In response to the events of our recent Easter Fair, and the Easter Ferret which somehow managed to bite one of my kids on the back of the leg and draw blood, the next morning between finishing my breakfast and getting in the car to drive to work, I wrote this quick little song for the kids. They thought it quite amusing. Yes, it’s four chords repeated over and over, but what do you expect for a ten minute song writing session when you’re technically already late for work?

The chords are C / Am / F / G, with the fourth line changing to F / G / C / C. Easy! The first part is slow, and the rest of the song follows the same tune and quicker speed of the second half. The little Ab / Bb / C ending you can also add in after each chorus if you wish.

The Ferret Song

Small, sharp teeth, beady eyes,
Whiskery nose twitching side to side.
Stalks its prey without a sound,
OUCH! I should have turned around, ’cause

Chorus
I got bitten on the leg by a ferret,
I got bitten yesterday at school!
I got bitten and it’s not really fair, it
Should have bit my friend as well!

The lady said, ‘What? It’s got a lead on!
If you don’t believe me then take a look!
It could’ve been worse, you could’ve been weed on!
Don’t be such a sook! But…

Chorus

Next time I see a ferret, gonna chop it half and
Kick it across the netball courts!
Or if my best friend won’t stop laughing
I might stuff it down his shorts! ‘Cause…

Chorus

It should have bit my friend as well!

Anyway, the kids thought it was amusing. The young feller who was actually bitten by the ferret the day before was so chuffed he actually substituted his own name into the lyrics instead. That’s all for now… more original songs next time something out of the ordinary happens at school, eh?

Cheers.

Related topics: The Easter Ferret, the School Spirit webcomic Easter Ferret story.

Technorati Tags: ferrets, Easter, songs, music.

Right from the very first, I should probably lay my cards out on the table. I’m not a dedicated convert to the global warming or climate change phenomenon. I’d like to think of myself as a healthy, albeit slightly suspicious, cynic in regards to many of the arguments (if they can be called that) predicting the end of the world due to this nasty carbon stuff. It’s only fair that I say this up front before moving on to the main topic of this post, which is the now global event called Earth Hour.

If you haven’t been aware, Earth Hour was an idea originating in Sydney last year (2007) where everyone was encouraged to turn off their lights for an hour for the benefit of the planet. About 2 million people (or is it households? That would have been more impressive) and 2000 businesses signed up to take part. The goal was to reduce greenhouse emissions in Sydney by 5%. About 10% was the figure achieved according to some reports, so straight up congratulations to Sydney on their one off reduction. This year, it’s a global event and cities all around the world are taking part.

Look, I think it’s a nice idea, I really do, but I have a suspicious feeling that it’s mostly going to be a single, feel-good hour which will give the planet a quick breather (if I may personify the planet… why not? Many people writing articles like this see it as suitable!) before most of the lights will come back on and the planet will once again glow like a Christmas bauble throwing thousands of black balloons into the air like we see on those greenhouse reduction ads on Australian television.

In regards to those ads, why don’t we ever see one showing those black CO2 balloons coming from the backside of a cow?

Some people (and blogs) are spouting the idea that it’s a great initiative to support the Earth and harness the interest of school kids in the wellbeing of the planet, and even better, ‘promises an opportunity where they can behave to demonstrate their understanding of being a global citizen‘. I actually agree with this idea, although I don’t know whether Earth Hour will be the true success it aims to be and therefore I’m not sure I would have (had it been during the term and not the school holidays) sold it to my own kids as a way to help save the planet. I don’t think it’s quite as simple as that, and I’d be selling the kids short if I tried to tell them so. I’m not much for flowery imagery in my statements, but it seems others are - ‘YOUR participation will go a long way in spreading the message thatwe, as individual droplets working collectively - can create an impetus far more powerful than the mightiest of rivers‘. Nice metaphor, and all meant with the best intentions, but does it really mean anything? Rivers are good for hydro power generation, which is apparently better for the environment… but that involves dams, eh? We’re not allowed to build more dams in Victoria… it harms the planet.

