Proverbs 11:16b

Be timid in business and come to beggary; be bold and make a fortune.

Strong

https://www.instagram.com/reel/C33Dh1Nu6ZB/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==

I have lowered my expectations

 https://www.instagram.com/p/C187W2zNbRf/

MGG - 3.2 - Masters, Business Analysis BA - church analysis

After I got my degree, my father was very interested in doing a business analysis, with me, of our church.

I should mention our church.  I should mention Vancouver.  It is a standing joke that nobody who actually lives in Vancouver was actually born there.  I went to a job interview one time and, as a little bit of small talk to break the ice and make you feel more comfortable, they asked me where I was from.  I said Vancouver.  They said, "No no, where were you *born*." Well, I was actually born in Vancouver.  Not only that, but both my parents were also born in Vancouver.  Not only that, but 75% of my grandparents were born in Vancouver.

Partly as a result of this, I am the fifth generation, of my family, to become a member of the church.  This is not only unusual in our church, but in any church in Vancouver.  The pin that I have attesting to this fact was given to me when I was 5 years old, before I was baptized, and therefore before I was a member of the church.  But I did get baptized, around about my 12th birthday, and, thus, did become a member.

So, yes, both my father and myself were members of the church.  And Dad, who was making a bit of a name for himself pioneering the use of computers in educational administration in Vancouver, Wanted us to do a business analysis of the church, with a view to getting the church involved in computers in ministry.

I foresaw a number of problems with this project.  I was very hesitant to be involved. But Dad was very keen on the whole idea.  So, I joined in, and, if I do say so myself, we did a bang-up job.  Dad had the position, and credentials, in the church to get people to talk to us.  We conducted more than twenty interviews, with people in a wide variety of ministry areas within the church.  Dad took the lead in the interviews, as the person with the role within the church.  But I threw in the questions to find out what could, actually, be done in information processing in the various areas of ministry.  I actually also wrote the report.  And, as I say, if I do say so myself, we did, and I did, a very good job.

The final report recommended some twenty areas of ministry that could be assisted, and therefore some twenty computers that would be needed, as well as a network, to tie them together, and facilitate the exchange of information between the different areas of ministry.  We presented the report, and, predictably, the church created a computer committee to consider it.

If I had been loath to do the systems analysis, I was doubly hesitant about being on the computer committee.  I saw it as a conflict of interest, a rather gross conflict of interest.  Since it was considering our report ( which was, you will recall, primarily my report.)  But dad, again, jumped in with both feet.  Nothing much happened.  So, once again, Dad wanted me to participate in the computer committee, and, once again, I acquiesced.

I went to one committee meeting.  The committee started to address the need for a church membership database.  The committee got bogged down in consideration of whether the church membership database would have a birthdate field.  Some saw this as very useful.  Others saw this as a gross invasion of privacy.  I pointed out that this did not need to hold up consideration of the database as a whole, as a birthdate field could be created, but then not populated until this decision had been finalized.  No, they had to decide about the birthdate field, before they could go on with any other aspects of the church membership database.

I quit the committee.

The committee continued to meet.  Sporadically.  This went on for some considerable time.  At some point, the committee did tender an RFP, a request for proposal, and sent it to a variety of computer and networking vendors in the Vancouver area.  It was based upon the recommendations from my report.  Roughly twenty computers, and because of the price difference between MS-DOS computers, and Apple computers, at the time, it was based on MS-DOS computers.

Eventually, Dad informed me that the church computer committee had come to a decision.  He told me the company that the tender had been given to.  I was confused.  The tender had been granted to a company which was owned by one of the members of the church, and a company which, I knew, sold Apple computers exclusively.  I questioned how the church was able to afford twenty Apple computers for the tender.  Oh no, Dad informed me.  The church member had been allowed to look at the other tenders, and, even though he had reduced his company's tender, to the point where it was the lowest bid, they were providing Apple computers, and they were only providing five.

I objected.  On two grounds.  First, it was a gross conflict of interest, to allow the church member to see the other vendors tenders, and then to retender for his own company.  Dad didn't see it that way.  Dad didn't see that this was a conflict of interest.  Dad didn't see that this was a gross breach of business ethics.  Dad just saw that a church member was getting the business, and the church was getting a better price.

But I also objected on the basis of the reduction in the functionality of the tender.  The five computers that were now to be purchased, would be used solely, for church administration.  No other areas of ministry were to be addressed.  No other areas of ministry were to benefit from the use of a computer.

Dad didn't see this as a problem.

Previous: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-31-masters-business-analysis-ba.html

Introduction and ToC: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/10/mgg-introduction.html

Next: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/03/mgg-33-masters-business-analysis-ba.html

Job 23:2

My complaint today

is still bitter, and I try 

not to groan aloud.

MGG - 3.1 - Masters, Business Analysis BA - Masters

After I got fired, I went and took a masters degree.

Oh, haven't I done that yet?  Oh well.

I had, even before I got my first teaching job, been interested in computers in education.  Not just teaching about computers, but using computers to teach, or to assist the education process, or processes.  I had gone to the World Conference on Computers in Education.  I had been exposed to some interesting aspects of the use of computers in education.  As one example, the use of a computer; an Apple ][ computer, no less; to grade, and mark, and even to tutor, students in composition for a master's program in music.  This was being done in 1981.  It's rather depressing to note the sorry state of the use of computers in education now, more than forty years later, when such things were already being done, with very minimally capable machines in comparison to what we have now, back then.

