Category Archives: Random thoughts

Switching Gears: A Teaching Life (Part I)

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I’ve been a teacher for more than half of my life and while it was, admittedly, one of my career choices, it was not my first. Every since I became aware of the concept of a career, I have wanted to be a writer first, second, a director, and third, an artist. There were several other potential choices along the way, including an actor, a doctor, a nun, and an Olympic athlete. At different times, I also considered being a historian (thanks to my senior high school history teacher who was a mentor and a dear friend to me until she died), an architect (because I loved the idea of seeing my wildest building concepts become concrete and I loved the works of Frank Lloyd Wright), an archaeologist (because I loved history and I dreamt of visiting ancient ruins), a choreographer (because I loved to watch dance performances and for a while found creative expression in dancing and had the opportunity to work with a dance company and do a bit of choreography), and a computer programmer (because I was intrigued by how I might create software that would do what I wanted it to).

I never shared my deepest desires with anyone. When I was 10, a conversation with my parents changed my mind about several potential career choices. Doctor? Mama said it would be too difficult for me because I would have to do a lot of memorization, work in a lab with corpses, and be the minority in a world of men. Actor? Mama said it was an immoral world and not for me because all girls in theatre were invariably loose and had no morals. Olympic athlete? Mama said why should I choose archery, of all sports, with such expensive equipment. Archaeologist? I would have to travel far and always be on the move, getting myself all filthy from digging dirt. Architect? That was a man’s field. Nun? I would break my father’s heart. Teacher? That wouldn’t earn me enough to sustain me. Computer programmer? I lost interest when they switched programming languages just when I was planning to try to see how much more serious I could get with it. I recently took some lessons in web design, graphic design, social media marketing, and Photoshop, thinking I could upgrade my skills and maybe monetize them. However, I became preoccupied with a brief teaching stint that demanded so much of my time and energy that I did not have time to continue those courses beyond the first levels. (Not that any of those skills are going to waste because they are applicable to my business. Besides, I can still continue them anytime I want since I have a lifetime membership with the institution that teaches them.) I already knew that if I brought up my desire to be an artist or writer, I would be told that I would end up being a starving artist or starving writer–because in previous family conversations mama had already emphasized how those careers would not put food on the table.

By the time I was ready for university, I was pretty much willing to take anything that would get me out of the house, which I had already sort of left by practically moving in with my aunt who was in theatre because she lived on campus where I had signed up for fellowship programs in theatre and creative writing. (Of course, my mother was strongly against it.) I had enrolled in a communications research course at the state university and was hoping to get into broadcasting. On the first day of class, even before my first class had begun, I was surprised to see mama at the door of the classroom, looking for me. She was much more excited than I was, as I had received a telegram (which she had read and already followed up on before telling me about it) inviting me to a full scholarship program.

Let me give a little backgrounder. In my senior year, I had learned that exams were open to students interested in the national science scholarship program. The only reason I knew about the program was because my youngest brother had studied high school in the national science high school and had already taken that exam. He was quite smug about being a science scholar and our mother made it very clear to everyone that he was the brilliant one who excelled in math and science. I decided to take the test just for the heck of seeing if I would pass it. Little did I know I would.

Upon receiving the telegram, mama had quickly called up the number provided, inquired about the program and, apparently, visited the university where I would be studying, if I decided to take the offer. She had met the program head and spoken with several of my professors-to-be. So when she appeared at my classroom door, she already knew what was in store for me.

At the “interview”, I found out that only the top 100 students from the thousands of examinees nationwide had been offered scholarships. The top 50 could choose any science-related degree they wanted in any college or university in the country. My brother had passed in the top 50. He would receive full tuition and a socialized stipend, which meant that, because my parents were in a higher income bracket, he would receive the smallest monthly allowance. The next 50 were offered a full scholarship with a full stipend (regardless of parents’ income), a full book and clothing allowance, and practically guaranteed employment for the first two years after graduation, because we were obliged to teach in a public school for two years, as part of the scholarship contract. The catch? We could pick either math or physics as our major degrees, doubled with an education degree. The objective of that program was to improve the quality of teaching math and physics in the country. I quickly figured that, since teaching had been a potential career on my list, and I could pick math because I guessed I could manage that better than having to produce lab reports for physics experiments–something that totally turned me off in high school (I could never get my experiments to perform the way they were supposed to and I hated doing the science projects). What was more important was the full stipend and additional allowances, which would give me complete independence and, thereby, emancipate my from mama’s control. Of course, I took the scholarship.

So my teaching degree sort of fell into my lap. It wasn’t anything I had to work very hard for and, as a result, I put in the least effort into it, focusing my energies instead on the school paper, then I was recruited into the resident folk dance company, then I was attracted by archery and became a varsity athlete, representing the university in several regional and national competitions. The best part was that all my extracurricular activities also earned me additional stipends. As a student, I was rich.