On another blog, I found this quote, which shows support once more for the initiative (and keep in mind I support the idea in general, I just don’t believe it is going to have the impact it promises). ‘This is a wonderful, simple idea to share with your students. It can make them feel part of a global movement, but more importantly it demonstrates that individuals CAN come up with simple, sharable ideas that make a difference‘. I actually agree with much of this statement. It truly is a wonderful and more importantly simple idea, and I recognise the benefits of the kids feeling like their involved in something bigger than themselves, their town or even their country. I’m also right up there with anything that will help kids think they’re important enough to make a difference. Again, I’m just not convinced the difference this will make will be of any significant benefit once those lights go back on sixty minutes after they get switched off.

My concern here is that I doubt it will actually achieve anything in the long run, which is what it is intended for. Once that hour is over, just about every business who has signed up will put those lights on in their office towers while no one is working there, have their neon lights back on to advertise their companies to passing pedestrians or motorists. The lights will come back on and the telly will flick back to whatever was being viewed before… and it will happen every night afterwards.

Until next year’s Earth Hour comes around again when we can all feel good about ourselves for going without lights for another hour to save the planet.

There’s my little cynical bit over with. I’ll go about my normal nightly business with a light on in the room I’m working in (usually a little lamp) and maybe the radio in the background or the telly if I’m in the lounge. In the classroom we generally only work with lights on if it gets too dim to see with cloud cover outside over the sun (or once we’ve done so much work we’ve covered the windows with displays!). To me, getting people to work with electricity in this way would be more beneficial. Hopefully that’s the message a lot of the people who take part this year get from it all. If it truly causes thousands of people to think to use only the lights they need when they need them, then I think Earth Hour will have done its job.

I’m not too convinced with some of the comments on the official Earth Hour site either, particularly the Frequently Asked Questions page. What candles should we use for light during this hour, it is asked at one point, to which the response is candles made of beeswax. Why? Because they are carbon neutral because ‘the CO2 they emit has already been taken from the atmosphere to produce the wax‘! Okay, by that logic, coal fired power stations are probably just as carbon neutral because the carbon produced by the burning was already taken from the atmosphere when they were alive as trees back in the Carboniferous Period! Millions of years ago those ancient forests grew, sucking up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere which is now stored in those coal deposits. So burning it is only releasing the carbon back into the atmosphere from where it came. I think that’s a little bit of flawed logic there, but again, it’s a nice thought, eh?

I’ll finish with this quote from the Age newspaper which, despite not particularly liking that paper, makes what I think is the most important point to be taken from this whole initiative. ‘It’s not simply about turning off your lights on March 29, even though it is estimated that this alone reduced carbon emissions equal to 48,000 cars being off the road for one hour last year. It’s about awareness, understanding and commitment: awareness of the impact of climate change, understanding that small, practical gestures by individuals can collectively make a profound difference and commitment to making an ongoing effort to reduce energy consumption for long-term benefit‘.

Anyway… enough rambling. On the whole, I think this Earth Hour initiative is very well-intentioned and will be a great article for the media across the world to cover, and very well might make the world’s politicians sit up and take notice (or at least wave at the crowd when they turn up to show their support before going back to their other policies the next morning). Any small approach to reducing these pollutants will help, but I’m just not convinced this is the world changing event it’s being built up to be.

Mind you… I’m more than happy to be proven wrong!

Technorati Tags: Earth Hour, climate change, global warming.

Easter Sunday brings the beginning of a new storyline to School Spirit, the webcomic version of this site. Originally I intended this strip to be a stand alone Special (larger edition) as I usually do for events like Easter, Christmas, ANZAC Day, etc, but it was such a small, regular sized strip that I decided it could just be, well, a small, regular sized strip.

