about Samoa, telling their classmates a little about their homeland. Then a group of girls in Samoan dress sang the national anthem (so much nicer than the recording downloaded form iTunes that we usually have).

Following this, several boys performed a haka (unusual in school uniform, but they weren’t willing to strip down to the shorts or loincloth they would normally wear – it was COLD this morning); and another group of girls danced for us.

The other children were enthralled, and the Samoan children were very proud that they were able to show some of their culture and home background to their friends. The best part was that this was all done with children from our school, with a little help from their older brothers and sisters in high school.

These events only work with the help of the community, and that is sometimes not easy to get. The Samoan Methodist Church, though, were wonderful, working with teachers and children to show off their culture to the world.

It was a good day.

I feel like a teacher again

2009-05-23T18:29:00.001+10:00

The first half of this year has been difficult. I find I don’t enjoy team teaching, miss my classroom and my children more than I can say, and generally am very dissatisfied with the turn my life and my career has taken.

Yesterday, due to a plague rampaging through our school, I was asked to leave my usual routine and take one class (a 3/4 composite) for the whole day. Again due to the plague, the class was reduced to ten children but it included three of the more difficult children in the year.

I loved it! We had our moments. The time I was sitting on a table to stop a child throwing it across the room wasn’t a high point, I have to say. However, talking her down out of the sugardoodle and back into reasonableness (relative, she is a child who has a lot of issues and is rarely truly reasonable) was a high point.

The eleven of us worked our way through literacy, through maths, a whole school assembly and an afternoon art lesson. I even got PAINT out (the height of self-confidence). We all got to the end of the day – not always possible with our difficult children and a change of routine – and enjoyed ourselves.

I felt like a teacher. I felt professional. I felt real.

I’m asking to go on class next year. Failing that, I will apply for a transfer.

The Drought

2009-04-12T09:07:00.001+10:00

As the Riverina enters its seventh consecutive year of well-below-average rainfall, the effects of the drought are starting to be felt even in this irrigation town.

Our town has no natural water supply. All water is brought in in irrigation channels (we are the heart of the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area) and, because of our outside water source, have been somewhat insulated from the lack of water elsewhere.

However, the rice crop has dropped by 80% this year. The grape vintage has also been low, and citrus fruits are being affected. The two week heat wave in early February, where the temperature did not go below 45 degrees celsius in the daytime for two weeks has also had an effect. Our house is in the middle of a vineyard, and I can tell you that cooked grapes rotting on the vine do not smell good. Thank goodness it’s not our income!

However, I am not unaffected by this. Because of the drought, jobs in agriculture and related industries are drying up. As jobs are not easily available, people take their families to where there is work. As the families leave so, of course, do the children. In the two and a half years I have been at this school, our enrolments have dropped from 450 to just around 300.

This makes a huge difference to the school, of course, and especially to me. Most of the children who have gone are the children of the itinerant farm workers and the refugees – the ESL children, in other words. While we will always have some ESL children at the school, it is beginning to be doubtful whether we will qualify for a full time ESL teacher next year.

Maybe I will be able to teach a class, with an ESL focus? Who knows? This year is not being fun, so I am looking forward to what happens next.

Dreary Morning Meetings

2009-03-01T21:11:00.001+11:00

I hate staff meetings. Really. I do. I love my job, but the weekly early morning gathering known as the staff meeting is torture. We shuffle in to the staffroom, half awake, but with our minds already moving to what has to be done to actually teach for the dy.

The boss usually tries to gain our attention and interest with a quick quick and prizes (chocolate works as well with teachers as it does with children) before getting down to business.

Unfortunately, only a very small percentage of what is discussed concerns the whole staff. A new maths resource doesn’t really concern me, but a new ESL directive only concerns me. Everyone else fades in and out of attention, as I do.

Invariably people wander in late – those who don’t care if the boss knows they don’t care about the meeting, those who take their own children to other schools and won’t or can’t come early, and those who just plain forgot it was Tuesday (been there, done that!).

Once the boss has finished, the executive start. I can’t get excited about what happens to the five boys in the Year 3 behaviour class when their teacher leaves at the end of term (singing and dancing her way out the gate, I have no doubt). We have been discussing this issue back and forth for five weeks now nd the answer keeps coming back the same – they have to be split into the existing Year 3 classes. Nobody wants them, the discussion is old and none of them are ESL – I don’t need to be involved. Executive needs to make a decision here.

Moving on – tea money for the term (I’ve paid), dinner to farewell the behaviour class teacher (I paid for that too), locking doors and gates (I lock the doors and the windows get broken. What happened to the bars I was meant to get last year?)

As usual it devolves into several small group discussions, each on a different thing.

There has to be a better way to do this.

And, yes, I drafted this during a staff meeting.

ESL is not a diagnosis

2009-02-18T22:48:00.001+11:00

Really, it isn’t. Just as an English-speaking child can speak English well and have one or more other issues affecting their learning at school (such as ADD, ASD, ODD, dyslexia, etc, etc), so an ESL child can speak Samoan, or Turkish, or Dari, and still have one or more other issues affecting their learning.