After graduation, I was no longer obliged to teach in a public school because I had neglected a couple of courses and had to repeat them. (I had actually deliberately neglected them for reasons I might put into writing some other time.) As a result, the scholarship was withdrawn, but because I was in my final year and my other grades were fairly outstanding, I was allowed to complete the degree but had to cover my own tuition and lost the stipends in my final additional semester. That did not bother me, because I was, as I mentioned, financially set as a student and had enough (including extra income from teaching a Polynesian dance class and some modeling) to cover my expenses. I had also started part-time work as a secretary / administrative assistant in my final semester, so I just had to pass those three courses I had neglected. The good thing was that I earned pretty high marks for them, so my GPA was pretty decent in the end.

I had continued my work, this time as a full-time secretary, and accepted a second job as a part-time comptroller. Shortly after, I decided to join one of the national theatre companies, to get closer to my dream of working with theatre and the performing arts, even if it was just doing marketing at first. That led to a whirlwind courtship and all my dreams of a professional career were put on hold. Sometime during that period when I was dealing with being a new wife and mother-to-be, I had decided I would pursue a master’s degree, but I needed to move back to the capital to do that.

My whirlwind courtship ended up as a whirlwind marriage and I found myself back in mama’s house, making myself useful and away from her as much as I could by taking my sister to school and picking her up after school. On one such trip, I ran into a former principal whom I had been quite close to, and she quickly invited me to teach, not math for which I had earned a degree, but English, which she knew I excelled at. To ensure I had the proper credentials to teach English, she directed my to the top private university, known for its courses in the liberal arts and humanities, in the National Capital Region where I was to enroll for a master’s degree with the English department. I never look a gift horse in the mouth and, by then, I was following whatever opportunities fell into my lap. So off I went to start my master’s and, in three months, I was officially employed as a teacher in the same school where I had studied from kindergarten to high school.

Success ≠ Material Wealth

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A post by Joshua Becker, “Stop chasing success, seek significance” (https://www.becomingminimalist.com/stop-chasing-success-seek-significance/), is circulating on Facebook and while many people will be quick to nod their heads and agree, I would like to somewhat disagree.

The first thing his post reminded me of was Viktor Frankl’s Man’s Search for Meaning. I read this book over and over again after my second year (grade 10) high school teacher recommended it as a reading for a Religion class.

This is so existentialist. We find meaning through the things we choose to do of our own free will–not because others say so, not because we choose to do what is right or wrong or good or bad, but because it gives us meaning. What is meaningful is what is significant. Can we say that seeking success and happiness are insignificant? That would be judging others who find the most meaning in success the way Joshua Becker defines it. Yet, success is not always defined by financial standards. This is the sad legacy of a materialistic culture. What we need to do is to redefine success, to change the connotation of success so it does not equate to material wealth.

I achieve success, for instance, as a writing coach, when I am able to nurture a mentee and guide him or her towards writing, when I am able to help writers overcome writing blocks, when I am able to help writers improve their craft, when I am able to help them become confident in their craft, when I am able to help them achieve their goals. To see those results is an affirmation that what I am doing is right and good because it empowers and enables others. That is only one of my successes.

Perhaps people have to go back to the actual meaning of success: the achievement of a goal or purpose. We should also think in terms of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. We shouldn’t denigrate anyone whose level of success is not at the pinnacle of human needs. After all, it is not everyone who can think of higher-level needs before they overcome even the most basic physiological needs and the need for safety and belonging. For many people, that is the extent of their needs and, therefore, the extent of their success. Self-realization and self-actualization usually happens after all the other needs have been satisfied, simply because we are freed from those cares and therefore free to actualize ourselves. I am wary and leery of anyone who is quick to define things in black and white because there are easily 8 billion shades of gray in this world.

Where goes the Philippines?

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I cannot be silent. Although I now carry a Canadian passport, I cannot deny my roots. I think what is happening in the Philippines and many other places around the world is both sad and alarming. The rise of populist leaders such as Duterte has followed on the wake of the leadership model of the admittedly most powerful country in the world. Leaders of nations have no business using their positions and powers to express, practice, and propagate their personal views, particularly when they are “elected” leaders–and I put that word in quotation marks because I sincerely do not and cannot believe the majority of any country would want such a leader in place.


The Philippines has been through hell and high water and several generations have fought and lost country and lives seeking freedom and independence, first from the Spaniards, then from the Japanese, then the Americans, and then from a home-grown dictator. All that only to suffer the indignity and crassness spread around by an uncivilized boor who likes to call himself President.


Granted, Filipinos as a nation are known for their extreme patience and tolerance, their politeness and meek nature, their come-what-may attitude and slowness to anger. The poverty and harshness of life of the majority force them to bow their heads and persist in eking out a living from the dregs of first world nations. The mantle of morality imposed by centuries of Spanish and religious rule might have imbued virtues and values that are unmatched by other nations, but that also compel the masses to bow their heads to the yoke of oppressors and silently endure the indignities heaped upon them.