Either way, here’s the beginning of the latest storyline, The Easter Ferret. For those who’ve read this blog a few times in the last week or so, yes, this will feature a few of the events of our own Easter Fair during the last week of term - especially the events recounted in my previous post of the same name - The Easter Ferret.

Clicking the strip will take you to that particular strip on the site. Incidentally… I packed away my Christmas stuff earlier than this. I took it all down on Easter Saturday.

Technorati Tags: Easter, webcomic, ferrets.

The Easter holidays have just started now, so this is likely to be my last regular post for much of those two weeks. There’ll be a few updates about School Spirit, the webcomic, but I doubt there’ll be too many more about teaching the kids. A good reason for this is that I’m not going to see them for two weeks, eh? So, hopefully, if you’re reading, this one will tide you over. I hope it comes out sounding sensible, but it’s something that I’m not quite able to explain to myself. I still thought it suitable to go up here though. Every now and then I suppose you have to ramble to get the important things out… even if you can’t quite put your finger on it, eh?

Anyway, here goes. I experienced a change in my role as a teacher the other day, and it really had little to do with the professional side of the deal. As I’ll say further down, I’m sure there were other things that have contributed to this awareness, but in this case it’s the relationship side of things that mean more. Enough rambling though, eh?

Feel free to comment at the end if you’ve something worthwhile to contribute, eh? See you at the end.

This is my eighth year teaching now… although granted it’s only the first term completed. That still means I’ve been at this caper for 29 terms. That’s a bigger number, eh? The Easter holidays have just begun and, although it’s been a short term with only seven and a half weeks due to the early Easter period this year (apparently it’s the earliest Easter has been since 1913!), once I arrived home on Thursday afternoon (an hour earlier than usual, I might add!) my body basically just decided it was time to shut down. I don’t think you ever quite manage to maintain your energy levels through the term quite adequately. Even through a shorter term you still seem to be running on fumes and adrenaline by the end.

I’ve brought this up though because, although I’ve completed seven full years working day in, day out with the kids, most of the time you think you’ve pretty well got most of the job covered. There’s not really all that much you need to learn to carry on with your job after seven odd years of experience, eh? Well… I don’t think that’s quite correct.

If you’ve ever played a role-playing styled computer game, then maybe you’ll sort of understand what I’m about to get at here. At the risk of betraying some sort of computer-geekish background (which is probably not quite accurate, but there you go, I generally enjoy the stories behind these sorts of games and I’ve had an interest in midieval history since, well, forever!), I’ll just leave that sentence up there! I’ll see if I can suitable explain what I mean.

When most of us talk about going up a level in regards to teaching, at least down here, it’s usually to do with the pay structure. You start out as a graduate and that’s the pay scale you’re on. Each year, provided you’ve met certain standards and so forth, you move up a level until you reach the top tier. I honestly have no idea what the top tier is now, nor which particular level I’m on right now either, as the structure has changed a few times since I started and I’ve just lost interest in exactly where I am on the scale. I know my pay has improved considerably since that first pay packet, but that’s as far as I’ve looked. But that’s not the sort of ‘Teaching Level’ I’m thinking about.
When I left work on that final afternoon a few days ago, yes, I was exhausted (as was everybody else working there, I should add!), but I stood by a gate watching one of the kids (not technically mine, but I taught the little bloke a few years ago) wander home after a quick chat and felt… satisfied. Like I’d reached some new step. The job seemed a little easier… a little more fulfilling. I actually felt more experienced now. Can I put my finger on why? Not specifically.

While I’m sure there are lots of things contributing to this new sense of accomplishment, I would suggest it was this last quick conversation with this boy that earned me that last few bits of experience to ‘gain’ this new level, if I can stick with the role-playing analogy. I’m usually a little uneasy mentioning particular instances such as this, but I think in this case it’s worth while. This little feller’s been having a bit of a hard time around the traps lately and trying hard to pull it all together, but I’ve seen the boy he is inside and know he’s going to do okay. I reckon he just needs somebody in his corner unconditionally, and I’m pretty sure he realises he’s got someone there. I won’t elaborate any further. Some things should remain close, eh? I’ll just say I think it was just this one conversation as he left for home that did it. A real smile and a thumbs up as he said ’see ya later, Mr V’ and he was off with a spring in his step.