I had subscribed to a magazine called The Computing Teacher.  It was produced by a fellow who ran a masters program, in computer education, at the University of Oregon.  I well remember one of the editorials that he wrote, in one of the issues, which said that, regardless of your skill or background in computer technology, you had the jump on 95% of your colleagues, simply because you subscribed to this magazine, and were more aware of what was going on in the field.  (Remember: at this time a computer in the home would have been a complete novelty.  Most people would never have touched a computer.)

So, when I got fired, I drove down to Oregon and talked to him.  I explained that I had enough money to take the program for a contiguous year.  Could I finish the program, I asked, in one year?  Yes, he said, that was doable.

So, I packed up my stuff, got an education visa, and drove down to the University of Oregon.  After a couple of false starts I found a place to stay.  I got registered for the first semester, which was the summer semester.  There weren't enough courses in the program for me to fill enough credit hours to keep going and finish in one year, so I was taking some traditional information systems courses.  For example, I registered for a course on database concepts and management.  I learned an awful lot from that course.  One of the things that I learned, by taking the course (it wasn't actually taught in the course), was that every program, regardless of what it is, is either involved with database management, or with numeric processing.  Or with both.  I still suggest to anyone, taking any program in any field of information technology, to take a course in database management.  It is one of the fundamentals, the absolute fundamentals, of information systems and processing.

When I came to the end of the semester, I suddenly realized that I had been lied to.  No further courses we're going to be given in the computers in education program until the following summer.  So I went to the manager of the program, laid out this problem, and asked what I was to do.  He said that I could take whatever courses related to information technology I could get into.

I had, of course, no prerequisites for any of the standard information systems courses or computer technology.  So I found any courses that were even dimly related to the field, went to the professors, and begged to get into the courses.  None of the professors for the standard computer technology courses what allow me into their courses without the prerequisites.  The only ones who would let me into their courses, were those who are teaching non-standard courses, in topics which they themselves loved, but which were not, strictly speaking, part of computer technology and information processing as it was then seen.  Therefore, I could only take these rather oddball courses.  I took a course on human factors engineering.  I took a course, taught by a professor from the physics department, and intended primarily for engineering students, on microprocessor interfacing and machine language programming.  I took courses on artificial intelligence programming, of various types.  (And there are many different types of artificial intelligence programming.)

I made it through, just by the skin of my teeth, and got my masters degree.  I have a degree as a Master of Computer and Information Science Education.  (I use that as justification for telling people, when they ask what I do, that I'm an Information Scientist.  I usually add that that means I know *everything*.)

Previous: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-27-teaching-robs-universal-classroom.html

Introduction and ToC: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/10/mgg-introduction.html

Next: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-32-masters-business-analysis-ba.html

Psalm 127:3

Children are a gift 

to us from the Lord above; 

babies a reward.

MGG - 2.7 - Teaching - Rob's Universal Classroom

I love teaching.  I take every chance to teach in whatever job I'm in.  I love presenting at conferences, which I see as just another form or level of teaching.  I see writing as primarily a form of teaching, although it's not as much fun, since you don't get as much feedback.

(And now I'm here in a town where there are no intellectual pursuits, because there are no intellectuals to pursue them.  I'm trying to find, and even create, opportunities to teach, but so far without success.)

When Gloria asked me about something, when I would start to answer, she would sometimes stop me and say, "You're in lecture mode."  Apparently I do this automatically, when I think it's a teaching situation.  Among other things, my voice gets louder, and this is what she was objecting to.

One time we were with a couple of the grandkids, and some of their friends.  During the conversation, one of the friends made an offhand comment.  I noted that what he'd said wasn't quite correct.  He was interested, and so I started to explain.  Behind me, I could hear Gloria saying to Number Two Daughter, "See?  There's Rob, and his universal classroom."

Previous: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-26-teaching-online-from-paradise.html

Introduction and ToC: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/10/mgg-introduction.html

Next: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-31-masters-business-analysis-ba.html

Joshua 1:9

I've commanded you to be strong and brave.  Don't ever be afraid or discouraged!  I am the Lord your God, and I will be there to help you wherever you go.

"Ask me about my grief" t-shirt ...

One of the grief accounts asked whether mourners would wear an "Ask me about my grief" t-shirt.  This was asked as a poll or survey.  The account owner wondered, would people actually ask?  What kind of conversations would this open up?  Could it help normalize and destigmatize talking about grief?

I'm not sure whether I'd wear the t-shirt.  Not because I'm afraid, but because I suspect it wouldn't do anything.  I'm pretty open about my grief.  Most people wouldn't read it.  Most of those who read it wouldn't ask.  Most of those who asked wouldn't really be asking--they'd then go on to tell you about *their* troubles.  (I'm not sure why, but it's an overwhelmingly common reaction.)

It would be rare that anyone would be outright rude or cruel to you in reference to the t-shirt and grief, so I was going to say that it couldn't hurt.  But the implicit rejection of those who didn't react, or asked and then went on to other things, could be extremely hurtful.

So, I'm still not sure whether I'd wear the t-shirt, or recommend whether anyone else should or shouldn't ...

Happy Family Day!

 

Two of my greatgrandchildren ...

 

MGG - 2.6 - Teaching - Online from Paradise

Once upon a time, way back in the dark ages of 1985, I did the technical part of the world's first fully integrated (what today would be called "hybrid") on-site, and online (what today would be called "remote"), conference.  Today, this would be known as hybrid, but in those days, being the first, the question would have been hybrid what?