For our school counsellor, listening to a list of behaviours displayed by a child which seem, to the class and ESL teachers, to be leading towards the child needing assessment and possible diagnosis of one of these problems, and then saying “But the child’s ESL!” as if that is a catch-all diagnosis for anything that might be an issue, IS NOT HELPFUL.

ESL children are subject to all the learning problems of the English speaking child; they may be extremely bright, or very not bright in their own language; they may be on the autism spectrum, or have ADD or be oppositional. Their lack of English is complication in diagnosis of such conditions, and a traumatic or refugee background can also hinder diagnosis, but that doesn’t mean that we use ESL as a catch all explanation for everything that comes up.

Case in point – little girl (I’ll call her F) in Year 4. We have been dealing with her for eighteen months. She is Samoan, and has chronic otitis media (currently on the waiting list for surgery), and the subsequent hearing loss has affected her learning of English. In addition, she is displaying a galaxy of behaviours, which would point to a number of different things (her class teacher and I are leaning towards an autism spectrum disorder, with complications of ODD); she is violent when crossed (I have the bruises to prove it); is completely non-compliant even when we are sure she understands what we want; she is completely disruptive to the learning of her class, and her teacher is at her wits’ end as to what to do. However, when we bring her case before the counsellor, repeatedly, all we hear is “She’s ESL”.

ESL IS NOT A DIAGNOSIS. It’s a (hopefully) temporary condition that does not cause or greatly affect these behaviours.

The Sikh Princes

2009-02-16T23:00:00.001+11:00

Over the last few months, we have enrolled several families of Indian children, specifically observant Sikhs. The young boys of these families are causing considerable interest and some concern among the staff at school.

They are, outwardly, well-mannered, very involved in school and keen to learn. They wear their uniforms, participate fully in what our school has to offer and seem to make friends easily. Equally, their sisters fit readily into their classrooms and are a pleasure to teach.

However, there is an arrogance about these boys that is unsettling in our egalitarian Australian rural playground, where nobody is seen as better than anybody else, unless they can kick a footy further and higher (not a talent of our Indian boys, I have to say).

These boys have an expectation that their needs and wants will be met immediately and without question. Whether it is for attention in the classroom, or dealing with a problem on the playground, it is obvious that they have never had to wait for their turn at anything. What they want must happen NOW or there will be trouble.

Equally, there is an expectation from the families that their sons will be served by the school as princes. If their son does not like his teacher, he will be moved to another class. If their son does not like who he is sitting with in class, he will be moved. If their son does not like sport, or library class, or anything else, then he will not be required to participate. And the parents will come to the school every morning to ensure that their prince’s desires are met and that we are his slaves.

It shows in the daughters as well – we have two girls who are devastated (outwardly, anyway) because they aren’t allowed to leave their classroom ten minutes before lunchtime so that they can prepare and serve their brother’s lunch in his classroom. Again, we have had parents in the office demanding this service for their children, but it just isn’t going to happen in an Australian school.

While these families and children are an undoubted asset to the school and the town, there are definite cultural issues which we are having to work on to make sure they can settle into our school comfortably.

Changes for 2009

2009-01-22T22:23:00.001+11:00

With the 2009 school year starting next year, we are having some changes to he way English is being run at school.

Instead of working with small groups in my own classroom, I will be attached to one class (a Year 3/4 group) for the morning literacy session and to another Year 3 class for the Maths session in the middle of the day. For the final session of the day, which is only an hour, I will, for three days a week, be able to take withdrawal groups.

I am in two (or more, actually) minds about all this. While team teaching looks good on paper, I have never seen or heard of a situation where it really works well. It seems that the support teacher (me) either ends up as a highly paid teacher’s aide, or there is a power struggle for control of the classroom. As I have no interest whatever in being an aide, and no desire to enter into a power struggle with teachers I like and respect, I am a little at a loss as to where to go with this. One of the teachers is very young (second year out of University – about the age of my daughter) and I am particularly unsure how to handle the situation with her.

On the other hand, if it works well, it could be excellent for all the children in both those classes. I wish I knew how to make it work well.

On the third hand (I’m an octopus, obviously), if I am concentrating a great deal of my time on only two classes, a lot of ESL children (who are scattered throughout the school) are going to miss out on any English at all. This is not acceptable as far as I’m concerned, and I have argued this point until I’m blue in the face with no effect.

Added to all this, on Friday I am to be the “library” teacher, but with no time in my timetable to actually set foot in the library. Instead, I will be mobile to several different classes, teaching whatever the classroom teacher wants me to, I believe. Relief teacher, in other words. I HATE this idea with the burning fire of ten thousand suns, but am apparently powerless to change it.

I feel I’m being punished for something, but not being told what I’ve done wrong. I definitely feel that I am not going to be an effective ESL teacher this year, and am wondering if I should think about making a move out of ESL and back to a regular classroom for 2010.

We shall see …

Come see my world!

2009-01-09T14:17:00.001+11:00

Well, we’re in summer holidays now, and nothing happening at school, so I thought I’d give you a tour of my classroom. This is what happens when you give a 9 year old the digital camera and let her loose!