I guess this sense of ‘level advancement’ is probably more to do with realising I was right about this kid and watching his back while he found his way through a few rough spots. If that’s the case, I’ll have to say that the feeling that came from that short five minute chat alone by the school gate means more than any of the pay scale level advancements I’ve been through.

And he says he’s gonna build me another wooden box to store more DVDs in, too. He’s a top little feller, this boy.

Mind you, it’ll cost me a twenty!

Cheers.

The latest storyline in the School Spirit webcomic, Fire!, has just concluded in time for the Easter break, so now we feature a Good Friday special strip. Just a one off joke but probably one that most people returning to the shops for a Boxing Day special are aware of - the ever earlier appearance of Easter goods on the shelves.

The cartoon to the side is clickable, as always, and will take you to the School Spirit website. Specifically, it will take you to the page of this particular strip.

Meanwhile, the Royal Children’s Hospital Good Friday Appeal will run again today so no doubt I’ll have the telly running in the background so I can pop my head in and out and keep up with how much money Victoria has raised this year. I think they’ll looking at about $14 million or some amazing total this year. We keep seeming to beat the previous record each and every time lately.

Anyway… enough for now. Hope you enjoy the Good Friday humour, and all the best.

I don’t actually think I even have any hot cross buns in the house today…

Technorati Tags: Good Friday, Easter, hot cross buns.

Yup. I don’t really understand how it came about, but we just lost our last indoor cricket match of the season which dropped us from third to fourth place. Usually that would mean we were playing off against the top team next week for the right to play in the grand final. Seems that when you’re playing in a mixed A and B grade competition, they do things a little differently.

They’ve split the ladder into two groups of finals. The first three play for the A Grade title, the next three play for the B Grade title. The first of each set of three automatically go through to the final match. So… yeah. Losing this last match means we’re now straight into the B Grade Grand Final next Friday, and the team who beat us take our spot on the ladder and have to play to get into the A Grade team.

So… basically… we’ve just earned a Grand Final place by losing our match. Fortunately we tried our bums off to win because it looked like we might have dropped out completely, but it’s quite an amusing turn of events. We lose our last match of the season, yet we’re still going to leave next week with a trophy!

How cool is that??

We held our annual Easter Fair this afternoon and one of the activities our grade organised and ran was what has become my staple Easter Fair event, Whack-a-ferret. In this case the burrow is a dirty great piece of white polypipe with a bend at the bottom, the kid waiting at the end is holding aloft a little wooden mallet to belt the snot out of the ferret as it comes out of the pipe, and the ferret itself is a soft yellow ball with eyes, whiskers and a tail drawn on in permanent texta. If they manage to whack the ferret on the way past they win a little solid Easter egg. If they don’t, then they’ve donated 20c (or three turns for 50c!) and generally come back to try again later and give us more money.

Nothing all that dastardly, eh? Nothing really dangerous except maybe a squashed finger if anybody nearby isn’t paying attention. It’s not like it’s a real ferret, eh?

Which is what turned up today.

Yup. While dropping our ferret down the polypipe and watching kids belt the life out of the asphalt as it rolled past, a mother held a real ferret down where I could see (on a leash with a little seat-belt harness, naturally…) and with a grin suggested they were here to protest the unfair treatment of ferrets. I thought nothing much more of it and gave a friendly chuckle while wondering why you would bother bringing what is basically a hairy snake with legs to a primary school anyway.

At least, until the cunning little blighter bit one of my kids…

Yup. It’s not everyday you write up a sick-bay incident report when the incident involves a kid getting bitten by a ferret. What more could I do than get him to clean the blood away and whack a bandaid on?