The conference included participants from 125 countries.  We had about 75 people on-site, at what was then the North Vancouver school district's outdoor school, north of Squamish, in Paradise Valley.  We had online attendance of about two hundred people.  As various organizations have recently found when going to remote/virtual online meetings, we were able to attract some very big name speakers, because they could participate, fairly easily, from wherever they were, and didn't require financial assistance for air travel and hotels.

The arrangements for the conference would be considered fairly primitive by today's standards.  There was no video conferencing, and there wasn't even really any audio conferencing.  BC Tel, as it then was, did participate in providing additional telephone lines, and long distance charge deferments, so that we could dial into CompuServe.  The conferencing was text-based, and only text based.  We did have a fantastic line up of speakers, as well as participation from some high level people, as well as those who were just parents, with their children.

I should perhaps note that this was the World Logo Conference, Logo being the computer language designed by Seymour Papert, and implemented by others (somewhat based on Lisp), intended for use by children.  It is easy enough to get them started with the graphic aspects of the language, which motivates them to learn the language and structure, and concepts of programming.  This then provides an entry to programming of all sorts.  The language is not limited to graphics, although many teachers who use it never get beyond that part of the language.

I must admit that, with responsibility for making sure that the technical parts of the program actually ran, I didn't get too much of a chance to participate in the conference proceedings themselves, except when I was running certain of the online sessions.

Online sessions were interesting.  We did have people who were reporting on the on-site sessions, and giving written resumes of the local sessions, for those online to read at their leisure.  In terms of the online sessions, and reporting to those who were on-site, we had huge sheets of particle board that we used as bulletin boards, and tacked printouts of the online sessions, and the discussions going on, on to those bulletin boards.  This was easier to do in those days, when everybody used fanfold paper, and so we had an awful lot of five and six foot long transcripts of sessions, on the bulletin boards that lined the walls.

As noted, I moderated some of the online sessions.  I well remember one, that started at six in the morning, locally.  This was because it was a reasonable time for the speaker, who was a big name in the Logo community.  At one point he raised the issue of teaching kids the three-dimensional shape of the Logo screen.  The logo screen is, of course, two dimensional, but, in regard to graphics, it wraps around.  He asserted that this shape represented a sphere.

It has always bugged me when people simplify technical material too much, presenting a rather patronizing attitude that the unwashed masses simply cannot understand technical concepts.  As far as I'm concerned, and as far as I have observed over the years, many such technical concepts are really quite simple.  And so, in the interest of accuracy, I responded to this particular part of his presentation and noted that the surface, when correctly mapped, did not form a sphere, but actually a toroid, or doughnut shape.

This, possibly predictably, drew the ire of the presenter, who did not want to be corrected.  He said that nobody would understand what a toroid was, and that the representation as a sphere was perfectly acceptable, and understandable, and that, in any case, if I was insisting on representing the screen as a doughnut shape, where was the hole?

I figured that I had done enough trouble, so I wasn't going to respond.  But, as noted, there were parents, with children, participating in our online sessions.  One such was a mother, with her five-year-old child.  As soon as the speaker made his comment, taking me to task for suggesting that the shape was a toroid, and asking where the hole was, she responded that Harley, her child, said that the whole was the "not screen."

That's actually a fairly sophisticated analysis, and, on many different levels, is correct.  I felt completely justified, without having to defend myself at all, and this is one of my favorite teaching experiences.

One of my favourite, but not *the* favourite.  When asked one time about my favourite experience in teaching, I couldn't recall one.  But Gloria did, and reminded me of the incident.

Previous: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-2-teaching-p1-and-p2.html

Introduction and ToC: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/10/mgg-introduction.html

Next: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-27-teaching-robs-universal-classroom.html

Job 3:20-22

Why is light given to one burdened with grief,

and life to those whose existence is bitter,

who wait for death, but it does not come,

and search for it more than for hidden treasure,

who are filled with much joy

and are glad when they reach the grave?

Port Alberni Official Community Plan (OCP)

The city of Port Alberni is projected to increase, in population, by roughly twenty percent over the next twenty years.  At the same time, Port Alberni is falling behind in the housing and environmental pollution targets mandated by the provincial government.

The city must plan how to meet the increased needs for services, infrastructure, and development over the next twenty years.  The Official Community Plan, or OCP, is a policy document to guide this planning.  What is decided this year will guide how Port Alberni grows over the next twenty.  (In other words, if you don't get involved in the current "engagement" over the OCP, you don't get to complain if Port Alberni turns out differently than you like over the next two decades.)

The are many opportunities to give your feedback for the "engagement."  You can check it out online, at https://www.letsconnectpa.ca/ocp

(There is an explanatory video, a little over fifteen minutes long, at https://www.letsconnectpa.ca/ocp/widgets/171323/videos/11553  It's pretty much required viewing.)

You can go to Echo Centre on February 14th and 15th, from 4:30 pm (1630H) to 8:30 pm (2030H) to talk to people, and work through the materials there.

There is a Community Representative Team (CRT).  Find someone on it and talk to them.  (You can probably guess one member.)

Have your say.  Direct how the city is going to develop over the next twenty years.

This message is posted at:

https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/port-alberni-official-community-plan-ocp.html

Hullo, Sailor!

The "Love Boat" franchise is starting up new series, using the "CSI:" model.  The first series to be produced will be "Love Boat: Nanaimo-Vancouver" (working title: "Hullo, Sailor!").  It will feature five-minute episodes, with a chime sounding to announce that you should switch to the next episode.