The Filipino woman has been insulted, demeaned, and raped by Spain, Japan, America, and other nations that see them as willing victims, and by Filipino men like Duterte, who does not even pretend to be moral, polite, dignified, or educated. Shall we continue to accept his insults and offer the other cheek until our faces are swollen and our bodies ravaged so that we are thrust naked though fully dressed and forced to parade before men of his ilk? Have we so little respect for ourselves that we act like attention-starved naive schoolgirls hungry for the compliments of rapacious men?

As a nation, are we not complicit in his rape and pimping of the Philippines if we do not stop him from allowing any other nation to walk all over us and disregard our sovereignty? Fellow Filipinos, no matter where you are in the world, no matter what nation or flag you now pledge allegiance to, there is no denying where your roots first sprouted. It does not mean that because our lives are more bearable, our futures more secure, that we should completely forget where we came from. Was it not our revered hero, Jose Rizal, who said that whosoever does not know where he came from will never reach his destination? The very same sentiment applies to all the younger generations of Filipinos who have forgotten the sacrifices of their ancestors, their parents, and their grandparents; who have forgotten the bloodshed, the raping, and pillaging of our country and our people through graft and corruption; who have forgotten how our people, our morals, and our riches were bartered and sold to the Americans; who have forgotten how our dreams and aspirations were hijacked and held hostage by wealthy individuals and voracious corporations that bled us of our money, our sweat, and our futures; who have forgotten the meaning of sovereignty, independence, and pride. How can anyone continue to sing the national anthem or pledge allegiance to the flag and really mean what the words say? Even that is mere lip service to the true meaning of the words.

If this tack Duterte is nudging the Philippines towards sees his desired end, whatever that is, we might as well change the words of the national anthem and the pledge of allegiance because there is no way in hell I will lay down my life for China or pledge allegiance to it. Duterte must be made to recite, memorize, understand, and embody what the Philippine national anthem and pledge of allegiance declare. And in case anyone has forgotten the words, I add them here as a reminder of what Filipinos are beholden to.

Lupang Hinirang
(The Philippine National Anthem)

Bayang magiliw
Perlas ng Silanganan,
Alab ng puso,
Sa dibdib mo’y buhay.

Lupang Hinirang,
Duyan ka ng magiting,
Sa manlulupig,
Di ka pasisiil.

Sa dagat at bundok,
Sa simoy at sa langit mong bughaw,
May dilag ang tula
At awit sa paglayang minamahal.

Ang kislap ng watawat mo’y
Tagumpay na nagniningning,
Ang bituin at araw niya
Kailan pa ma’y di magdidilim.

Lupa ng araw, ng luwalhati’t pagsinta,
Buhay ay langit sa piling mo.
Aming ligaya, na pag may mang-aapi
Ang mamatay nang dahil sa iyo.

THE PHILIPPINE HYMN

The English Version of the Philippine National Anthem (Translated by Camilo Osias and A.L. Lane)

Land of the morning,
Child of the sun returning,
With fervor burning,
Thee do our souls adore.

Land dear and holy,
Cradle of noble heroes,
Ne’er shall invaders
Trample thy sacred shore.

Ever within thy skies and through thy clouds
And o’er thy hills and sea,
Do we behold the radiance, feel and throb,
Of glorious liberty.

Thy banner, dear to all our hearts,
Its sun and stars alight,
O never shall its shining field
Be dimmed by tyrant’s might!

Beautiful land of love, o land of light,
In thine embrace ’tis rapture to lie,
But it is glory ever, when thou art wronged,
For us, thy sons to suffer and die.

Patriotic Oath of the Philippines

Iniibig ko ang Pilipinas, aking lupang sinilangan,
Tahanan ng aking lahi, kinukupkop ako at tinutulungang
Maging malakas, masipag at marangal
Dahil mahal ko ang Pilipinas,
Diringgin ko ang payo ng aking magulang,
Susundin ko ang tuntunin ng paaralan,
Tutuparin ko ang mga tungkulin ng isang mamamayang makabayan,
Naglilingkod, nag-aaral at nagdarasal nang buong katapatan.
Iaalay ko ang aking buhay, pangarap, pagsisikap
Sa bansang Pilipinas.

English Translation of Pledge

I love the Philippines, the land of my birth,
The home of my people; it protects me and helps me
Become strong, hardworking and honorable.
Because I love the Philippines,
I will heed the counsel of my parents,
I will obey the rules of my school,
I will perform the duties of a patriotic citizen,
Serving, studying, and praying faithfully.
I shall offer my life, dreams, successes
To the Philippine nation.