Fortunately, Mum was quite okay with the whole deal when I approached her with the story at the end of the day. Turns out they actually see this woman every now and then walking her ferrets down the street! It was only last night when they joked that he’d be coming to school to help run Whack-a-ferret and wouldn’t it be funny if a real one bit him. He’ll get a proper clean with some Dettol or something tonight and she’ll let me know if it causes any more trouble, so I’m appreciative of her good humour and understanding.

But honestly… bringing a ferret to an Easter Fair…

At least I can add that to my list of ’strangest things I’ve had to tell parents’, eh?

Related Posts: The Ferret Song

Technorati Tags: ferrets, Easter, parents, teaching

Last week saw me scoring a kids’ basketball match (okay, just pressing the buttons and controlling the scoreboard… not the actual sheet with the important stuff that gets signed by the umpires and stuff later… but the kids only care about the scoreboard, eh?) and then stopping off at the local bottle-o on the way home because the madness of the experience left me ‘needing’ a drink.

Note the quotation marks around the word ‘needing’… I probably could have done with just a good few deep breaths, but good deep breaths, although they’re good and deep, just don’t taste as good or deep as scotch, eh?

Well… one week on and I’m back there again, sitting down a little before the game while the kids start turning up… and this time it’s the umpire who approaches me and suggests I help score again. Fortunately there was a young girl from the other team who was willing to do the paperwork side of things, so I agreed. Her mum was sitting right next door, so that was good too as I taught the girl six years ago and I assured them I’d barrack for my team and their son. He’s another I’ve taught as well so I was more than happy to do that.

Anyway… seems it’s like scoring is like falling off a bike. You never forget how. Or is that riding a bike… anyway, you always remember both, eh? The scoring worked again, and I must have felt confident this time around as I spent as much time watching the game and pressing the (mostly) correct buttons as I did arguing in a friendly manner with the girl and her mother about everything we could think of. Much less stressful this time!

End result - the kids had a good match and ended up winning about 51 to 39. High scoring, so I guess my fingers were moving quicker than last week, but once more the scores matched up to the score sheet. Well… pretty much. When we found a 2 point discrepancy between us, she just added it onto her sheet instead of worrying about removing it because she figured the other team were far enough behind it didn’t really matter!

More importantly, especially in regards to possible future visits to certain anonymous meetings, I didn’t feel like I needed a stiff drink once I’d finished. That has to be a positive, eh? I think it means I’m a competent scorer now and could do it at the drop of the hat! That’s something worth celebrating, eh?

With a stiff scotch!

Related post: Scoring for basketball… leads me to drink!

Technorati tags: basketball, kids sport.

Sunday morning, the sun’s already belting down before nine in the morning, and anyone with half a brain is planning on spending the last day of their weekend holed up indoors either camped in front of their air conditioners or spending time with a bag of granny smiths inside the crisper compartment of their fridge. Not me. No, this particular Sunday, with the mercury tipped to rise up like a furious Messiah beyond 38 Celsius, I’m driving into town to the club’s presentation day. Why? Because when they said to me in November, ‘hey, you’re here killing time after work anyway, and you work with little buggers this age, you can coach the Under 12s!’

And me? I said, ‘yeah, okay’.

Jokes aside though, this day is probably the most important of the year for those kids, even though I doubt they realise it. They turn up to train once a week before the older teams and are usually all finished and back home again before the senior players rock up later in the afternoon after work. They turn up each Wednesday afternoon after school and run around like mad cats across the various local ovals across town chasing red leather balls or, if someone’s actually managed to take a catch, after each other. We don’t technically keep track of who wins or loses these matches, and if they ask ‘did we win’ and we reply ‘well, you played really well’, they tend to grab each other in communal group hugs or ’stacks on the mill’ cheering ‘we won, we won!’ Life can be so simple when you’re young, eh?