(The Vancouver Island Ferry Company Nanaimo-Vancouver fast ferry has announced "speed dating" runs.  https://www.nanaimobulletin.com/local-news/nanaimo-vancouver-fast-ferry-love-boat-has-a-place-in-modern-matchmaking-7317298 )

MGG - 2.5 - Teaching - P1 and P2

I don't even want to talk about them, but I guess I have to.  They were major factors in what happened with my teaching career.  I'll call them P1 and P2: Principal 1 and Principal 2.

(By the way, my teaching career, here in chapter 2, continues in chapter 4, "All Things Work Together."  And this is an important part of that, as well.)

You can easily find P1's name in news references of the time.  He's even made the news again recently, because of legal actions over failure to compensate some of the victims.  He was the principal of Kildala Elementary School.  What nobody knew, until well after I got fired and left, was that he had been sexually abusing boys in the town of Kitimat, for many, many years.  He, interestingly, did not prey upon the boys in the Kildala school itself.  He, I suppose, knew enough to abuse boys who were not students in his immediate orbit.  This sexual abuse had taken place over a great many years, possibly as many as twenty.  So, even though he did not prey upon the students in Kildala school itself, I am rather surprised that, in a small town, he got away with it for as long as he did.

But he certainly did take steps to ensure that he protected himself, in quite a variety of ways.  I am sure that court transcripts are somewhat sealed, because they deal with minors, but I am sure that he did significant social engineering on the boys that he abused, telling them that it wasn't abuse, telling them that it was ordinary, telling them that this was something everyone did but no one talked about, telling them that if anyone found out what they were doing they would blame the boys.  But he also worked in the community, to create a position and protection for himself, as a valued member of the society in a small town.

He was very popular with the teachers in the school.  There were a lot of parties among the staff at the school.  Some of them were barbecues at P1's place.  He made his own wine, and was liberal in donating it to those who expressed an appreciation for it.  He was, of course, as a principal, in a position of authority, and a respected position within the community.

He ensured that the parents were unworried about the education that was happening at the school.  If you actually examined standardized scores, or the needs of the students once they graduated into other institutions, you might have had a few questions about this, but P1 made sure that nothing untoward, nothing questionable, nothing unpleasant happened at the school.  The parents were not to be worried.  The students were to enjoy their time at school.  The school, as I have mentioned, had a specialist program in music, and in science, and whether or not these programs were educational, they certainly were impressive on paper.

And this is where I came in.  When I got hired on to the Kitimat school district, and assigned to Kildala school, I was in the science teacher position.  As previously noted, almost immediately I realized that the students were woefully unprepared in science, and in math, and even in basic educational activities and disciplines, such as doing homework and completing projects.  Actually being required to do some educational work, and produce something for assessment, seemed to be a foreign concept.  So, I set about trying to teach the students what they needed to know and do.  What kind of work they needed to produce.  What kind of homework they needed to do, and how much time to put in for that activity.  I was working pretty much alone, and under some constraints.

I had more success in math than in science.  Math, after all, is fairly structured, standardized, and it's easier to assess whether the students actually know what they need to know.  The science was more difficult, particularly with the imposition of the new science curriculum.  I have no idea why the previous incumbent of the specialist science teacher position left that position.  He was, in fact, teaching and enrolling a class at Kildala school.  I didn't know this for a while, until I started to raise the issue of the lack of science background in pretty much all the students, and he was quite offended at my assessment.

So, I wasn't making any friends, but I was doing my job.  As best I could.

And then came the first report card.  I had to fail about three quarters of the students.  They just hadn't turned in any work at all, or at least not sufficient for me to give them anything near a passing grade.

Well, that set the cat among the pigeons.  There was a huge furor.  How dare I fail so many students?  The parents were up in arms.  And, predictably, had I but known the full background of everything that was happening in the school, I was thrown to the wolves.  P1 sent set up a meeting, and invited any parents who were concerned about their children's marks to meet with me.  Me, you will notice.  Not him.  I was to handle this on my own, and I was to satisfy the parents.  I had created the problem: I had to clean it up.

I met with the parents.  Equally predictably (and I expected this), the parents who did show up were the parents of the students who actually had passed, but had obtained marks at a C level, rather than the A's and B's that their parents expected.  I tended to refer to these students as members of the figure skating club.  All of their parents were not millworkers, but professionals and managers at the mills.  They were the parents with lots of money, and they were the students with lots of activities and training going on.  As implied by my name for them, pretty much all of them were, in fact, members of the figure skating club in town.  They were students who were going to do well, and had the genetics, family connections, money, and ambition to actually work towards a superior life.

As I said, I expected this.  I was not surprised.  I explained to the parents that the students, all the students, had performed well below what would be expected.  I explained that I did not feel that I should allow them to go on to high school without being challenged in this way so that they would know what to expect when they had more responsibility for their own studies.  The parents didn't like it, but grudgingly accepted that this was not completely arbitrary on my part, and that it did have some validity.

And, in fact, it worked.  During the subsequent terms of the school year, the work improved markedly, and so did their marks.  They realized that I was serious about assignments and homework, and they started to work closer to an acceptable standard.  As far as I was concerned, I had done a good job: assessing the problem, setting a standard, sticking to the standard, letting the students know what the expectations were, and following through.