***

Some of our work on display – the big square in the centre is a city we planned, put together, spoke and wrote about. We used directions and descriptive language in this activity, which went on for several weeks. The students (Year 4/5) also had their own smaller map and planned their own town – very interesting what some of them considered important to have in a neighbourhood.

The people are part of an “about me” activity we did as an exchange with another school out in the mulga.

***

Our “Where do we come from” wall. When a new child comes to school, we add the flag for their country; it’s a nice little ceremony and helps them feel part of their strange new environment (that’s the aim anyway). Not all the flags show on the photo – we have nineteen nationalities at last count.

***

Some of the artwork from our big Term 3 art activity, which I described in detail earlier.

***

My desk. I do not pretend to be a tidy worker. The scary pink face is a Halloween mask – we made them in October.

***

Two views from my classroom window. The top one is towards the back of the school and the oval; the second shows the main infants’ building,which dates from the 1930s.

***

Papier maiche dragons, which were part of a larger literacy unit on fantasy and mythology. The children adored this craft, which involved a balloon, lots of glue and torn up newspaper. It’s hugely messy, takes several weeks to finish and the clean up is huge each time. Not something to be attempted with a class of thirty children, but with a small group of six to ten, it’s ideal. Because of the literacy component, it’s for an advanced ESL class.

***

The games bookshelf. Games are an important and stress free way to learn, practise and reinforce English that has been learnt, and are very popular in my room. You haven’t lived until you’ve been part of an Australia teacher and a Chinese girl teaching an Afghani girl and Turkish boy to play chess!

***

Class library bookshelf. It doesn’t often have this many books on it, as the children are constantly borrowing them and taking them home, but this was taken close to the Christmas holidays, when almost all the books had been brought back. The children are ver reliable about returning books they have borrowed.

***

A sneaky hand in the prize box. I don’t really like having a prize box in the classroom, but school culture requires it. The children have to work hard before they get a choice from my prize box, though; I don’t give prizes out randomly.

***

Some of the infants work on display. I like to showcase as much of the children’s work as I can. Not always easy in a language room, but I do the best I can.

Thank you for looking; I hope you enjoyed your tour of my strange little world.

I hate the end of the year

2008-12-06T16:51:00.002+11:00

Our Year 3/4 classes went on a two day excursion. 11 children were left behind, mostly for behaviour problems. I got to babysit - my ESL programme becomes expendable at this time of the year, regardless of whether I think it should or not.

Yay, me.

I had four of the worst children in the school, confined in one room, not wanting to be there, with no real relationship with the teacher, and with none of the normal structure of a school day in place. Ialso had some other very dodgy kids, and two well-behaved ones. Only one of these is one that comes to me regularly. I did get an aide, and the promise of instant executive help if I needed somebody removed.

Yay, me, again.

We survived yesterday, the first day, intact. No fights, no bloodshed, no damage.

Today we got to about 20 minutes before the end, and one boy lost his temper (I still don't know over what). He swept six chairs (which were sitting on the tables) to the floor, capsizing pencil tins, paint containers and water, screamed 'FUCK THIS FUCKING SHIT!" and left the room .

He was rounded up by an executive and I haven't seen him since.

Ten minutes further on, two more of the problem boys decided to have a fist fight. I leapt in and grabbed one and Kerry (the aide) grabbed the other. However, we both got punched in the process. I am incubating a nice bruise on my arm, and she got hit in the back. I sent one of my good children for an executive and FIFTEEN FUCKING MINUTES later (ie after the bell had rung and the others had left) an exec wandered in to see what the problem was. I was burning by this stage - 10 children and a serious fight going on in a room marked as likely to be a problem, and no executive would come? Not acceptable. This will be raised at Tuesday's staff meeting. You may hear me from there.

They don't pay me enough for this shit. And we have two weeks to go. Nobody is expecting me to teach any more English, but only to fill in for various odd things that happen.

Ten Children and Ten Pin Bowling

2008-11-06T11:39:00.003+11:00

Sometimes I think I should be locked up for my own sanity, really. I was "persuaded" (strong-armed might be a better expression) into agreeing to help a friend with a project he was setting up for after school. He has government funding for after school sport, and was proposing to spend some of it by taking a group of our most disadvantaged children tenpin bowling once a week for a term. On his own, he could take five children; with a second teacher, he could take ten.

Muggins here is the second teacher. I enjoy bowling, and love the kids, so I agreed.

Our first task was to select and invite the ten children. After much debating and back and forth and discussions with class teachers, we ended up with:

Four children from the V family. Dad is a single parent with six kids - in Years 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8! The younger four come bowling.

Two children from the T family. Their parents recently adopted two cousins from the Pacific Islands, one with severe physical and mental handicaps, and one with extreme behavioural problems. These two need a break; and so do their exhausted parents.

Two children from the M family. Nice kids from a very poor family with a history of violence.

M, the boy with no language from earlier in this blog. We thought a social activity with his peers with no academic pressure might be good for him.

MM, a girl from a dysfunctional alcoholic home. She is athletically extremely talented, but has never had much of a chance to shine.

There were so many we could have picked, all with similar needs.

