ANZAC Day indoctrination

This is the worksheet that all of Ben's school did on ANZAC Day. For context, this is for 5-8 year olds. Poor child got quite the lecture when he got home (not directed at him, directed at the makers of the sheet).

What are your favourite bits?

I am rather fond of how "proud" we are to take part in ANZAC Day. *shudder*

I also like the implication that Gallipoli had something to do with "defend"-ing... well anybody really. It's a pretty impressive argument that can conclude that we took part in the invasion of Turkey in order to defend Australia.

I'm also amused that for some reason "Australian and New Zealand Army Corps" was just too hard for these kids. Or something.

But really, how can you go past "a big fight between countries who disagree over some things"? That's.... jaw dropping. In the context of 5-8 year olds, I can see these kids thinking that war is somewhere between a screaming match over who had it first and an all-in brawl with a spot of punching and kicking. Of course, wars do often start out as a screaming match over who had it first, but they aren't discussing the causes.

I realise it's tricky, and I think there is a reasonable argument to ignore ANZAC Day altogether in infants school, but if you're going to go there, you can't do it disingenuously. Surely "a big fight between countries in which lots of people die" would be closer, without getting into particularly nasty detail?

I think I'd be much happier if they just left it alone until at least primary school. This pro-ANZAC Day propaganda campaign in schools is very disturbing. When I went to school, ANZAC Day was presented as a day to mark all that is stupid, awful and pointless about war, with a side helping of the value of friendship, ingenuity and disobeying orders. We were taught that Gallipoli was a monumental management cock up, that ANZAC soldiers were treated by the lofty British as disposable cannon fodder, and that above all, this kind of thing should never be allowed to happen again. We were taught that following stupid orders is not brave and loyal, it's stupid and fatal.

Not that I think what we were taught ticked all the boxes. There was still a glorification of the ANZAC soldiers - the whole "ANZAC soldiers were better/smarter/more effective", which smacks of nationalism, although it probably has a grain of truth. More importantly, we weren't taught the wider implications of the invasion of Turkey nor any of the horrors visited upon the "bad guys" by the "good guys". Nor did anyone ever mention the Armenian genocide that was taking place on the very same day. I notice that in all the "Aussies and Turks are mates now" stuff that goes on in Gallipoli itself, the Armenians don't get a mention either.

I think perhaps it is time for parents and P&Cs to take a long hard look at the materials being given to schools for ANZAC Day, and ask what we want our kids to be taught.

ETA: Credit where it's due - apparently Ben's teacher expressed concern with the use of the word "proud".

My School is fine thank you

...but what about the others?

I went to have a look at the schools in our area on the My School website that Julia Gillard has launched today. I figured I should at least have a squiz before I bitched loudly about it. (For non-Australian, or uninterested Australian readers, this is a Government sponsored website which reports basic stats and results on standardised tests for all schools in Australia - none of the other myriad things that go into making a school what it is are mentioned.)

The school my son goes to doesn't do NAPLAN tests, because it only goes to year 2, and they start in year 3. However, the school he will move on to next year is there. It's fine. It scored above the national average and about the same or better than its statistically similar cousins. Surprise, surprise. We live in a pretty good area, with an ever decreasing number of children who don't speak English at home (the last main migration wave in our area happened about 10-20 years ago, so we are very, very multicultural, but with an increasing majority of second generation or later migrants) and enough local schools for kids to be able to move about and find the environment that suits them.

But what about all the places where this is not the case? An enormous number of factors influence the marks that get spat out of a standardised test. The basic premise of this website which claims to provide "a new level of transparency and accountability to the Australian school system" is that the teachers and other staff of a school are accountable for the results the kids in that school get. And yes, to a point, they are. However, there are so many other factors.

Good schools attract good teachers, for one. Which is not to say there are no good teachers at schools which don't perform so well on standardised tests - there are some amazingly wonderful, dedicated teachers at troubled schools - but it's going to be a harder job, so many of our best teachers will opt for the easier schools to teach in.

