"And now we're going to train them up the way they ought to go...."

by iosaf Sat Jul 01, 2006 17:24

I must admit over the last weeks I gave the English requirements in Irish education some thought.
Mostly the use of obligatory Shakespeare, as far as I can remember these are the plays all Irish kids have to study in cycle either for Junior Cert or Leaving Cert :-
Julius Caesar, Romeo & Juliet, Merchant of Venice - King Lear, Othello & Macbeth, Hamlet, As you lie it..,
That means every Irish kid has "studied" one of the first three for minimum secondary level and one of the latter five to be properly "schooled". Why?
Haughey's death saw his final speech to the Dail in which he quoted Othello aired, I remember thinking "ah! less than one third of those with leaving cert english really get the references" . I then started talking about "titus andronicus" in reference to Peter Preston's hunger strike ( 41 days today ). No-one really got the references unless (most probably ) they had seen the movie with Hannibal Lector actor Anthony Hopkins, together with Othello its the only play with a "black" character, the last possible candidate being the "pale moor" of the Merchant of Venice a play with more jewish ethnic references than moorish. The horror of a daughter without hands to write or tongue to speak & her dad writing letters on the street daming Caesar and Senate utterly lost on most.

I've often thought there is little point in attempting to introduce so forcefully adolescents to shakespearian drama and especially not if it is so selective. Why were these plays chosen?
I'm not saying "don't teach Shakespeare" not a bit of it, just do it in a different way. There really ought be more material considered, in these days of audio-visual resources in most schools in Europe ( I presume in Ireland too ) it is not inconcievable that in a 2 or 3 year cycle kids could watch & appreciate the complete set list of Irish Shakespeare plays as well as the other lesser known works and even more plays by other dramatists since. The depth of the moral lessons would be I think improved by that.

I therefore have a niggling doubt - that the Irish education set material is counter-productive. If you want to talk "shakespeare" complete with the quotations we are made learn with anyone else they must be from your exact same year of examination or three years after or before. & naturally those little quotes get forgotten. Its all seems like a very fnordish way of turning kids off what they're supposed to be absorbing. I think the same of the Gaeilge set material too.....

by Chris Murray - The Unmanageables Sun Jul 02, 2006 15:04

There are shades, so I only speak from experience. It aggravates the disability (how I hate that word!).
It illuminates garishly the defecit at the heart of the so called equality in second-level
institutions.

Political 'items' in relation to dsylexia/aspergers/adhd , such as access to educational psychology services are figures massaged beyond any point of recognition.

The necessity to highlight a subject with dsylexia is crucial from the youngest possible age in order to give that person skills and tools to cope with basics. At primary level, the two to three kids who get the benefit of state services annually are lucky, because behind them there averages 49-53 kids not accessing the services: The registration , access to resource teachers, technology.

Take the issue to second level: undiagnosed dsylexics who were not 'got' early enough are sliding down the academic scale. Their two peers, having been tutored in the phonics system and have technological adeptness are achieving highly.

There is no resource at second level: tuition is a matter of organised grinds or private tutor.
Maintaining a 'grade' average in the teeth of what is basically a different way of absorbing and disseminating materials becomes problematic. Less so to the the two/53 pupils who got ed pscyh
access.

The material necessary for the leaving cert becomes problematic to the child diagnosed at four,
and more so to the one who finally got the resources age 9/10.

He is visual, he has little or no short term memory but he has learnt or knows how to
retain data and information through visual means.
example : one four year old dyslexic was diagnosed because he could not begin his first reader but had memorised every word on the page in conjunction with the images. reading texts, actually gives him pain,
including severe migraine and he
would suffer severe depression because though he has accesssed the 'key' the problem
is still there. The problem being that he learns differently and cannot fit into the concept of mainstreaming. The one size fits all ideal. His problems with short term memory and data retention
stem from the dyslexic mind wherein sequencing and repitition are bogeys. Tables of elements, maths tables and spelling tests are areas that are problematic.

Second level resources are:
The dropping of Irish (irish exemption- takes a while to get that one)
Extra time at examinations.
Technology access for learning.
The right to have spelling understood by the examiner as part of the'condition'

There are no one on one classes/resource teachers provided by the State to the secondary school student.

Organisations such as DAI (Dsylexic Assoc. of Ireland) provide lists of ed psych.
tutors.
These are very expensive and cope with the run-off that the Dept of Education does not deal
with.