The families of these children need do nothing, except sign a permission note for the children to bowl, and a permission note for them to ride in a teacher's car. The activity is free and teacher supervised.

The kids are having an absolute ball. Some of the little ones are almost delirious with excitement when we get there, and it just escalates as they get to bowl. They are cheering each other one, the older ones spending time with the little ones (the oldest is 12, the youngest 7) and helping and encouraging them. We are seeing new friendships form (M is making friend!) and are, ourselves, developing new relationships with the kids we see and teach every day.

And they are very kind to me, because I suck at bowling.

One of our little girls bowled 149 on her second day out! We are already looking at putting together a team for the primary school league next year, and finding a third teacher and expanding to 15 children after the summer holidays.

And, driving these kids home takes me into parts of town I've never been before - the bad parts of town. The scary parts of town. Where they live.

Meeting the Mothers

2008-10-31T21:57:00.002+11:00

We had a function (school fete) this evening, and I was at school until 8pm. Many of our families came, to enjoy the fun with their kids, buy a cake and enjoy. For just about the first time, a group of our Afghani mothers came to see what was going on. It has taken us a long time to get them confident enough to come to school.

For most of these women, school is a foreign concept. Very few of them are literate at all, and those who have some basic skills have had little formal education. The free education available to their children is one of the main attractions of living in Australia, but they are unfamiliar with the mechanics of it, and shy of teachers. And shy with their English. None of them hold jobs, most have several young children, and nearly all have a baby under 12 months old.

One of the children grabbed me and pulled me over to meet her mother and her baby sister, and I ended up with a group of Afghani women in traditional dress, all eagerly practising their English and showing me their babies. I'm a sucker for babies with big brown eyes, so I was hooked. I hope I get to teach these babies in a few years time.

Country life is great. Mostly.

2008-10-12T14:38:00.004+11:00

I love living in the country. I love being away from the city, the smog and the traffic and the hustle. I like the slower pace. I like looking out my window at vineyards and orange groves, not houses and streetscape.

There are drawbacks, however. The main one is the unwanted wildlife. Yesterday, we discovered that there is living under our back steps a nest of baby Eastern Brown Snakes. Yes, three feet from our back door are at least three of one of the most venomous snakes in the country (and therefore the world). Delightful.

So, my husband and son have mowed the lawn down to the level of a billiard table, to try and discourage more from moving in. To do this, they wore steelcapped boots, long jeans and shin pads, although the snakes stayed quietly out of the way while the lawnmower was running.

So, we are holed up in the house (with three very unhappy cats, who would like nothing more than to go out and play with the snakes). Tomorrow morning a call goes to National Parks and Wildlife (as this snake doesn't seem to have a "snake man" as we are used to) to see if we can somehow get them moved from right outside the back door.

Living in the country, we expected there to be snakes - it's part of life. However, we don't expect them to move almost into the house with us. I don't think they can get into the house itself (there is plenty of water outside, so hopefully they won't feel the need to get up three or four steps to get in), but am still jumping at every movement I catch out of the corner of my eye.

I still don't want to go back to the city, though.

The Art World

2008-09-19T19:55:00.002+10:00

Well, it's been a busy month. We are winding down to the end of a long, cold winter term, and everybody is tired. With this in mind, I am spending the last two weeks of term on a major art project with all my students. We are going to turn our English classroom into an art gallery, complete with classic artworks, annotated by the students, and original artworks made by, and annotated by, the students.

As a prelude to this, I took eighteen children to the local art gallery, to see an exhibition of work by local young artists, many of whom are known to the children. We walked from school through the centre of town to the gallery, and I was proud of their manners and behaviour.

At the gallery, they were a little over-awed by the space (despite its close proximity to their school and homes, this was the first visit for most), but were soon swept into the excitement of seeing "real" paintings by the kid they kick a footy with at the park. We spent half an hour there, and this was the first time I have managed to get the two groups (Afghani and Pacific Islander) really interacting together. Good for them, and for me, I think.

From the gallery we went to the park, where they had their afternoon snack, and played for a little while on the equipment. From there, we walked back to school for afternoon dismissal, where I told them how proud I was of them.

They are now busily researching their chosen famous Australian artwork and its artist, and making their own artwork (painting or clay model) based on that work. The cultural turns they are bringing to this are very interesting indeed. And we have some very very talented children.

So, what does this have to do with teaching and learning English, I can hear you asking? Well, quite a bit, really. Having the two groups interact together means they MUST speak in English, not in their home language. Researching artists has them reading English, either on the internet or in books (our school library is being inundated with requests for material about artists). Annotating their display means they are writing in English. Short paragraphs about their chosen artist, his/her life and work and a short paragraph about themselves and their artwork.

Speaking. Reading. Writing. All the elements are there, and painlessly, as they are having fun with it.

Bonfire Night!

2008-08-16T21:43:00.003+10:00

Why is burning rubbish such a thrill? We've had some trees taken out at school (getting old and dangerous) and the pile of debris has been drying in a corner of the playground. Tonight we had the big burning.

And, in true school style, made a party and a fundraiser out of it. We had a sausage sizzle, corn, roast potatoes, damper, drinks, a huge raffle and fireworks to finish off.