Time for Education to Change

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I have been commenting on the public school system and how it is failing our students time and again. Ever since social promotion was introduced, students have slowly figured out that they don’t even need to work hard to pass. Couple that with a 50% passing mark and you have average graduates. Worse yet, students earn high marks despite their performance so that when they reach the tertiary level, if they do decide to undertake a college or university course, they do not have the skills they need to excel.

Let me pose a few assumptions:

Assumption One: The public school system does not seem to communicate with colleges and universities and vice versa about what students need to know or be capable of doing.

One would come to this conclusion because students who come from the public school system have weak grammar knowledge and poor writing skills. From experience, I have discovered that they are unfamiliar with research methods and research writing; they are unable to write a cohesive research paper; they use incomplete sentences and dangling modifiers; their vocabularies are limited; they cannot speak in public; they have difficulty understanding and solving basic mathematics problems, and so on. The list goes on and on.

Assumption Two: Pass marks of 50% mean that students have only learned half of what they should.

That, plus the fact that they only perform half of what is expected of them. This is alarming, because students no longer strive to be as good as they can be in school. They are content to pass with only half the marks, as long as they pass. Their ambitions are low and they do not try to aim for more.

Naturally, there are those who work as hard as they can and earn higher marks, some of them attaining the status of honour students. I often wonder about what qualifies students to be honour students in the public school system. Is it that they achieve a general average of 80 and above? How are their grades determined then, if they achieve 80% or more and still cannot demonstrate strong basic skills in reading, writing, and mathematics? I have worked with college students claiming to have been honour students in high school and being told their work was excellent, yet could not submit written work, let alone a research paper, with complete, grammatically correct sentences throughout, nor were they certain of the correct use of punctuation.

Assumption Three: Students who do not make the grade, so to speak, are promoted nevertheless.

I say this because I have not heard of any students who have failed and have been held back to repeat a year or attend remedial classes. All this achieves is send the message to students that they don’t even need to try, because they’ll pass anyway, whether or not they get the 50% mark. If that is the case, what is the point of even having a pass mark? Do students ever attend remedial classes in the public schools?

I’m aware that students who need help are sometimes sent to resource. However, I do question how much help students get, and if resource is uniform across the board. I have heard of resource where students do nothing at all, particularly in cases where students have learning disabilities and are assumed to be incapable of learning. Resource should be tailored to the students’ weaknesses, and even then, a small handful of resource teachers cannot fill in the knowledge that students should have gained over the years.

Assumption Four: The Public School System does not want change.

Why do I say this? The writing is clearly on the wall. Students graduate each year with worsening levels of achievement. Teachers are teaching to the test so that students can score well in the foundational outcomes tests. The teaching is inconsistent and the teachers are not all fully capable of teaching.

We no longer need the factory design that churns children out of school with the barest knowledge so they can find their place among assembly lines. The world has changed; the 21st century demands training in skills that are transferable. While there might be specialized skills, the basic skills still need to be taught well. Math, reading, and writing are no longer valued when they should be at the forefront of teaching. Communication is a huge factor in the working world–it has always been and always will be–and yet very little effort seems to be made to develop this skill among school-age children.

Assumption Five: Teachers are not well-trained.

When learning about education and how to teach was reduced from a four-year course to a two-year course after attaining a regular undergraduate degree, then to a one-year course, churning out new teachers on a conveyor belt, I knew the quality of education would drop even further.

When it was still a two-year course, I had the opportunity to teach a methods class for one semester, and I knew from the beginning it would be a disaster. In the first place, students were allowed to enrol in the methods class before they had taken the theory class, so instead of being able to apply theories they had learned first before working on methods, the students had to be taught theory. I had designed the class to be a workshop-type class because it was a methods class, but a good number of the students expected a full lecture class–all 45 hours of it at 3 hours a week–and for me to teach them everything I knew about teaching English. That expectation alone was ridiculous because what I knew about teaching English was something I had learned over 20 years of teaching. Also, it would be impossible for me to teach everything I knew, because a great deal of what students learn about teaching is learnt in the classroom, doing actual teaching.

The other thing that I found most ridiculous was that many students felt they were being embarrassed in front of their peers when they had to receive a 360-degree critique of a demo class. If they could not receive comments and suggestions from their peers and professor in a safe setting, how much more would they feel when faced with and average of 25 students in each class all ready to criticize them, and in most cases not constructively? Needless to say, I did not regret not being invited to teach the class again.

Assumption Six: Education does not always attract the brightest and best students.

The fact that many teachers are churned out with only one year of teacher training has a negative effect on their ability to teach. I have heard of teachers who don’t even understand what they are teaching, teach to the test, teach to the whiteboard, or even teach to themselves. Some teachers seem to be teaching subject matter they are unfamiliar with and end up leaving students without a clear understanding of the subject matter. Many times, teachers are made to teach subjects they are not experts in, regardless of the level they are assigned to.

