School Performance

In what way is school performance linked to learning and teaching behaviours?
To what extent can a teacher make a difference where a student's ability to learn is impaired by their learning behaviours?
These are the questions that are asked over and over at last night's parent teacher night for Tom.
Teachers would overwhelmingly like to teach students who do not have learning behaviour which is outside their teaching style.
Students would like to learn without having to meet rigid teaching styles.
Formal schooling in Australia is now compulsory to age 17. For most students this will mean that they are in school until the completion of Yr 12 - 13 years of schooling. It will still be possible to be enrolled at TAFE after Yr 10 on a full time basis to complete the years of schooling.
The pressure this places on junior school teachers is obvious, all years of education are now geared towards the HSC. Even yr 7 students sit two papers for their English exams in replica of the final formal and compulsory English exam in Yr 12. Texts are studied for essays and their examinable content. Students in lower grades are having their educations focussed by formal assessment tasks. There is no longer scope for individual learning styles and wider reading. Yes the books that we all read in between - the ones that we learned to love and re read in our adult years and share with our own children.

The exam system is flawed as a sole teaching and learning model.
It is failing our son. It is no fun for teachers - or students.

If you have comments on this topic I would like to read them......

Music Night

To get your music badge you need to demonstrate knowledge about your chosen musical instrument and play a piece for the troup. There was a lot of musical talent in Tom's scouting group, and many different musical instruments were played. Tom played his violin.

Fun at the Fair

At the St Thomas Fair there was a tea cup merry go round which the boys liked. The all day fun pass this year included jumping castles, a slippery dip and a wrestling ring that you could knock down your opponent with a large blow up pole. With some food to go it was a fun afternoon. Maybe I will get to go back and see the Art today.

Heath Ledger in The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

Terry Gilliam, co-wrote, co-produced and directed this masterpiece of the imagination. Doctor Parnassus is running an imaginarium where ticket paying people enter through a mirror into the world of his mind and their imagination. He runs his show with Anton a harlequin like clown, Valentina his daughter and Percy a vertically challenged super intelligent person. One day they save Tony who has been sent to his death on London Bridge by the Russian mafia for not repaying their loan to him that he has conveniently laundered in his children's charity organisation.
The show of Parnassus is underpinned by his mortality and an earlier agreement he made with the Devil. Which if he loses the wager will see his daughter fall to his control. Everyone who enters the imaginarium is able to make a choice for good or for an evil end. In this way Parnassus can continue in his immortality without wishing to change the world or control it as a powerful figure.

Gilliam imparts layers of history to the film, comedie del arte, the renaissance, the industrialisation of the west all sit juxtaposed with the modern 21st Century in which our characters find themselves caught outside time along.

This film asks more questions than it answers. It will leave you with imagery and moments that can be retrieved from your visual cortex for years to come. Rated PG it is nevertheless a reasonably dark film best suited to adults.

Heath Ledger acts in his role with grace and certainty. The sequences filmed with the co-actors of Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Collin Farrell are all edited to his footage and storyline in a seamless and plausible way.

Lily Cole is ethereal but real as Valentina. Her beautiful style is made great use of by Gilliam's direction however her acting delivers punch after punch as Valentina makes do with a home living magazine in lieu of the life she really leads as a travelling showgirl in her father's imaginarium.

The imaginarium is a unique idea made up of gypsy trailer, self contained theater, side show alley tralier and simply an effortless portal for the characters to be transformed by.

Rating: 4 and a half STARS.

In good arthouse cinemas from 29th October 2009.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1054606/

Bush Garden

Some of the blogs that are listed on this site are written around the aspect of a garden. We have a bush garden and now that Spring has come all of the pretty flowers have been replaced by many different types and shades of green foliage. Here are some pics of the garden today.

Across The Universe

This is my favourite Beatles song from my childhood. I always though they were singing Jackaroo Davis Om - so it just shows that the internet knows best!






Across the Universe

Words are flowing like endless rain into a paper cup
They slither while they pass, they slip across the universe.
Pools of sorrow waves of joy are drifting through my opened mind,
Possessing and caressing me.

Jai guru deva om
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world.

Images of broken light which dance before me like a million eyes,
They call me on and on across the universe,
Thoughts meander like a restless wind
Inside a letter box they
Stumble blindly as they make their way
Across the universe

Jai guru deva om
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world

Sounds of laughter shades of life are ringing
Through my open mind inciting and inviting me.
Limitless undying love which shines around me like a million suns,
And calls me on and on across the universe

Jai guru deva om
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world
Nothing's gonna change my world

Jai guru deva om
Jai guru deva om
Jai guru deva om
Jai guru deva om


Lennon and Mc Cartney 1970 - Let It Be album


For those who would like to hear it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rj-4t9drU1M

Basket Ball Game

Tom is number 6

Layout warmup

Preparing for rebounds

Tom had his first basketball game today and he managed to score his first three point goal. While they lost the game his team showed great enthusiasm and motivation. Go Tom!