It was cold. Oh boy, was it cold. This town in August is not warm. There will be frost before morning. Despite that, the weather was clear, and we had a turnout of over 500 people - absolutely amazing for our school community. Many of the children running around were unfamiliar, presumably relatives or friends of our children. Among the crowd were families (that I saw) that were Aboriginal, Pacific Islander (Tongan, Samoan and Fijian), Turkish, Afghani and Filipino. All enjoying the night.

Putting on something like this in our area is a huge risk. But it worked. Tonight it worked.

The Difference Schooling Makes

2008-08-01T19:58:00.003+10:00

Our most recent arrivals at school are from China - a boy in Year 2 and a girl in Year 6. These children are from an educated family and have had continuous uninterrupted education in China. They have all the academic and social skills appropriate for children of their ages, and only need to learn English to translate them. They are literate in Chinese, understand how school works and are keen and motivated to learn. They know that education is important, and it is expected in their family and society.

This is in contrast to our refugee and itinerant children who have, prior to coming to Australia, had no schooling at all or very limited and uninterrupted schooling. They don't have the academic and social skills expect of children of their age. Their parents are keen for their children to be educated (for many, availability of education is part of the reason they have left their home country), however, many of the parents are illiterate or barely literate. They want their children educated, but there isn't the inbuilt understanding and expectation of what that means for their children.

The difference in language acquisition between well-educated and first-generation educated is enormous. In ten days, our Chinese children have progressed from learning to say "Hello" to beginning to put together simple English sentences. They are constantly questioning their teachers and peers about vocabulary and meanings and are curious about their new world.

The refugee children, while keen to learn, don't have the inbuilt knowledge of "how" to learn. They are dealing with difficult, often traumatic backgrounds, and just don't have the background knowledge of school.

I am sitting back stunned at how well these new children are doing (and will continue to do, I'm sure) and wondering how I can help this happen for my other, so very deserving, children.

A new term

2008-07-23T20:08:00.002+10:00

In the first three days of this second semester of the year, we have enrolled five new ESL children - all from countries that have not previously appeared on our rolls. A very small girl from Bangladesh going into Kindergarten. Two Tagalog-speaking boys from the Phillippines going into Year 1 and Year 2, and two Fujian-Chinese speakers; a boy in Year 2 and a girl in Year 6. None of these children know any English beyond a tentative "Hello", and there is nobody in the school who can speak to them and interpret. Only the Year 6 girl is literate in her own language, and a desperate call has been sent to Sydney for a bilingual dictionary.

Today, we went for a tour of the school, and tried to ensure that such important phrases as "May I go to the toilet?" are added to their vocabulary. Survival first! We took photos and tomorrow will set about writing labels for the photographs. We will make a classroom display, I think.

One thing, my job is never dull!

I'm the English teacher, dammit!

2008-07-21T17:25:00.002+10:00

I am employed here by the Department of Education as the ESL (English as a Second Language) teacher. My only professional concern is with those children for whom English is not their first language. As that is more than 40% of our enrolment, my time is filled. As a legitimate sideline, I work with children doing public speaking competitions and debating.

Why, then, do executive keep coming to me with harebrained schemes for filling my (non-existent) spare time? No, it isn't part of my role to escort the IM (special) class to Riding for the Disabled. It might be a lot of fun (I'm sure it would be), but in no way is it my job.

Supervising indigenous cultural lessons is so far from my job I shouldn't need to comment. No, I don't teach sport. Or choir. Or Year 6 numeracy.

ESL is my role. Respect that, please, or I will be obliged to tattle to my boss in Sydney on you!

The Migratory family

2008-07-03T18:27:00.002+10:00

MC is different from most of our children, in that he is not from a refugee background. His family comes from Turkey and seems to be quite well off. He is currently 9 years old, and has been in Australia since he was 18 months old. All his schooling has been in Australia.

However, every year, his family "go home" to Turkey for the northern hemisphere summer - usually about a three month's trip. During that time, the children (MC is the only one I teach, although there are several others of school age) do not attend school. I can only assume school in Turkey is out for the summer. Then they return to Australia, have a few week's school, then our summer holidays, a few more week's of school and off to Turkey again.

As a result, MC is getting only about half the schooling time he should. He is, unsurprisingly, way behind is peers in academics and his English is tentative at best. Schoolwork sent to Turkey with him remains undone as there is nobody to help him there. Meetings with parents, both our school and the high school, have pointed out emphatically that this lifestyle is limiting their childrens' education, but it makes no difference.

They left last week for Turkey and won't be back until October.

An update on R

2008-06-27T18:24:00.002+10:00

Remember R, from my very first post, back in April? The little girl who spoke so movingly about the loss of her father in the fighting in Afghanistan?

Today we had our mid-year parent/teacher interview with R's mother. The class teacher and I were able to give her a completely positive report on her daughter. She is communicating well in English (ungrammatically, but always gets her point across); she is able to advocate for her little sister in an issue on the playground; she is reading at only a little below grade level, and writing a little below that; mathematically she is just on grade level. She is a social girl with a lot of friends throughout the year group, of many nationalities, and is generally a delight to teach. This was all interpreted to her mother by our teacher's aide, and she beamed and beamed with pride and delight.