In many countries, families have been known to encourage the least scholarly or academically-inclined of their children to take up teaching. The brightest and smartest are encouraged to take up medicine, law, or engineering–still top-rating courses no matter where in the world you go. In highly-religious cultures, the priesthood is the fourth vocation of choice. Parents ensured their futures by ensuring their children covered all necessary aspects of their lives: a doctor to take care of them in their old age; a lawyer to attend to their legal needs; an engineer to build and show off skills; a priest to take care of their spiritual needs. Once all these had been taken, the last choice would be to have a child unsuited to the top choices become a teacher. Admittedly, there are many more careers students can choose from today than there were half a century or more ago, but the elders of society might still assign greater value the same things they would have half a century or more ago. After all, having a son who is a lawyer or a doctor is still more prestigious than having one who is a computer programmer or an actuarian, assuming they understand what a computer programmer or actuarian does.

Assumption Seven: Expectations are unrealistic.

Sometimes, failure in the classroom is not completely the teacher’s fault. Sometimes, teachers are expected to teach a particular subject matter in a particular way that the teacher is not prepared to do or that does not suit the students’ learning styles. There is a problem with knowing that students all have different learning styles, just as teachers have different teaching styles. Are students expected to adapt lessons to each and every student? In an ideal world, yes, but the immensity of that proposition is beyond the reach or ability of any school.

Several theories of education besides the public-school-conveyor-belt system have been proposed, studied, and implemented in progressive schools, many with great success. Common among these theories are the Montessori approach and the Emilio Reggio approach. The theory of Multiple Intelligences has been accepted as a sound theory of learning, as is the theory of learning styles, and yet public school systems have not adapted their settings to reflect this learning. Models of the best school systems have been shown successful in Scandinavian countries, notably in Finland, yet North America has been slow to even explore these models.

Assumption Eight: The bottom line is still money.

I think that bottom line of the North American reluctance to change the way the public school system operates is money. North America’s governments do not want to foot the bill when it comes to overhauling the educational system. The cost of retrofitting classrooms and retraining educators will be no less than staggering, because not only will the public schools have to change, but the way teachers are trained must change. Teachers need to be retrained to change their perspective, their teaching-learning styles, their content learning. Too many teachers have been entrenched in their methods and adapting to new ways of teaching and learning is something they either do not want to do or cannot do.

Assumption Nine: Society’s perception of what education is must change.

Besides changing the system of education and teacher training, how society sees education as well as what society expects of education must also change. Society still sees schools the way they were taught and expects nothing to change. Probably the majority of students graduate (whether they deserve to or not) with the feeling that they are escaping a prison and choose not to look back until they have children of their own who need to attend school. Then they expect schools to teach their children everything the children need to know when they grow up, as if they themselves learned everything they needed to know from school. The attitude towards school and learning is also something society must instill in people. If the majority think going to school isn’t really worth it, is it any surprise their children do not see the value of education?

Assumption Ten: Schools just aren’t teaching the skills needed by society.

If we are teaching transferable skills that will allow students to become successful in multiple contexts, then content should not be the primary focus of education. If 90% of all graduates use only 10% of all the math they are taught, why do we continue insisting on teaching 90% of the content to the 90% and expect them to fail anyway? Why do we not teach the 90% math that they do need and will use 90% of the time? If 10% of all graduates become excellent writers or researchers and 90% of the jobs waiting for them require mastery of writing and research skills, why aren’t we teaching more writing and research? If 90% of all the jobs out there require public speaking and other communication skills, why aren’t we teaching more public speaking and communication? If everything is being done on computers or using digital media, then understanding computers and digital media should be more of a norm than a novelty.

We are approaching a time when we can no longer ignore the consequences of stubbornly clinging to an educational system that does not work. Our graduates cannot read or write or do math properly. The only thing they can do on computers is use social media. They spell as if they were texting all the time. They cannot shake hands properly or look people straight in the eye when speaking. They cannot even speak before a crowd properly. Most of them have no idea what debate or oratory or declamation is. They do not even have manners or social graces so that they know what to do with protocol. There is no denying that education is still entrenched in the 19th century while everything else is straining at its leashes, raring to leap into the 21st century.

I’ve gone on much longer on this than I thought I would, which just goes to show how much of an opinion I have on the state and quality of education today. I am certain of one thing, though: there MUST BE CHANGE.

 

Stories of My Life Workshop

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I have just concluded delivering another workshop for a group of seniors, this one called “Stories of my life”, administered by the Senior Citizens’ Federation of PEI and funded by New Horizons for Seniors.

I had wanted to join Kathleen Hamilton’s memoir-writing workshops so I could just be the writer instead of being the mentor or teacher all the time, but I guess that wasn’t meant to be. I tutor everyday after school until a fairly late hour, and the workshops were always in the early evenings, so there was no way I could attend those workshops.