Despite all that, and the fun and enjoyment they get from just getting out there and having a red hot go, I still think that the presentation day at the end of the season is one of the most important for them. It’s the one day when the rest of the club actually realises they’re there. The Under 14 and 16 teams play each week and with luck reach finals and, appropriately, are talked up to the rest of the senior members of the club. When they play finals, there’s always several members of the senior teams turning up to support them throughout the day. Not so the Under 12s.

Presentation Day is the one day of the year when the rest of the club recognises that they are a part of the club, and importantly, they’re the future of the club. This is what I tried to bring across making my impromptu speech handing out their little trophies. Not only were they being presented to the club on Sunday, but I made sure I mentioned something particular about each young kid too. They’re not just little tackers running around in games that don’t really count through the week, these are kids that love the game, love playing together and are the future of the club.

I was rapt at the end when they presented me with a parting gift for the season. A cricket helmet… the last piece of gear I needed and was too stingy to buy! Now, after three seasons, I finally have a full collection of gear. I should have held out and tried to get them to give me a cricket bat next year, eh? But I guess the one item I’ll treasure most is the photo of the team. It’ll end up on a wall somewhere around here an, one day, when some of these kids reach the A grade team, I can look back and think ‘I can barely play this game, but bugger me, this kid playing A grade… I was his first coach!’

Anyway… although their presentation only lasted about twenty minutes, the rest of the club was now aware of who these little fellers were, and they now knew something more about them.

Once that was over, lunch arrived, the rest of the presentations were made, the kids all went home, and we watched the Under 16s play the Legends (over 40s) in the now annual challenge match. The young fellers did well, but the Legends retained their undefeated status and much amber fluid was consumed.

Once the game concluded and most went home, with the day still hot and dry, somehow the buckets came out and anyone who wasn’t quick enough or wasn’t paying attention got drenched in water. I didn’t end up dry until I got home at 11pm! Couldn’t really complain though, eh? I figured if a kid could now come up to me, give me that little cheeky glint in his eye and then throw a full bucket of water at me and not grizzle when I caught the bucket and tipped the last half on him, then I guess that’s respect of a sort, eh?

It’s the respect I’d prefer, anyway!

Guess I’m coaching next year now too…

Related posts: Coaching Under 12s… the final cricket match of the season.

Technorati Tags: cricket, kids sport, coaching.

Ever had that experience where you’ve been doing something - it doesn’t really matter what - while the radio is playing quietly in the background, and then suddenly your ears prick up at a quick newsflash and your stomach sinks to your toes because your ears have subconsciously picked up on a single sentence the announcer has just said?

Yesterday afternoon I was driving home from work particularly tired and run down after the week’s adventures. It was only a four day week, but with school photos, various meetings, and several stinking hot days with the kids I felt like I’d been given a good flogging all week. So you could imagine that my mind was elsewhere (although hopefully focused on the road!) when the radio program was interrupted with a local breaking news story.

Turns out there has been a single car accident in the north east of the state along the Hume highway. Sadly, it’s a triple fatality with a fourth in critical condition in hospital, and no other details at this stage. Normally I wouldn’t batter an eyelid except to think ‘those poor buggers’ and so on. But today…

Today was the day one of the kids and her family (of five) were driving along the Hume highway to start their Easter holiday early. You can imagine the thoughts running through my head in the moments following the sudden news.

Now, statistically there would have been thousands of people driving that road yesterday, but how many of them would have had that many people or more in one vehicle? I spent the rest of the trip home running over the figures to convince myself (fairly well, I should say) that with four in the car it’s another poor group of people and not the ones I saw off with grinning faces the afternoon before.

It was a bittersweet moment last night as I was driving back into town for a game of indoor cricket when I heard an update on the radio and learned it was some other poor family that has to face the tragic news. The description of the people involved didn’t match the family I was concerned for, and they’ll be happily waking up this morning on the first official morning of their New South Wales holiday.

You feel a little awkward being thankful for that, knowing full well it’s going to be one of the worst mornings ever for someone else.