R's mother is a brave woman. After all they have been through, she is allowing R to go away on our 4 day Year 6 school trip to Canberra. She is the first of our Afghani students to have been allowed to take this trip - after all they have been through so recently, letting their children go is very hard. But she's doing it.

I love these successes.

A dilemma

2008-06-27T17:52:00.002+10:00

Y is a 12 year old girl in her last year of school with us. She has been enrolled here for two years, and has a lot of issues. Aside from the usual refugee and language problems, she was injured in an incident in Afghanistan and suffers some mild brain damage, which makes her behaviour unpredictable and unreliable. She copes reasonably well with her schoolwork, it is other areas that are affected. She has, at best, a loose grasp on the truth - possibly a result of her injuries, or as a survival mechanism arising from her background.

This weeks is parent/teacher interviews. The children meet with their parent/caregiver and their teacher and their progress is discussed. Y's parents usually attend, with her older brother (aged 17 or 18) as interpreter. As English teacher, I also attend as many interviews as possible that concern my students.

Y is scared stiff of her interview. She knows that her behaviour and attitude have been poor, she has been caught bare-faced lying several times in the last couple of months. She says that if we tell her parents the truth about her behaviour and attitude, she will be beaten at home.

We have had concerns about heavy physical punishment at home before - and a DOCS report has been filed - however, we can't lie to her parents about her behaviour and progress at school, to protect her from punishment.

Can we?

Why doesn't anyone like us?

2008-06-15T12:42:00.003+10:00

My other role at school is public speaking and debating, which involves me with a very different group of children to the ones I normally teach (although I plan to corral several ESL children into public speaking next year).

Now, in our town, there are three public primary schools. There is East, which enrols the children from the newer, wealthier parts of town; North, which enrols the children from the old-name, established parts of town; and our school, which enrols the poorer areas, the Aboriginal children, the immigrant and refugee children. We are looked down upon in this town. Anything which involves all three schools, we are expected to take last place and be grateful for the opportunity to attend. It's an attitude that sucks.

Today, however, we got a little bit of revenge. Just a little bit. I took my Year 5 debating team to North to debate their team on the topic "That Cats are Better than Dogs". They knew the topic in advance and had prepared well.

They were dressed for the part. All in full uniform, with blazers (owned by the school), clean shoes, and uniforms in good repair. They looked smart. I had one Aboriginal girl, one Samoan girl, and two Anglo children (one boy and one girl). They get on well together, are well-mannered and bright.

We walked into the hall at North, and all eyes turned to us. And I could see the surprise in their teacher's eyes. You see, Friday is sport day at North. Their kids were prepared to debate in their tracky daks and poloshirts they'd been playing football in. We immediately had an edge - we looked the part.

The debate went well; both sides presented their arguments and rebuttals very well. It was adjudicated by the principal of a village school (outside town) who commented specifically on the appearance of the two teams.

Afterwards, all the debaters were given afternoon tea, and our kids remembered their manners, spoke beautifully, and behaved wonderfully. They shook hands with the teacher from North as we left and thanked her for having them.

I shouted them an ice cream from McDonald's on the way back to school. They earnt it.

And the debate was a draw - a big result for us.

So, why do they look down on us?

The Aide's Story

2008-05-24T17:31:00.002+10:00

I have a teacher's aide. His official title within the Department is Teacher's Aide (Ethnic), and is also known as a Bilingual Aide. He was employed when our school received a large influx of refugee children from Afghanistan to act as a cultural and linguistic aide at school, and liaison between the school and the Afghani community. He has lived in Australia for seven years. He is an impressive man - not tall, but with a strong presence. The children, even those not from Afghanistan respect him and enjoy working with him.

Years 5 and 6 this year are studying refugees and this week we arranged for him to talk to some of these students about his life and experiences. He is not confident with English in this sort of situation, so asked his 18 year old daughter to come and interpret for him.

This is his story.

He, and the other families in this town, are from the Hazara tribe of central Afghanistan. The Hazara are Shia Muslims in a nation of Sunni, and represent about 9% of the total population of the country. Because of their religious differences, and different physical appearance (more Asian or Mongol than the other tribes) the Hazara have become a persecuted minority within Afghanistan. This persecution has led to massacre, land-stealing and oppression over the years.

Despite this, my aide is an educated man. Because of what he describes as a "very determined man" (his father) he was educated and obtained his degree in education from a University in Kabul in 1981. He was the only boy from his village to have this opportunity and he still greatly appreciates and values his education. After graduating, he was employed as a teacher in a school in Kabul, where he stayed for three years.

This was during the time of the Russian invasion of Afghanistan, and the country was far from peaceful. His school was closed, and he returned to the countryside, to marry and work on his father's farm, running a school for the local children as a sideline. It was after the rise of the Taliban that he first fell foul of the authorities, as his school enrolled and educated girls as well as boys, and taught subjects other than religious ones. He was imprisoned and beaten several times. However, his school was run under the banner of the Care organisation, and was somehow able to continue in a fashion.