But, of course, there were factors in play that I knew nothing about.  I had given the school, and, by extension, P1, a black mark.  As previously noted, P1's prime objective in the running of the school was that no questions or issues should be raised which might turn attention on him.  I had brought attention on the school, and, naturally, P1, as principal, would be asked to address the issue of what to do with me.  P1's answer was very simple.  In those days, it was pretty much automatic that you were on probation for your first year in employment.  Then, once you had gotten through your first year, pretty much automatically you got a permanent contract.  Well, I was put on probation for a second year.  The fact that I had created a furor was all the explanation anybody needed.  This took the pressure off P1, and Kildala school, by making me the scapegoat for it.

Somehow, though, P1's star had somewhat dimmed.  In the second year I was removed from the position as specialist science teacher, and given a grade 5 classroom.  In addition, though, P1 moved from being principal of the largest elementary school, to one of three vice principals of the secondary school.  You could see this as sort of a lateral transfer.  Even though he went from principal to vice principal, you could say that secondary schools are larger and more complex institutions, and so it doesn't necessarily mean any loss in status.  P2 was one of the vice principals at the secondary school, and came to Kildala as principal.

P2, in addressing his new staff at the elementary school, spoke of tightening up on educational standards, and avoiding some of the laxity that had been observed at the elementary schools in the city.  To me, this sounded good.

What none of us knew was the extent of P2's ambition.  Merely moving up to a principalship wasn't enough.  In successive years, he went from vice principal, to principal, to director of instruction, to superintendent, to a position with the Ministry of Education.  One year per step.  That's very rapid advancement.  And I'm fairly sure that he climbed over bodies all the way.

I was the first.

At the same time as all of this was going on, the government of the day was carrying on a fight with the civil service, and, in particular, because it was a strong cohesive group, with the educators of the province.  The government passed various laws (a number of which were later struck down after challenges in the courts, but until that happened were in force for a number of years), rolling back wages for teachers, eliminating hard won limits on class sizes, and generally making life difficult for teachers.  This was known as a "restraint program," and was seen as an economic necessity at the time.  It never did any good for the educational system, and probably did an awful lot of damage, over the years.

I was in a very vulnerable position.  I was the only teacher actually on probation in Kitimat, in that second year.  No teachers have been hired in that year, so nobody else was on probation.  And, of course, everybody knew that there were going to be job cuts.  We didn't know the extent of P2's ambition, but he knew that the best thing he could do, to help to trim budgets, was to fire people.  And there I was, already in a position where I could be fired very easily.

Teaching is, despite the appearance of collegiality, actually a rather isolated and isolating job.  The teacher is in charge in their own classroom, and everybody has their own classroom, and their own concerns.  Getting teachers to work together is not necessarily hugely difficult, but you do have to come up with a plan and explanation as to what there is a benefit for the teachers you would like to group to work together.  Teachers are used to working on their own, obtaining their own resources, running things their own way, and really do not, ordinarily, collaborate on their jobs.

So, it's relatively easy to ensure that somebody fails as a teacher.  All you have to do is remove the resources that you notice this particular teacher relies upon, and wait for what is pretty much inevitable.  Unless the teacher objects, and mounts some campaign for support from their colleagues, this goes unnoticed, and probably unrealized even by the teacher you're attacking, until it's far too late.

P2 came up with a number of cost saving measures, all of which, oddly, limited my access to tools, and resources, that I was trying to use in a number of areas that I was teaching for the first time.  This was probably overkill on P2's part: he probably didn't need to ensure that I was teaching badly, since you really didn't need to fire someone on probation for cause.  But, messing with me, and ensuring that I was feeling bewildered by everything that was going on, simply allowed him to find areas that he could pick on and say that I was failing as a teacher.  It wasn't an awful lot of fun.  Even though I was having fun actually teaching.

The day that I was fired, someone from the school board office came down, and he and P2 came and called me out of my classroom, in the middle of a lesson.  Predictably, as they were droning on in the hall about how I was failing and I would have to be removed, the class got noisier and noisier.  At one point, while they were still talking, and I hadn't even responded to anything, I leaned back into the classroom, and gave a one word command, and the class immediately went silent.  When I stepped back out, the person from the school board office, made a very interesting comment.  He berated me for doing that, and said that no one had ever questioned my classroom management skills.

This is interesting because, while educators talk about all manner of skills in teaching (and they are important), the one prime consideration is always classroom management.  If you can't handle twenty-five not terribly motivated students, keep them in line, keep them from getting out of hand, it doesn't matter what other educational tricks you get up to.  Classroom management isn't the "be all and end all," but it is the one factor with the single greatest importance, of all aspects of teaching.

There were additional indications that the school board realized that they were pulling a fast one.  The school board said that if I took *any* other educational training, they would rewrite my teaching assessment.  If, in fact, I did have failings as a teacher, why did they not specify what particular type of training I should take?

I was also dumped by the union, the BC Teachers Federation.  The BCTF, at that time, was not merely a union, but also the professional association for the educators in the province.  However, the BCTF, and all local representatives, knew that they were in for a fight with this supposed restraint program.  They were all assured of savage fights over contract negotiations and were trying to prepare for it.  They didn't have time for one single teacher's firing, particularly a new teacher, whom nobody really knew.

Subsequently, as I'll go into later, I was teaching computer courses at the BCTF's Unemployed Teachers Action Centre.  One of the teachers from Kildala showed up there.  He apologized to me, saying that nobody realized, when *I* got fired, how much at risk their own jobs were.