Also, in areas where parents are poor, have little social support, a very low appreciation for education and therefore low attendance rates, no teacher, no matter how wonderful, will make those scores look wonderful. They may, however, inspire a love of learning in some kids who otherwise would never have found it. Surely that is as valuable, if not more so, than managing to teach my kid to read to the state sanctioned level.

There are also issues of culture, language background, focus on specific results rather than the whole educational experience. The list of reasons why this thing is stupid are long.

It's kinda hard to talk about this sort of stuff without sounding like you're blaming someone. As I'm writing this, I'm trying not blame the parents of kids who don't go to school, because that's not how I see it. It's more complicated than that. Which is why this one dimensional website is disgusting. It fails to recognise that kids are human beings who live surrounded by other human beings, and instead treats them as a product. I don't know where this thing will go, but I sent this email to Julia Gillard, just because I don't want to sit here silently and let it go on.

Dear Ms Gillard,

I'd just like to register my disgust at publishing the kind of information available on the My School website. The number of ways it can be misused and misinterpreted is endless. I have school-age children, and they are fortunate enough to live in a socially advantaged area and all their local schools look fine on this one dimensional measuring stick. However, many other children are not so lucky. I can't see how this can do anything but further disadvantage already struggling schools.

The underlying premise is that these results say something meaningful about the staff and the way the school is run, which is dubious at best. The Government should be committed to maintaining a high standard everywhere, not vilifying schools which are already strained to breaking point.

And this doesn't even begin to address such things as school leavers having prospective employers looking up their schools and writing them off as a result of what they find. If this information must be collected it should be used only to see where extra funding, both in schools and in the community in general, should be directed.

Anti-racism week - 2009

Last week was anti-racism week at Ben's school. I ranted about this last year, but a few new things have started to annoy me.

The example posters shown at school to provide inspiration have a common theme - we may be different on the outside, but we're all the same on the inside. This is pretty much the message in Mem Fox's Whoever You Are, from which I essentially stole last year's poster theme. However, Mem Fox's version is slightly less problematic, in that it specifies particular things that are the same - love, laughter, pain and so on.

But to just generally describe us as all the same on the inside - I have a problem with that. First of all, it still implies that we need to be the same to be equal - the different outside can be tolerated because the insides are the same. But also, it lays the foundation for the "I wouldn't do it, so anyone who does is inferior/evil/wrong" kind of argument that is so, so prevalent in justifications of racism, sexism, ... *ism.

This argument is often genuinely based in egalitarianism - when I've challenged people to defend why their own stance is the gold standard, they generally say it is because they aren't any better than anyone else, that all people are the same deep down - all the simplistic messages that are given to infants school kids about racism. Some people may be hiding behind these answers, but I'm convinced that quite a lot are not. The concept that people may be very different, and yet equal seems impossible to comprehend for many.

I'd rather see a celebration of difference week. In fact, I'd passionately rather see a celebration of difference week - there is so much more to be gained in so many aspects of children's lives from such a celebration.

School days

I am back in the land of considering child care options because our day care carer is pregnant with her second child and will be finishing up in March. The situation is massively complicated by the fact that Charlie will be four and a half at the beginning of the school year, and not ready to start school. However, he won't be far off, and by the beginning of the following school year I imagine he will be well past ready. So next year I have to make sure that whatever the care arrangements are, there is a lot of structure and a lot of learning.

My childcare whinging aside, I don't understand the system we have for starting kids at school. When my mother was a kid, you started school on your 5th birthday. I understand this is how it works in New Zealand as well. At the end of the year you start, you are assessed to see if you are ready to go on to year 1 or you need another year of kindy. It's a pretty even split and so there's no big deal about staying in kindy. That way readiness for year 1 can be based on the child's progress, not a calendar date.