As many other things that seem to happen purely by chance, I ran into the Executive Director of the Senior Citizens’ Federation, whom I had met several times in the past when I ran LEAP workshops in art for a few seniors’ residences in Charlottetown. She asked if I would be interested in teaching a memoir-writing class on “Stories of My Life”, and when I confirmed I would have the time to fit it into my pretty full schedule, I accepted, since it would not conflict with any of my other bookings.

I will not say what topics we wrote about, nor will I share any of the stories that were shared except maybe some of mine, but I will say what one participant said: “What a wonderful group of women with such diverse stories.”

Diverse, yes, but also uncannily similar in some cases. Because of the workshop, the group has agreed that we will continue writing and meeting and I will continue to guide their writing as we deepen our stories and deepen our connection.

Yes, I had hoped, when I moved here, to find a group of friends–and I certainly have made many friends and have several different groups I work with on different things at different levels of involvement or commitment–but I needed to find a group of friends with whom I could share a deeper connection that included my writing. I needed a writing group with people whose stories needed to be shared–and not the literary and creative writing I do, because I have friends and a group to do that with–but the very personal writing that bares our souls to each other in a safe yet creative environment.

It seems that I have finally found that group I needed, and maybe we have found each other, because it was chance that brought me to the group, and chance that brought each of the other participants to the workshop. While we have not met outside of the workshop yet, we have already planned our next meeting and everyone already has the next writing assignment. I feel that the connection we have made is one that will keep us together for a while, perhaps even longer than a while. After all, it takes a lifetime to make a memoir.

Why be an artist?

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A good friend of mine very recently shared a post from Facebook where someone shared how she responded to the question of why people should be artists–because everyone is familiar with the phrase “starving artist”–and not switch to a career in technology because that’s where the money is. Her response was to invite naysayers to isolate themselves for 30 days without music, books, films, television, art, or dance–and I would add they should be in a plain make-shift shack or a blank-walled cell so they do not see any architectural structures–and see what life would be like. I agree with her completely.

I believe true artists follow their passion knowing full well that they could remain penniless and unrecognized all their lives, and if they are among the few fortunate enough to be discovered, they might earn something out of it, and possibly be revered after they die. Since the Renaissance ended, history shows that artists are among the most mistreated people–Van Gogh hardly sold any paintings while he was alive; Edgar Allen Poe was penniless, Sammy Davis Jr. owed millions–and the pursuit of any field related to art is discouraged because everyone knows most artists can’t live off their art.

The arts that receive the most attention are performance arts, and yet, unless you are a top-rated film actor or a record-breaking recording artist or singer, or a consistent best-seller novelist, you’re probably scrounging around for a job most of the time. Even big-name stars might be in the limelight for a while, but when the public transfers their adulation to another star, previous stars have difficulty even getting a bit-role and some even end up isolating themselves and living in seclusion because they are unable to live with the loss or their adoring public and the loss of their source of income. Among writers, it is no better. As long as you write books that the public eats up, you’re fine; the moment they find someone else to follow, and you are unable to churn out work that sells like hotcakes, your books are relegated to the back shelf or worse, taken off the shelves. Architects are often not even considered artists, and yet the artistic creations of the greatest architects live on long after their names have been forgotten. How many people still know that the Guggenheim Museum, along with thousands of other magnificent structures, were designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. How many people can name the architects of the Notre Dame Cathedral? Big Ben? Westminster Abbey? the Eiffel Tower? I could go on and on, but unless you’re a fan or student of architecture (or a trivia buff) you probably can’t shoot off their names from the top of your head.

Non-performing artists, such as poets, essayists, short-story writers, theatre performers, dancers, crafters, and architects, to name a few, often have greater difficulty making ends meet. While a great number of artists dream that they will be recognized some day and start receiving what their creations are worth, there are still more who simply create art because it is the best thing they do and the only thing they want to do. Thank goodness for all the reality shows where unbelievable talents are discovered, but there are several arts that do not lend themselves to performance, hence more limited and exclusive audiences.

True artists create art not for the recognition they receive, whether pecuniary or acclamatory, but for the fulfillment and satisfaction they achieve from the mere act of creation, because everything they create is an extension of themselves. True art embodies the artists’ souls and the mere expression of artists’ deepest thoughts and emotions is reward enough. For their art to be appreciated and valued by others is an affirmation of their existence. To make money is merely icing on the cake.