Previous: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-24-teaching-pea-soup.html

Introduction and ToC: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/10/mgg-introduction.html

Next: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-26-teaching-online-from-paradise.html

Psalm 6:6

Tired of all this;

crying to You, my couch is 

soaking: so tired ...

"Let me know if I can ever help you out."

The churches of Port Alberni pretty much universally keep talking about outreach, reaching out to the community, bringing the community into the church, and growing their own congregations.  It is extremely disappointing, and very discouraging, to find that the churches of Port Alberni have extremely little actual ambition or intention to do so.  I have been involved in several proposals to provide the churches with options for outreach type programs (reaching out to the community, providing services or events for the community, to allow them to invite, to an event, people who would not normally be willing to attend a church service).  The churches are not even willing to advertise these activities in their own bulletins, announcements, or email messages and Facebook postings to their congregants.  Nobody has the slightest interest, not in helping me, but in doing the slightest thing to help me help them.

This is the more frustrating, discouraging, and disappointing, to me personally.  Particularly when there are people involved in the leadership of the churches here in Port Alberni, who have asserted and insisted that they are my friends, and are trying to support me personally, and my endeavours, quite separate from my church activities, but then cannot be bothered to take the slightest actions, or make the slightest efforts, with regard to ensuring or at least mentioning these events and activities.

As usual, it's Sunday (when there are fewer other volunteer activities to distract me, and when I am definitely visiting churches) that points out this problem in high relief.  At one church the minister makes a special point of telling me that he will not be supporting this event because of a personal prejudice against one of the churches marginally involved.  At another a request to mention the project to his congregation gets the kind of vague acknowledgement which you know will not lead to any action, and is impossible to fight.

In one specific case, it's depressing, and discouraging, to realize that the person that everyone agrees is the person that I need to talk to, and who will be able to assist the project, and without whom the project will not proceed, and who is, in fact, in a specific position to help and support people in my situation, has made abundantly, pelucidly, comprehensively clear that he does not care anything about me, my needs, or my situation.  If I don't do things not only his way, but in his form and per his demands, he will do nothing.  He hasn't refused to help with the project, mind you, what he's refused to do is to communicate with me, in any way that I find convenient, or even possible.  I am to pursue him, via his chosen means of communication, and make undoubtedly multiple attempts to fit into his schedule, regardless of how busy I am.  His disinterest in even talking with me does not bode well for any assistance with the project, or indeed with any of the projects.  Not only because I can't provide him with necessary information, but because it's obvious that his disinterest in communicating with me extends to communicating with anyone.  And it's ironic, on this day, that his sermon stresses that we, as members of the church, need to take action, whenever and wherever we see something that needs to be done.  Since he, clearly, refuses to acknowledge any situations but his own.

MGG - 2.4 - Teaching - pea soup

In British Columbia, grade 5, in social studies, is Canadian history.  Canadian history, of course, includes the fur trade and the voyageurs. When you are talking about the voyageurs, you probably shouldn't be talking, at least grade five students, about country wives, and the possible origin of the Metis.  You could, of course, talk about canoeing and the level of difficulty and exertion that the voyageurs put into paddling canoes over long distances.  But, unless you have actual cargo canoes, and instructors, and appropriate bodies of water, you can't do much about turning that into an actual hands-on activity.

But you can make pea soup.

You can also make bannock, but bannock requires an oven.  Or an open fire and a cast iron frying pan, but that's probably about the same level of difficulties to come across.  For pea soup, you need a pot and a hot plate.

Also, I love pea soup.

(Gboard, apparently, does not love pea soup.  While I was dictating this, it transcribed "pea soup" as all kinds of other things.  Including "I love you.")

So, as a an activity, in social studies, we made pea soup.  It's fairly easy, and, depending upon your situation, you can get the students to bring most of what you need.  You probably don't need an actual hambone, but some bacon goes a long way to filling in that gap.  It's probably a good idea to add an onion or two.  If you were going to do spices, you should probably bring your own, because the students probably won't know which spices are appropriate, and how much you will need.  You could try and get the students to bring dried peas, as well, but that, I suspect, may be taking a bit of a chance.  Yellow peas are the peas that the voyageurs probably used, and you do take a bit of a chance of the students bringing dried green peas.  And, these days, they may bring wasabi peas, or some similar snack type item.  I figured it would be safest for me to buy and bring my own dry yellow peas.

It's best to start the lesson first thing in the morning.  You can do a bit of introduction, talking about the voyageurs, and their meals, and foodstuffs that didn't require refrigeration, and what you could, and couldn't, bring on long trips.  While you're doing that, you can get the pot on the hot plate, start it up, and start chopping up the bacon.  You dump the bacon into the pot, and fry it up a bit.

I should probably note, at this point, that you send home letters, well in advance, informing the parents of what you are doing, and asking if anyone objects to their child actually eating the pea soup, on a religious basis (for Jews and Muslims), or on a dietary, or allergic basis (for anybody allergic to pork, onions, yellow peas, or even just the off chance that they might be allergic to spices).