As to Shakespeare. its far easier for a dyslexic child to watch the DVD and make a comic
becuse visual retention of the images and their creative impact matters more than a whole load
of text that gives them a migraine. Mainstreaming does not account for different rates, modes and methods of learning. nor for the individual. The process of fitting someone categorised as learning disabled into systemised eduaction takes no account of individuality or creativity.

by iosaf Tue Jul 04, 2006 18:57

A great dramatist, but why is his inclusion on the educational sylabus reduced to one permenant fixture? "Juno & the Paycock". For one no-one pronounces peacock that way anymore, and our female youngsters don't really have to grapple with the horrid prospect of being seduced by a lawyer and left pregnant. do they? Is this play left on the list to inform us all of the horrible tenament slum past endured by most Dubliners? Today I've been talking to paranoid Barcelona types who are saying ooooooo did you see the station the train crashed at in Valencia, JESUS! and the black nazi pope is coming. First time he doesn't do something NAZI like....................who did it??????

& to calm down I thought I'd have a go at at the Ardteistiméireacht 2006, the 78th year youngsters of Eire have had the option to sit this.

The theme of this year's english honours paper 1 was "pretence" ( & falsehood ) you can read the papers here :- http://www.examinations.ie/index.php?l=en&mc=en&sc=ep&f...bject


TEST YOURSELVES!


for your first 100 marks write a composition on any of these subjects

(1) "let's stop all this pretence, let's tell each other the unvarnished truth for once"
= write a personal essay in response to that.

(3) "It was mad, ridiculous"
= write a composition starting with that sentance.

(4)"....someday I hope to come up with a get rich idea...."
= write a magazine article (serious or lighthearted) outlining a get rich idea of your own.

(5) "What seems to be the problem?"
= write a speech for world leaders in which you persuade them to deal with one of the world's problems.

Wow eh? I haven't included them all, coz we're grown ups.
The comprehension section was based on ghost writing and some member of the anglo-irish aristocracy visiting her orchard. The set text for composition extension was about a boy visiting a girl for Valentines day...... I wonder how many people thought to suggest s/he was "g-a-y".

This brings us to Paper 2.
http://www.examinations.ie/archive/exampapers/2006/LC00...V.pdf

Our kids were asked to ponder the fascinating relationship between Elizabeth and Mr Darcy of "pride & prejudice" yet again Now this is something most of us have done. & we can all in a nutshell sum up the relationship between Lizzie & Darcy - can't we? yep. we can.- We haven't forgotten at all. It was all about money, mortgage, the car, the VHI, a bit of P-r-i-d-e and a dollop of P-r-e-j-u-d-i-c-e coz they were snobby brits.

then the Shakespeare. this year "As you like it" or "King Lear". Kids were asked quite simply "why did you enjoy "As you like it"?" or "why is "As you like it" romantic?" Obviously our youngsters are very romantic & shagging all the time. We went into this on another thread in June- I believe.
For those kids who weren't lucky enough to have a romantically inclined teacher, (?) the play was King Lear -
Questions :- compare Gloucester & Lear. oh!!!! tricky that one. You'd need to back yourself up with quotes, basically they're both old codgers who eff everything up and one gets his eyes gouged out like the black mamba does in Kill Bill 2.

Those kids who couldn't remember the quotes got the snuff movie appreciation option & I quote :-
"Reading or Watching King Lear is a horrifying as well as uplifting experience" [sic] JAYZHUS! yeah its brilliant Edmund is a bastard and teams up with this snobby bloke to pluck eyes out like Kill Bill 2. It was brill!

_________________________________________

by now 2 hours into our writing, and remembering the difference between "its" & "it's" I'd hope most of us are cruising happily at the B level and happily grappling with the appreciate comparison of textx which brings us to the great Aesthetic moment of Irish secondary level education.....
the unseen poem Now let us reflect on the importance of the the unseen poem a moment. It might quite probably be the last poetic text many of our youngsters read in their lives. & here it is ( in its entirety)

The Toy Horse

someone when I was young, stole my toy horse,
The charm of my morning romps, my man's delight.
For two days I grieved, holding the sorrow like flowers
Between the bars of my sullen angry mind.

Next day I went out with evil in my heart,
Evil between my eyes and at the tips of my hands,
Looking for my enemy at the armed stations,
Until I found him, playing in his garden

With my toy horse, urgent in the battle
Against the enemeies of his Unreason's land:
He was so happy, I gave him also
My Vivid coloured caryons and my big glass marble.

Valentin Iremonger (1918 - )

The kids were asked if this was a shocking display of childhood.........

Jayzhus, someone had my skateboard, so I went round his gaff, tagged it up in hate graffiti and then I gouged out his eyes like in Kill Bill2 and now he has a marble for an eye.