In 2000, he left Afghanistan by a back door route into Pakistan, and eventually made his way to Australia, via Indonesia, eventually arriving as one of the "boat people" with no visa, no papers and no identity. His family did not know where he was and he was unable, at that time, to contact them safely.

He spent some time in the notorious refugee detainment centre at Woomera in South Australia and, surprisingly, says that his time there was quite pleasant. He was fed, warm and safe. "Nobody was trying to kill me". He eventually got his Temporary Residents Visa and was free to obtain work, contact his family and begin to build a new life for himself. He came to this town and got work as a farm labourer and began to save to bring his family (wife and five children) to Australia. In 2004, he was finally granted Permanent Residency and was able to bring his family here. His wife and the children (aged from 15 down to 6) arrived in January 2005. He enrolled the younger ones in the local public school (ours) and the older ones in the High School and his manner so impressed the Principal that he was approached about the possibility of his taking on the recently created Teachers Aide (Ethnic) position. This approach was made with no knowledge of his background in education.

Now, this man who was Principal of his own school, works as my aide. The last eighteen months would have been incredibly difficult for me without his support and presence. He has extended his role within the school and now not only works with the Afghani children (most of whom are now quite competent in English) but with some of the at-risk Islander and Aboriginal children. He is a gifted Maths teacher and seems to have a way of reaching these boys, despite his still limited English. It is a shame his English will never be good enough for him to get his teaching qualification in Australia. He also teaches classes to the Afghani children in Dari (their home language) to enable them to keep up their skills in that language as well as improve their English.

He and his wife and children are now Australian citizens and he is proud to belong to and participate in his new country. He is happy and proud that his oldest daughter is currently deciding whether to apply to study Engineering or Science at University next year, and that his younger children will all have the same chance to succeed.

They now have their "little Aussie" son, born in December 2007.

I have much more than a teacher's aide.

The Broken Boy

2008-05-08T18:02:00.002+10:00

I broke a child today.

Well, I didn't really, but he got broken on my watch. I was on playground duty at lunch time, watching a soccer game among some of the senior (10-12 year old) boys. It was pretty enthusiastic, but quite fair and I felt no need to intervene.

One of the boys kicked the ball. It went high, and straight towards A's head. A put his arm up to deflect the ball and it hit him on the forearm. He collapsed to the ground, crying in pain. I expected a nasty bruise to develop, and sent him to the office for an ice pack (in our school, ice packs cure everything).

The first aider in the office suspected something more than a bruise, and called A's father, who came and collected him to take him to the doctor for a check.

Mid-afternoon we got the word from the local hospital that A's forearm was broken - both bones. So I spent the rest of the day filling in the accident report for the Education Department, interviewing the witnesses, convincing the boy who had kicked the ball that he wasn't in trouble, and that accidents happen (he was expecting at least a suspension), and doing all the paperwork that arises from this sort of incident.

And all the while it was niggling in the back of my mind that this just wasn't an accident that should cause a bone to break - let alone two of them! The soccer ball wasn't hard (it was pretty flat, really), M didn't kick it that hard, and it didn't hit A very hard, really. Then it occurred to me. A is one of our refugee children, who fled Afghanistan when very young, and spent several years in a refugee camp in Pakistan, waiting for approval for his mother and siblings to come to Australia to join their father (who had come earlier on the refugee boat from Indonesia). What was his diet like in the camp? Would calcium-rich foods have been a part of his diet at that time? Has his growing body been damaged by that experience?

I may never know, but I begin to suspect so.

Multicultural Education and how it works

2008-05-04T12:52:00.000+10:00

GPS has more than 150 students who come from a language background other than English - some of these speak English very well, some not at all. In 2007,the school enrolled a number of new students, many of whome are from a refugee background and speak no English at home at all.

We started 2007 with two full-time ESL teachers, and the ESL focus has been split between infants and primary. Primary (Years 3-6) students have had English instruction by means of withdrawal from class in small groups of similar ability. The focus in these groups has been on speaking, reading and writing in English.

The infants ESL was delivered by way of a self-contained 1/2 composite class, taught by one of the ESL teachers, where the full curriculum was delivered with a focus on language learning. This class continued until midway through third term, when the teacher retired and the children returned to mainstream classes.

Both groups have focused on children who are newly arrived in Australia or who have been here for less than three years.

We continue to encourage a close relationship between the school and our new families. Our bilingual aide (from Afghanistan) has been invaluable in working with our teachers, students and families from that part of the world. He has also taught classes in written Dari (the Afghani students' home language) to enable the children to maintain and develop their skills in Dari along with their skills in English. His assistance in dealing with cultural and religious issues has also been irreplaceable.

In 2008, it was decided that the full-time class was not a success and will not be tried again. We have one full-time ESL teacher (that's me!) and three days a week covered by a part-time teacher. Generally, the children are working well in both mainstream and English classes, with some doing very well and some not so well (as can be expected - ability levels vary in ESL children as in all children).

By contrast, we have enrolled about 100 children who are identified as Australian Aboriginal. All are English-speaking, none speak a tribal language at home or anywhere. Their education programme is delivered by multiple means of assistance. We have a Cultural Liaison Officers; an Aboriginal Education Officer; a Special Programmes Officer and eight Aboriginal teacher's aides.