 

On the Miss America issue and beauty pageants in general

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“If we don’t have swimsuit, we’re leaving out a vital part of Miss Texas and Miss America,” said Dana Rogers Martin, Miss Texas 1983. “It’s about fitness and nutrition. I’m hoping it will come back.”
My dear Ms. Martin, fitness and nutrition can be seen without having to wear a swimsuit! Just have a look at every athlete in the Olympics!
Really, beauty contests were created to objectify women’s bodies. It’s sad that so many women find fulfillment in joining and winning a beauty contest. All it is, is winning the approval of a board of judges who think your outer appearance is more important than who you really are inside. Western society has objectified women by extolling beauty, and Hollywood has played a huge part in solidifying the image of a beautiful woman, to the exclusion of any woman who was not white, not tall, not slim or shapely, not symmetrically balanced from head to toe, spreading that belief around the world. It was a huge step forward when women who were not white were selected as winners in international beauty pageants. And yet, most pageant organizers have acknowledged that, as an ambassador of goodwill, beauty contest winners need more than just physical beauty, hence the interview portions and talent portions. Lately, we’ve seen more women competing who’re smarter and more accomplished than in the past, which is a good sign. Removing the swimsuit competition acknowledges that women don’t need to expose themselves to show how beautiful, healthy, talented, and smart they are, and how they can be the best goodwill ambassadors to travel the world over. But really, I think that a truly progressive century will be one where there is no need for beauty pageants or swimsuit competitions.

Why PEI Needs Real Math Teachers in Elementary Schools

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It’s been a while since I last posted an article, a whole month and some days to be precise.  I must apologize. Besides preparing for the Seniors College class on stories by Alice Munro, which began three weeks ago and will be in its fourth week Tuesday, I spent every minute of my spare time researching and preparing materials for a Math Camps program for grades 1-12 for the LDAPEI, where I tutor everyday after school. Yup, my main occupation at the moment is tutoring, which is both a good thing and a sad thing. Good, because students who need help and are struggling with reading and math, regardless of whether they have a learning disability or not, get the help they need. Sadly, there are just not enough tutors to help everyone. But that’s not the sad thing. The sad thing is that there are so many students who need the help, and these aren’t just students with learning disabilities, particularly when it comes to math. In my years of subbing and tutoring, I’ve encountered students who insist on performing basic math operations the wrong way because their teacher taught them that was how to do it. Those students will have to unlearn those wrong procedures and relearn the right way; meanwhile, they will experience frustration because they will never get the answers right. I discovered elementary schools do not have math majors teaching math, hence the development of concepts and skills is not approached the way teachers trained specifically to teach math would teach. Where I grew up, we always had a dedicated period for math only and math teachers who were math majors or minors teaching math in grade school; in higher grades, our math teachers had majored in math and were trained to teach math. The basic concepts were ingrained in us so that by the time we were in seventh grade, we had mastered all basic operations and knew our multiplication, addition, division, and subtraction forwards and

Good, because students who need help and are struggling with reading and math, regardless of whether they have a learning disability or not, get the help they need. Sadly, there are just not enough tutors to help everyone. But that’s not the sad thing. The sad thing is that there are so many students who need help, and these aren’t just students with learning disabilities, particularly when it comes to math. (I’ve a different rant for students who don’t learn correct grammar and spelling!)

In my years of subbing and tutoring, I’ve encountered students who insist on performing basic math operations the wrong way because their teacher taught them that was how to do it. Those students will have to unlearn those wrong procedures and relearn the right way; meanwhile, they will experience frustration because they will never get the answers right. I discovered elementary schools do not have math majors teaching math, hence the development of concepts and skills is not approached the way teachers trained specifically to teach math would teach. This is definitely a call-out to PEI’s Department of Education and Early Childhood Development: Kids are bad at math because they’re not taught the right way, they don’t have the proper foundational training. Kids need real math teachers from the very start so they develop sound concepts correctly. Kids need real math teachers throughout elementary school because these are the foundational years. If they don’t learn it right at the start, they’ll have difficulty understanding concepts that build on the basics. It’s not like there aren’t any math majors available. If you can get specialized teachers for music and gym, why not math? Math is an essential skill to real life because math concepts are relevant to nearly everything they will encounter.

Where I grew up, we always had a dedicated period for math only and math teachers who were math majors or minors teaching math in grade school; in higher grades, our math teachers had majored in math and were trained to teach math. The basic concepts were ingrained in us so that by the time we were in seventh grade, we had mastered all basic operations and knew our multiplication, addition, division, and subtraction forwards and backwards. We were ready for algebra, geometry, and trigonometry–the basis of pre-calculus, which students in senior high need to understand to complete their GED requirements. If the foundation is weak, students will have greater difficulty coping as the concepts become more complex and the calculations become more complicated. By then, students will have a greater dislike for math than at the onset because of repeated failure and lack of understanding. That is where the idea of Math Camps came from–giving students the opportunity to encounter math in friendly, fun, and practical

If the foundation is weak, students will have greater difficulty coping as the concepts become more complex and the calculations become more complicated. By then, students will have a greater dislike for math than at the onset because of repeated failure and lack of understanding. That is where the idea of Math Camps came from–giving students the opportunity to encounter math in friendly, fun, and practical acpplications that reinforce the basics. And yes, that’s because I was a math major and a teacher trained to teach math before I decided to focus on writing and literature. Math rant over.

