Things that have happened since our course together

Hi Everybody,
The ten days we spent together in Rutherford Extension 11 seems a long time ago. I know it isn't but after your course I got drafted from evening programme work into taking over the group of a colleague who did not have the right things to give her group.
I felt like a cuckoo having to do this.......and I felt some resentment at a group who had unseated their trainer. ( We have all had difficult classes...or at least classes that seemed to us difficult)
I took me about three days to fully shed this feeling of resentment towards the participants, though at the same time understanding and sympathising with their deep discontent.

Then came the 35 Anniversary Conf........My job was to give the final plenary somehow drawing of the previous four plenaries. Stimulating but risky work.
The Conference was really extrordinarily harmonious and the level of animation was very high.
I went to a brilliant workshop on primary story-telling , given by Eleanor Watts. Wow!

Then a week's semi-holiday: ;local tourism in the early morning and work through the rest of the day.

On Friday I am off to Wales for a five day cottage holiday....and then a conf in Czech Republic.

Some of you must be on the cusp of the new academic year in all the various places where you teach. The geographical spread from Trinidad to Slovenia and from Azerbaijan to Poland. I look forward to hearing how this real beginning of the course happens. I guess your thoughts on this may be interesting to all the blog readers.

I wonder how many people have been in touch with Hanna K about writing something for HLT?
Don't forget.......

Good night,

Mario

Do schools kill creativity?

If you haven't seen this video, whenever you can spare 20 minutes, you can't miss it!

It's hilarious, very interesting, and you may like to listen to this case of a highly kinesthetic girl at school Gillian Lynne, a well-known multimilionare coreographer (Cats, Phantom of the Opera), who was diagnosed a learning disorder at school.

sonnet Shakespeare in logical mathematical form

Dear all,

This is a very funny translation of a Shakespeare sonnet into logical mathematical graphics. My son found it somewhere on the internet. In case you can't read it in my message, use this link:
http://i26.tinypic.com/6edipz.jpg

I was in France for a week with one of my sons, and feel well-relaxed; and still 3 more weeks of holydays!! Happy to be a teacher... On the other hand, I am thinking about the many of us who still have to wait and see whether they will have a job and if so, which and where! I sincerely hope Vanja, Paula, Helena (?) will be offered interesting posts!
All the best to you all, enjoy your holydays!
ELsbeth

Escola da Ponte

Dear all,

Here's some information about "Escola da Ponte", a portuguese state school with an innovative project. This information was taken from their website.

"The students aren't distributed by school years, or by classes. The students that enter the first cycle in "Escola da Ponte" start by sharing a space that is called "Initialisation". In this space the kids learn the bases of reading and writing on a natural method approach.

Here they also learn to work autonomously in diverse areas of the curriculum, working in group and being people... In the "Initialisation" the children elaborate, together with a teacher, a fortnightly plan that is "negotiated " amongst them all.

When they are able to read and write with some corrections, solve some elementary calculations, help and be helped by the others, they move on the " transaction " space, which is characterised by group work and research. The children help to elaborate their individual plan.

When they are able to work in group, elaborate research work, do auto-planning and auto-evaluations, as well as dominate a determined number of goals in the different curriculum areas, they are able to autonomously manage their learning time and space in what is called " working in freedom and in great level", in total autonomy.

In the beginning of each fortnight they elaborate their own working plan, negotiate amongst themselves and the teachers. They elaborate individual plans everyday, not forgetting the school, the groups and their own interests. At the end of every fortnight they proceed in auto-evaluating their plan according to the development of the project."

For more information about this school, click here to visit their website or email me and I'll send you more info.

Love,

Lena.

P.S.- Did everybody get the letters we wrote each other? I got mine... thanks, Lisa!

A bit of visual intelligence

Hi!
Hope you are all safe and sound after your journeys back home!
For those already feeling a bit nostalgic about our summer course like myself, I leave you a Portuguese song by the author Rodrigo Leão just perfect for that mood. It's called "Voltar" (Coming Back). Hope you enjoy it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6artkfX54s

Paula Serra

Good news for all of us from the EC

The European Commission

The European Commission has announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the EU, rather than German, which was the other contender. Her Majesty's Government conceded that English spelling had room for improvement and has therefore accepted a five-year phasing in of "Euro-English".

In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make sivil servants jump for joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of the "k", Which should klear up some konfusion and allow one key less on keyboards.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f", making words like "fotograf" 20% shorter.

In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of the silent "e" is disgrasful.

By the fourth yer, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v".

During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters. After zis fifz yer, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil be no mor trubls or difikultis and everivun vil find it ezi to understand ech ozer. ZE DREM VIL FINALI COM TRU!

Herr Schmidt