I understand that turning 5 doesn't magically make you ready for school. There is a wide range of maturity across 5 years olds. However, in NSW, you can start anywhere between 4 and a half and 6 years old. So this means the wide range in maturity is magnified by anything up to a 20 month age spread. And it also means that parents with children whose birthdays fall in the first half of the year have to agonise about whether to send them this year or next year. They have to estimate their child's readiness for school, factor in the impact of an extra year's child care and consider the consequences of living with a child who is now ready for school but can't start for another 4-6 months. And there are no right answers, some kids thrive when they start school early - it gives them the structure and stimulation they need and it's great. Other kids do amazingly well with an extra year of a more informal environment - they build their confidence and learn the basics on their own timetable and hit the ground running when they go to school.
And then there's the kids who start early and really struggle, feeling overwhelmed and intimidated, and the ones who stay home, only to turn into bored, horrific monsters in desperate need of structure.

Starting either at a child's 5th birthday, or with a mid-year intake and a transition year allows much better tailoring for each child's development in an environment where it is normal for some kids to do a year and a half, or maybe even two years of kindergarten. I doubt that it would be a good idea for me to send Charlie to school next year, despite him being technically old enough to start. However, I don't know for sure. Structure has been good for him on the whole, perhaps more of it would be the making of him. But there is no culture whatsoever of repeating kids at the moment, so if he started and really wasn't ready for year 1 by the end of kindy, I couldn't keep him back and might struggle all the way through. On the other hand, another year of minimal structure might reinforce some of the bad habits and make school and even more difficult transition. The fact that Charlie has to start 6 months too early or 6 months too late is ridiculous, and he's hardly alone. Odds are about 50% kindy kids' parents have spent at least some time pondering the 12 month wait.

Back to school

As expected, I am ready for the school holidays to be over. It's a two step process, since Charlie goes back to pre-school tomorrow but Ben's teachers need a day to get their heads around the fact that they signed up to teach infants school, so he doesn't go back until Tuesday. It doesn't bother me much - it's Charlie I need to get back to pre-school.

I knew pre-school had been good for Charlie, but these holidays have really highlighted how much he needs that structured environment. By the first Tuesday of the holidays he was already starting to be unhappy, and take that out on the rest of us. We have had two weeks of shouting, stomping, throwing things and, consequently, time-outs. Tonight he was telling me he doesn't like the end of the day (a very standard complaint), and I told him that the end of the day made it much closer to time for pre-school. He was much, much calmer after that.

And so I start another round of "what am I going to do with him next year?". It would take a evolutionary change to make him ready to start school, but I really think he's going to need five days of structure. We can't get five days of pre-school (and we couldn't afford it anyway), family day care is not cutting it for Charlie, and so it looks like I am going to have to look at long day care.

Has anyone else had a similar experience with a kid who turned five in June/July and needed a more formal environment but wasn't ready for school at four and a half? Does a long day care/pre-school combo work well or cause confusion? I love the pre-school he goes to, and wouldn't like to have to abandon it completely, but it is 3 days max, and even then it isn't a good 3 days for us work-wise.

The end of the term

It's been a long term, everyone's nerves are frazzled, the kids are exhausted and so are their parents. I know that in two weeks I'll be hanging for them to go back to school. But right now, I am very glad that the term is over. Two weeks of no requirement for uniforms, home readers, homework or remembering library books. (To be honest, Ben has been almost exclusively responsible for his library books, I probably only provided reminders twice all term.)

Cheers to everyone that needs this holiday. Best wishes for the lurgi to be kept at bay and some fine weather for throwing the kids out into the park for a few hours.

The other Charlie

Charlie, it seems, lives a double life. This, from his pre-school teacher this afternoon:

"I was just telling Mrs B today how wonderful our lives would be if everyone was like Charlie."

Who is this Charlie of whom you speak, and what have you done with my child?

The thing is though, the afternoons he has been at pre-school, he really is delightful. He is currently playing with his sister on the lounge, and they are both having a ball. They have been at it for half an hour and there have been no tears, or yelling, or anything but giggle and laughter.

It just highlights how frustrating it is that schools here only have one intake per year. He just isn't going to be ready academically to go to school next year, but I really think he'll be ready for the structure and the independence and identity outside of this house. If he could start mid-year next year, it'd be perfect.