The Genuineness of Alice Munro’s Stories

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My fall literature class for Seniors College is three weeks in and we have five short weeks to go. So far, we have read and analyzed three of Alice Munro’s short stories. When we began, half the class knew of Alice Munro, the other half barely knew her, had only heard of hear, or did not know her at all. Of the half that knew her, they had read a bit of her but could not remember much of what they had read or had not read enough to form an opinion of her. Many times, we read literary works—in this case, short stories—and either like them or don’t like them. Unless we look more deeply into those works, we are unable to create an honest, informed opinion about them. At most, we might say we liked the works because they were interesting or entertaining, or we didn’t like the works because of the exact opposite—we thought them boring or uninteresting. The point with classics and works by acknowledged literary giants is that there is more to them than just mere entertainment or surface interest. That would apply to nearly every book in national and international bestseller lists. When does a literary work climb from being a bestseller to a classic, besides being a bestseller year after year, decade after decade, century after century? What is it that prize committees look for in works that earn their authors accolades and the status of laureate? Probably the most important quality a great literary work has is genuineness. Not impeccable grammar or perfect form. Not even masterful sentences or brilliant plots. This is where I bring around Alice Munro’s writing. The one thing that stands out in all her works is genuineness. Her stories are populated by genuine people, characters we can easily and quickly identify with, dealing with situations and problems we have all encountered or dealt with at one time or another. Her characters live real lives in a familiar world and, like many of us do, live mundane lives of quiet desperation or struggle through daily routines and encounters as heroically as they can. She makes readers see there can be pleasure and happiness in the littlest things, despite the hardships we face on a daily basis. She opens our eyes to the ideas, practices, and beliefs that define our behavior and affect our relationships. She reminds us that sometimes, we cannot change who we are, especially when we aren’t aware of why we think, act, or feel the way we do about what happens to us, what we do, or who we interact with. She points a spotlight on relationships in every imaginable form and makes us think about our relationships, how we live our lives, what we do, what motivates us—because it is exactly what motivates her characters and makes them think, feel, and do what they do.

Explain Less, Write More

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When you write, the temptation is to explain everything because you want to make sure your reader understands your story. You don’t want to leave any stone unturned, especially if it has any connection at all to the story you want to tell.

You try to explain your characters’ backgrounds because you know that provides your characters’ motivation, why they behave in certain ways or say things the way they do or even just say whatever it is you make them say. As you do that, you talk about their upbringing, their family and friends, their family history. You try to develop a whole character report, including what could pass for a decent psychological evaluation. You include birth dates, places, schools, past jobs—a complete dossier on each character.

You try to explain the setting because you believe the readers need to see your characters’ environment, the environment of the story, where it is happening and where it all began. You present no less than an historical treatment of the village, town, city, or country your characters move around in. You describe every room, house, street, and building in detail because you don’t want your reader to miss anything.

All that work and you still haven’t started telling your story! All that preparation and the first thing your editor does is chop it all out. All those painstaking details and it gets thrown away. Really, I have seen psychological evaluations that run as long as forty pages. And all for just a single person. And that doesn’t even include a comprehensive background or family history. You argue and agonize and complain and try to sneak the material back in, maybe even dump your editor and find a new one because you think your writing was brilliant and detailed.

It doesn’t matter how meticulous or brilliant any writing is that went into background because that is all it is—background. Any time you try to explain things to prepare the reader for what will happen merely takes away from how much time and space you have to show the reader what is happening—the true action of the story. How do you avoid this common pitfall?

When I teach fiction writing, I encourage students to imagine they are in their character’s shoes—whichever character’s point of view it is—and provide descriptions for anything as the character encounters it. For instance, don’t describe a house until your character sees it, from approach to entry. That way, your reader sees the house from the character’s perspective. Refrain from describing anything inside the house until the character has opened the door and looked in. Don’t describe the upstairs rooms if the character is moving around in the kitchen—unless your character is thinking of the upstairs rooms. If your character never sees the basement, there’s no need to describe it. Unless you have another character who’s thinking of the basement or is in the basement. It’s the same thing with characters encountering other characters. If the character knows nothing about another character and you’re setting them up to meet, don’t describe the second character until your first character sees him or her. That way, your reader also sees others through your character’s eyes. That way, you can introduce action and dialogue from the very start of your story instead of providing details that the reader is likely to forget as the story progresses.

It’s somewhat different with novels, of course, but it also depends on the type of novel you are writing. If you can carry on a brilliant dissertation on the creation and evolution of an island over a thousand years before it becomes populated with people the way Michener did, then, by all means, go right ahead. Otherwise, cut it short. After all, not everyone is a huge fan of Michener.