The Aboriginal children are achieving overall at a much lower level than the ESL students at our school. I believe the difference is family attitudes.

Friendship

2008-04-14T13:01:00.000+10:00

I spent the weekend with my best friend. Twice a year we both abandon our families, head to Albury on the Murray River and have a weekend. We talk, we shop, we drink wine and we eat chocolate. We come home refreshed and energised.

We met ten years ago when we first started University, both as mature age students. We were terrified of what we were doing and bonded over that. We are now both doing well in our chosen careers and still have that bond.

On the surface, though, we couldn't be less alike.

She loves to cook and eat and makes a production of mealtime. I regard food as fuel and, as long as it isn't actively poisonous, am happy to eat almost anything.

She's a city girl. I'm not. To her, Geelong, where she lives, is a small town, with its population of 130,000. To me, Griffith, where I live, is a big town, with its population of 16,000. The quiet of the country intimidates her; the noise of Sydney or Melbourne life confuses and scares me.

She is definitely middle class - raised in the city with a professional father. Her children have all attended good Catholic schools, and the suggestion of public schools is always laughed off. My family is firmly working class rural, and my father always worked with his hands. I love the public school education I had and that my children received.

Despite all these differences, we still think the same way in many things. We can complete each other's sentences, understand each other's jokes and references, and drove our University professors mad by producing very similar work when there was no possibility of collusion.

We are each other's best friend.

The Child with no Language

2008-04-09T19:26:00.000+10:00

We take for granted that every able-bodied person in the world speaks at least one language fluently and in depth. The drive for spoken language is hand-wired into our brain, and a child has to be profoundly impaired physically or mentally before that drive is not evident. So every child learns its mother tongut thoroughly and may also develop facility and depth with other languages, either at the same tim eif being raised bilingually, or later.

No, not necessarily.

For children caught in the refugee system, and lacking family or educational support, it is quite possible for them to develop a smattering of several languages, but to lack depth of knowledge of any of them.

I teach such a child.

M was born in Afghanistan, to a peasant family of the Hazara tribe. Neither of his parents are literate, nor are most of his older siblings. His native language is Dari, but the family left Afghanistan when he was five; his father eventually to Australia on a refugee boat to escape the Taliban; mother and some of the children to Pakistan to wait to hear where their husband and father had ended up, if he was still alive. M's knowledge of Dari has remained at the level of a five year old verbally, and he is completely illiterate in that language.

In Parkistan, he was exposed to a mixture of Pashto and Urdu and developed a basic knowledge of both these languages. No education was available to refugee children in Pakistan and formal language instruction was not on the agenda.

From Pakistan, the family went to Syria where, for the first time, M (now aged about 8) was able to go to school. In Syria, schooling was in Arabic, another new language for M. No special language classes were provided - the only method of language instruction was "immersion" (also known as "sink or swim"). M, with no strong home language and little support for or understanding of his schooling at home, sank like a stone. He developed a basic knowledge of pidgin Arabic and remained basically illiterate.

After two years, M's father tracked his family and began to make moves to bring them to Australia. The first step on that leg of their journey was to travel to Indonesia, where they stayed for nearly a year. M again was enrolled at school, where all instruction was in Indonesian. Again, he started at the beginning with a new, completely unrelated, language. Again he coped badly.

Now, at 12, M is in Australia. He is in Year 6 at a state primary school and faces the challenges of high school next year. He is a lovely young man, but he will never achieve a high level of education in English or any other language despite intensive English tuition.

By 12, a child should have a strong fluency in at least one language, with a good depth and breadth of vocabulary, grammatical structure and expression.

Unfortunately, M has become a victim of the refugee system and has these skills in no language. It is highly unlikely that he will now attain them.

A Child's Eyes

2008-04-07T17:22:00.000+10:00

Public speaking is hard for most children. No matter how confident and privileged the child, standing up in front of their peers and speaking is nerve-wracking and risk-taking. How much more so, then, for my deprived, refugee, English learners? To try and make the idea slightly less threatening, we have been doing some short talks in the more supportive atmosphere of the ESL classroom.

I gave my seven Year 6 students a choice of topic, with some suggestions. Most stumbled through a thirty second talk on their favourite sport - good first attempts from most of them.

R. was different. She decided to talk about her family. She spoke in her halting English about her mother and her sister, her uncle and her grandmother, who are all here in Australia with her. Then she talked about her father.

"I don't have my Dad. When I was little girl in Afghanistan there was fight and my Dad was taken away. The Taliban came in the middle of the night and broke the door to our home. I was very fright. They take my Dad away. I not see him again. My sister was in my mother's stomach, she never see our Dad."

All of this group of children have been through refugee camps, and statelessness and the insecurity that goes with it, before coming to Australia. Most, including R, are now Australian citizens. Many have been through periods of not knowing where their fathers were, or if they were alive or dead, but all the others now have reunited, intact families.

R's mother is a strong woman with a great determination for her daughters to be educated and successful - my admiration for her has leapt tenfold today.