Plenty of school systems start kids when they turn 5, what's wrong with ours?*

*Yes, ok, I know that question requires at least an essay in response, but it was just a figure os speech. :)

OK, so I was wrong

I argued that K-2 kids didn't have much experience of racism. But it seems I may have been wrong. It was the last scripture lesson for the year, and to celebrate Christmas, their scripture teacher taught them all about the spiritual significance of candy canes. Yes, candy canes. To be fair, she did acknowledge that this wasn't from the Bible.

So, you ask, what IS the spiritual significance of a candy cane? Well, upside down (and the appropriate way around) it is a J for Jesus. The right way up it is the crook of the shepherds. So far so good. The red signifies the blood and pain of Christ (wrong holiday, but OK) and the white signifies our clean skin. Ummm....

After clarifying that this was really what was said, and then recovering from a mild case of apoplexy, I pointed out that this was really rather racist, and asked how he thought [first kid's name I could think of that isn't anglo at his school] would feel about white signifying clean skin. An hour later, he volunteered that it might make [another non-anglo kid] feel pretty bad too. At least he tells me the loony stuff he hears, so I can embark on re-indoctrination immediately.

I had pretty much already decided that Ben wasn't doing scripture next year, this has sealed the deal. And completely ameliorated any guilt I may have felt in not getting Ben to write a thank you note to the teacher.

I know how they all went extinct

There was no meteorite half the size of a continent, there was no ice age, it wasn't even smoking. The dinosaurs simply disappeared into thin air. This is clearly imprinted on their very image. Bobgreen is nowhere. I have hunted, on and off, for three days. I have looked through all the toy boxes, I have found two odd socks, a multitude of cars, a petrified apple core and several species of dust bunny, but no Bobgreen. It is sending me quite strange - when I found a toy car ditched off the edge of the rug under the entertainment unit, I actually thought "I don't suppose Bobgreen could be in there" before I regained some control of myself. I even looked in the toilet brush holder.

I have had Ben looking too - he sorted through a toy box, with instructions to put all the toys back into the places where they belonged. I have quizzed him repeatedly on Bobgreen's last movements, but I have to admit, my suspicions lie with Charlie. Or perhaps Crash.

And of course, K Mart sell the bleedin' things, but in a different colour. How many more years of school do we have?

Missing dinosaur

A photo may be all we have left of Bobgreen. He was on the dining room table when I left for the P&C meeting on Wednesday evening, but by breakfast time Thursday, he was gone. I have done some hunting, and so has Ben, but so far there is no sign. It is all very sad.

I guess the next step is to move all the lounges. *sigh* School is really making my life so much easier just at the moment...

Tired and sticky

Today started badly. We woke up at 7:25am, which is too late to get 3 kids to Homebush swimming pool by 8:30am. At 7:27am, there was a knock on the door. I had pants on, but was still putting a shirt on as I ran down the stairs to open the door to the P&C president who was coming to pick up our enormous esky (bought for Carols in the Domain) to hold sausages for the school's Gala day. Local government elections were held today, an obvious fundraising opportunity.

It was improved no end by getting two cars to the pool and discovering that between us we had only brought one of the two swimming bags. Crash had to go home to get it. On the plus side, all the swimmers were with us, only towels and clothing were missing, so everyone got to their lessons. Unfortunately, my schedule only allowed for 30 minutes at the pool, but Crash couldn't possibly get home and back in 30 minutes...

So I was late to get to the school for the gelato delivery. Thankfully the P&C president is a much better mother than me, and took over for me. I arrived as they were setting up. I then sold gelato from 10am to 4:30pm, with about an hour and half off in the middle chasing the two older boys around the school.

The ultimate irony is that I couldn't actually vote at the polling place I was at all day, and when they finally took the gelato away, I had to go to another school to vote. I'm sure you know how much effort I put into voting. I sincerely hope the Greens know what to do with my preferences, because I sure as hell didn't...

So now I am buggered, and sticky. Bloody hard way to make $300 if you ask me.