Anyway, just about everyone appreciates the smell of frying bacon.  Then you chop up the onions, and drop them in, frying them up with the bacon.  The whole class is probably very interested by now.  Then you dump in the appropriate amount of water while giving a bit more instruction about voyageurs, lack of refrigeration, dried foods, preserved foods (such as salt pork), and other relevant topics until the water comes to a boil.  Then you dump in the dried peas.  You can leave it on high for a while, but, shortly, you turn it down, and let it simmer.  And teach arithmetic, or spelling, or whatever.  We'll let the soup simmer for a couple of hours.  Until lunch time.  At which time, you and the class, or at least that portion of the class who have returned their permission slip, have pea soup for lunch.  You dismiss the students, for the remainder of lunch hour, and go up to the staff room. Where are your colleagues are lying in wait.  They are all starving to death, because the entire school has been filled with the aroma of simmering pea soup.  For the entire morning.  Whether you apologize to your colleagues, or lord it over them for being the only one who has been prescient enough to arrange for this particular activity in the history unit, is up to your personal preference.

Previous: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-23-teaching.html

Introduction and ToC: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/10/mgg-introduction.html

Next: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-2-teaching-p1-and-p2.html

Job 1:7, 2:2, 1 Peter 5:8

"What have you been up to?"

Wandering to and fro upon the face of the earth, seeking whom I may devour.

Overeating and Job

So, I ate too much, yesterday.  That's bad, right?

I didn't eat enough to feel uncomfortable, but I did eat enough, without drinking enough, to feel thirsty, so, because of the diabetes, I've been pushing fluids.  (Mostly water.)  Thing is, when I eat a lot, generally I sleep well.  But, this morning I woke up early.  Which is a bit odd.

I'm reading Job, right now.  I like Job.  Me and Job, we're tight.  The guy suffered.  I mean, I lost my wife: he lost everything *but* his wife, and his wife told him to curse God and die.  I'm pretty sure I lost the better wife.  And all his friends, trying to comfort him, were idiots!  His "church" kept throwing preachy cliches at him, instead of listening to him!  Yup, I understand Job.

I'm sure there's not just *a* sermon in Job, but a whole series.  I've been thinking about that a bit.  And, this morning, for some reason, I've started collecting some of the bits I've already looked at, and, yes, there's an awful lot there.  So, I guess I have a new project.

So, if overeating prompts a sermon series on Job, is it bad?

Maybe *this* is what I'm here for?  Not the Grief Guys?  Not the Jesus Film Festival?  Not the outreach offerings for the churches?  Maybe, if I write up this series, God will *finally* let me die?

MGG - 2.3 - Teaching - Kitimat

Somewhat ironically, given where I have ended up, one of the jobs that I applied for was in Port Alberni.  I remember very little of the interview, but I do remember that, while waiting for my appointment time, I had one of the best clubhouse sandwiches I have ever eaten in one of the local Port Alberni restaurants.  Which is undoubtedly closed by now.

Eventually I ended up in Kitimat.  The word "kitimat," depending on who you ask, means either people of the snow, or land of the falling snow, or some variation on those ideas.  Yes, it snows an awful lot, being just far enough inland to be slightly away from the moderating influence of the ocean, but still close enough that the moist air coming in off the Pacific still holds a fair amount of moisture, which, once over the first barrier mountain on the coast cools enough to fall as snow, on Kitimat.

Kildala was the largest elementary school in Kitimat.  We had 600 students.

I was not particularly impressed by my fellow teachers at Kildala, and didn't have an awful lot of contact with teachers at other schools.  My animus to the teachers at my own school was not simply to the science teacher who had failed at teaching science for fourteen years, or the many math teachers who had failed at teaching math.  Basically, possibly because of Cyril Portman, the attitude in this school was that we were paid to babysit, not really to teach.

The position that I obtained within the school was that of a specialist science teacher.  This was not a usual position in an elementary school.  Elementary schools, particularly of the day, held that teachers should teach all subjects in elementary school and specialists were to be avoided.  The science teacher who had preceded me in the position had, basically, taught science by doing fancy experiments as demonstrations for the kids, without really teaching any science principles.  This had gone on for a number of years.

Science was not the only subject to have been neglected in that particular school, over the preceding years.  The intermediate grades in elementary school, that of grades four through seven, had a specialist music teacher.  The specialist music teacher, therefore, had to have the regular subjects for his classes taught by other teachers.  In addition to the science that I taught in all grades from four to seven, I also taught all of the math for all the grades six and seven.

It quickly became apparent that the students in grades six and seven had not even learned the math concepts that were supposedly taught in grade four.  So, I had to bring all of the grade six and seven students, up from a grade three level, to their own grade level.  In addition, of course, I had to teach science up to the proper grade level.

There was one additional factor.  The previous year, the school district had decided on a new science curriculum.  This new science curriculum was massive.  Given approximately seventy hours of instruction for an entire year, each of grades four through seven was supposed to be instructed in at least 150 different concepts.  A number of these concepts were completely unrelated to science, such as song, dance, and puppetry.

As one, and only one, example of the general attitude to teaching in the school, because of donations from the mills in town, basically any time the schools wanted ice time for their students or classes, they got it.  All we had to do was make a request.  Then we could troop our students over for an hour, or two, or three, even if it was only one classroom.  The kids got to skate, and the teachers didn't have to teach.  A lot of times the teachers didn't even bother to hang around the rink.  They would just tell the kids to go home when they wanted to.  I did take my class over sometimes when other teachers had booked the rink, but I always stayed.  The other teachers knew this, and by Christmas time in my second year, I was being asked simply to take all of their classes, sometimes four and five at a time, over to the rink, and then dismiss them from the rink.  This being requested, I would dismiss the other classes, but I would walk my own class back to the classroom, and dismiss them from the school.  Probably overkill on my part, since the skating rink and the school were no more than four blocks apart.