Education minister

A while ago a wrote to the (acting) Education minister to growl about the Shine program being used in public schools, as pointed out by Mim. I finally got this reply:

I write in response to your correspondence of 26th July 2008 to the Acting Minister for Education and Training, the Hon John Hatzistergos MLC, regarding the Shine program in NSW high schools. The Minister has asked me to respond on his behalf.

Recent media attention has focused on the Shine program and its use in NSW secondary schools. Shine is a program that claims a "preventative, solutions-based model, committed to seeing females connected to positive pathways in their lives and encountering their true value". Shine is one of many externally available programs that schools may choose to conduct ti complement the school's teaching and learning program.

The Department of Education and Training does not recommend or endorse these programs. Decisions about which resources to purchase are made by school principals who are best placed to determine what adds value to the curriculum, based on the needs and interests of the students and the ethos of the community. Consultation with the community should occur. Participation in the Shine program is to be voluntary and with parental consent.

As the Shine program is not designed as a program for special religious education (SRE), to be delivered by approved providers, it should not be offered to students during time set aside for SRE. Schools offering this program during time set aside for SRE are in conflict with the Religious Education policy, Section 3:11.

I hope that this clarifies the situation for you.

It is signed by Robert Randall, R/General Manager, Learning and Development.

Well, no, it doesn't clarify the situation for me. I pretty much knew all that. What I want to know is why something that does have religious intentions is not regarded as religious education, and why something which is just plain wrong is allowed to be chosen by any principal. Does the DoE have no opinion on what rubbish can be delivered in our schools?

Also, what does parental consent entail? Does it mean informed consent? Because I think it is pretty clear that unless parents know what's in it, it isn't informed consent.

It seems pretty clear to me that the damage that this kind of crap can do to teenage girls doesn't make it on to the radar for our state pollies. Then again, our state pollies are so unbelievably incompetent, this is probably no surprise.

Arrrgggg... I am paralysed by exasperation.

Labels

Last week I went to the hairdresser, and when I arrived, there was a woman I know from Ben's school. She looked up and said "There's another Yeo Park mum." For some reason I found that rather grating. I don't have a big problem with being known as Ben's mum, but somehow the leap to Yeo Park mum removes way too much of my identity. I am happy to be involved, but really don't want to be defined that way. It was such a strong reaction, my immediate thought was that I need do less with the P&C. Not exactly constructive, but my objection to institutions is pretty strong.

Not the most riveting evening

We organised for Nerida to look after the kids so we could both go to the information night at the school. For some reason I had the impression this would be interesting and useful.

It was a bizarre combination of being lectured about following school rules, and listening to a passionate defence of their decision to create to K/1 classes as a result of too many kindy kids for one class. It was not terribly informative, and having to breastfeed sitting in a kindy chair didn't really enhance the experience.

There was no discussion of parent helpers, that was just in a note we took home. I could have got that without using babysitter points.

Ben's teacher seems nice enough. I shan't be making any efforts to make sure both of us get to another one.

The defensiveness over the K/1 composites was unsettling. They defended it to the point of me starting to wonder if it was going to be a major problem. Up until this evening, I was only annoyed that they had managed to move all the kids Ben knew into the other class. Well, not quite all, he is sitting next to one kid whose name he had mentioned previously. I'm still pretty confident that it will be fine, but Crash is less convinced. I presume some parents got very stroppy.

Day 4

Daddy did last night's bed time, and although he didn't specifically note the time she was officially sleeping on her back, it was definitely before 9pm! It looks like we might be making real progress!

School is not an overwhelming success, but neither is it a disaster. I think that's a pretty good outcome for the first day. We have 13 years to develop the mandatory school dislike. :)

Update - Plan A

Last night Plan A resulted in bub sleeping by 9:25pm, which could be an improvement or random fluctuation. Also, she woke at 11:30pm and I spent 40 minutes putting her back to sleep before she woke again at 1:15am, at which point I fed her. I hope it isn't related. The previous nights had been quite sensible (one waking at 2am and 4am each night respectively).

We got Ben off to school, with only a little bit of pouting. Hopefully things will be a bit more cheerful this afternoon. The pictured smile was extracted by Dad attacking Charlie with the "the Craw".