At the beginning of my second year, given a grade five (and only grade five) class, I told them on that first day, that there were things they would like, and things they would not like, and that was too bad because this is all part of education, and besides, there would be days, even if they didn't believe me, that they would not want to go home.  Predictably, they didn't believe me and pooh-poohed the whole idea.  However, that Christmas, having taken a bunch of classes over to skating rink, and having dismissed the other classes (by their teacher's request), and trooped my own class back to the classroom, I dismissed them from the school.  At least a dozen doesn't didn't go.  Noting that our classroom was to be painted, during the Christmas break, I set them to taking down everything off the walls, so that the walls could be painted.  About half a dozen of the students left after that.  The others still wouldn't go.  So, I set them to cleaning up other areas of the classroom, such as taking some stabile artworks that we had mounted in the ceiling, down from the ceiling, and things like that.  (I must admit, in getting them to do that, it's quite likely that I had students standing on stools, perched atop tables.  I don't recall that particular configuration, but I suspect that it happened. So that's another rule of teaching that I broke: that would have been very dangerous for the students.  At least in legal eyes, if anything had happened.)

A couple of them left after that, and, having moved all the desks to the center of the classroom, I got the kids to sweep the floor.  But four students still wouldn't leave.  So I reminded them that they had not believed me when I told them, at the beginning of the year, that there were going to be days when they wouldn't want to go home, and that they had to go home, because I was leaving town during the break.

Previous: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-22-teaching.html

Introduction and ToC: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/10/mgg-introduction.html

Next: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-24-teaching-pea-soup.html

2 Corinthians 2:7,8

 ... and the best thing now is to give him your forgiveness and encouragement, or he might break down from much misery.  So I am asking you to give him some definite proof of your love for him.

MGG - 2.2 - Teaching

One other experience, in the student teaching at this particular school, had nothing that I can immediately think of to relate it to education, other than noting the oddities of noticing your environment, and being situationally aware.

I have a beard.  This is not a fashion statement.  I have rather sensitive skin, and shaving, with either a razor or an electric shaver, irritates my skin quite a bit.  So I stopped shaving.  Having a beard occasionally came in handy, when I was working in work camps, where it was not always possible to depend on the resources for the niceties of personal hygiene.  If the other guys had three days growth of beard, they looked scruffy.  If I had three days growth of beard, nobody noticed.

I have shaved off my beard from time to time, for various reasons.  When I shave, I get two, and only two, reactions.  About half of the population doesn't notice that I have shaved, or, indeed, done anything at all with regard to fashion or grooming.  The other half of the population doesn't recognize me.  There is no middle ground.

Well, since my father had suggested; very, very strongly; that having a beard would be contraindicated for obtaining a job in education, I decided to shave and I shaved on the last day we were going to be at our practicum school.  I must admit that I kind of weighted the experiment, by wearing a three-piece suit for the first time in that school.

I really didn't think of it as an experiment or a test.  When I got to the school, I had some work for a class that I was going to be teaching, so I was supposed to copying some material in the office.  One teacher, in whose class I had taught, came into the office and started doing something else, without speaking to me.  I didn't think anything of it: all teachers are busy pretty much all the time, and I just thought that he was too busy for social niceties, in regard to whatever he had to get done before class.  Presently another teacher came in, saw me, and called out, "Hi, Rob."  The teacher who had come in previously looked at him, questioningly, and said, "Rob's not here."  The second teacher, who obviously hadn't noticed that I had changed anything, and the first teacher, who didn't recognize me, started discussing whether or not I was actually in the room.  Then the secretary came in, and couldn't figure out why the two of them were discussing whether or not Rob was in the room, when Rob was obviously in the room.

That was, as I say, the last day that we were to be in that particular school.  Because the teachers normally have a bit of a send-off for student teachers, and particularly because we had being in that school for more time than is normal for student teachers, the teachers decided that we should have a bit of a send-off at a local pub.

One of the other student teachers and I showed up at the pub fairly early, but at about the same time as one of the teachers.  This particular teacher had taken a kind of leadership role in liaising with the student teachers.  I had, in fact, become something of the spokesman for the student teachers, myself, and so had had several meetings with her, and others, as well as teaching in her classroom.  This teacher started chatting amiably with the other student teacher, and, after about ten minutes, stopped and asked the other student teacher, "Well, aren't you going to introduce me to your friend?"  The tone of her question obviously assumed that I was one of the faculty from UBC who were teaching this particular teacher transfer program.  The other student teacher started stammering, "But, you, he, but, ..." unable to get any explanation formulated in his astonishment that the teacher was not able to recognize me.  I was no help in explaining things because I was completely convulsed with laughter while noting that the teacher was completely bewildered by our reaction.

(That morning, I had managed to leave the house where I was living, with five other flatmates, without anyone knowing that I had shaved.  When I got home, two didn't recognize me, and three didn't notice any change ...)

Previous: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/01/mgg-21-teaching.html

Introduction and ToC: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2023/10/mgg-introduction.html

Next: https://fibrecookery.blogspot.com/2024/02/mgg-23-teaching.html

Matthew 13:12

For anyone who has will be given more, and he will have more than enough; but from anyone who has not, even what he has will be taken away.

Change is bad

Grief is about a loss.

Loss is a change.

It is a change for the worse.

Therefore, those who are bereaved, and grieving, have suffered a grievous loss, and an enormous negative change.  Therefore, to them, *any* change is bad.  Even minor changes can unsettle and rattle them.