After a long post which equates to 5 and a half pages of size 11 Calibri font on Microsoft Word (or 3 370 words, if you prefer), I'm back for more ranting!
Art
I don't remember that much about art in primary school. The amount we did lessened in upper primary school. One thing I do remember, however, was making a paper mache version of Earth in year 6. Basically we applied paper mache on a balloon and when it dried, we popped the balloon, painted the paper mache and stuck white paper coloured green on it for the continents. I had to get someone else to inflate my balloon for me and my globe was the smallest, cutest (in size) and roundest of the lot.
There was a small hole where the neck of the balloon was in every globe and it was in this hole where string was attached so that the globes could be hung from the classroom ceiling. Most people had glued on the continents so that the north pole was where the hole was, but I'd done mine so that the south pole was where the hole was. Consequently, my globe was upside down, compared with the stereotypical globe. When the string was attached to my globe, I held my globe by the string and said to the arts assistant, "My world is upside down."
LOTE (Languages Other Than English, which in my school's case was French)
Nobody liked it, so consequently nobody wanted to do it, so consequently nobody tried. I recall one girl in my class asking the French assistant, "Why is French so boring?" Another memory I have is of someone doing "1, 2, 3, 1, 2" in which they took two steps backwards for every three steps forwards, all because they didn't want to go to French.
In year 7 I annoyed my French teacher by telling him that I was going to learn Chinese in high school. This year I'm going to be doing French
and Chinese. Go figure.
Music- Normal class
Most of what we did was sing. Occasionally we had to learn the names of the notes too. Not hard because I could play piano. One game we played involved having to jump onto a musical staff and the teacher would ask what note you had landed on. You could easily rig this by jumping onto the same note every time. That was only a minor flaw, however. The major flaw was that the staff didn't have a clef on it. It was assumed to be treble clef but it could also have been bass clef, alto clef, tenor clef or... percussion clef. "No, Miss, I am not standing on the C line, I am standing on the snare drum line." Or, if you prefer, "I'm sorry, but I've decided to be in alto clef today, so this note is a D, not a C." Unfortunately, back then, I only knew of treble clef and bass clef, so I could only make bass clef jokes (which I didn't, but there was one time I landed on the C space and I said E before quickly changing my answer to C, although E would have been correct in bass clef).
Music- Choir and Community Singing
In choir, the teacher generally spent most of the class yelling at us to shut up. Most people didn't really want to be there, but it was a choice between that and doing work on
Behind the News or other fascinating stuff in those non-choir classes.
As for community singing, that was a little better as the class was smaller. Once we had a relief teacher who came around and made sure we were all singing. I easily countered this by mouthing the words when she wasn't nearby and singing when she was.
My neighbour- the husband of the zucchini-loving family- said that when he was in primary school, he would always mouth the words in choir practice, but when they actually had to perform, he would sing really loudly because the teacher couldn't stop him then. Today he is a primary school principal.
Sport
I hated sport, because I never understood the point of getting sweaty and tired chasing after a ball just to score goals. I felt inferior and if I actually tried then people would laugh at me, thus creating a vicious cycle. I was a good runner- both cross-country and sprints- until year 7, when I lost my ability in long-distance running.
Health
Health in year 4 was just listening to the teacher talk. Consequently, it was our favourite class. After that I think we just occasionally touched on topics related to health. Always physical health- never mental health. The first time I did mental health at school was in year 9.
On second thoughts- we
did do health as a separate subject in year 6! We learned about wonderful stuff like caffeine and if I remember correctly, nutrition and risk taking. Apparently talking in class is a risk, because it means that you could get into trouble (i.e. have your name written on the board). We also learned about that wonderful thing known as puberty and we got to watch a lovely old video called "What's Happening to Me?"
Last but not least, I have just realised that I have forgotten one part of my music education in primary school. I can't believe that I've forgotten it.
Music- Clarinet
(Speaking of which, I should be practising that thing right about now.)
Another subject in which I learned something! I learned how to play the complete lower register and most of the upper register (the only note I had trouble with was the highest C in the standard range). I also learned how to tongue. I didn't practise very much but somehow I got an A for clarinet both years and my teacher thought that I was "an organised and reliable student who always works well in lessons!"
Other notes on primary school
- Too much standardised testing preparation! I remember telling one of the teachers (my year 1 teacher) about my annoyance (she was on duty and I was randomly talking to her). I asked her something like, "You can't fail or anything like that, so why does it matter?" She asked me why not being able to fail causes the tests to not matter. She was probably trying me to change my frame of mind. I think she may have succeeded, which was all the worse for me.
- Homework was generally one sheet due back the next week- that is, if we had homework at all. I decided to finish each sheet on the night I got them. My teacher always seemed slightly annoyed whenever I handed in homework early.
- Every day, in lower primary school, we would have to greet our teachers with a "Good morning, Mr/Mrs/Miss [whatever]" in the morning and a "Good afternoon, Mr/Mrs/Miss [whatever]" in the afternoon. Most times, we would sing our "good mornings" or our "good afternoons." As we progressed to upper primary school, teachers began to tell us to "say it, don't sing it," and eventually we all managed to get over the habit. It was very funny to listen to the school greeting a teacher in school assemblies because the disparity between the two halves of the school was obvious! It was also funny in the first or second week in high school when my S+E teacher said, "Good morning," and a few people started singing, "Good morning Mr..." and then cut off.
- In primary school, I learned two bicycle rules before learning how to ride a bike. In year 1 or 2, we were taught to walk our bikes across the road. In year 7 we were taught to ride on the road as the law says that only children under the age of 12, or those accompanying children under the age of 12, are allowed to ride on the footpath. This isn't a good thing if you learn how to ride a bike over that age as when you can't ride a bike properly, it's probably not a good idea to ride on the road. I will admit, however, that the law is not the fault of primary school.
- I'm currently looking at the school policies listed on my primary school's website and it says on the year 1-3 time-out sheet the first question is, "What did you do?" There are a few checkboxes such as "I was talking too much." After this it says, "I will write a sentence:" The sensible junior primary student would write a random sentence not related to their behaviour. If a teacher tries to punish them further, they can use the badly worded question in their defence.
- Another thing that it says is that physical assault of staff or other students or verbal abuse or harassment of staff will result in suspension. What about verbal abuse or harassment of students?
- If you were part of that group who arrived at school before 8.25am, classmates would say something like, "Wow, you were here early!" At my high school it's normal to arrive at that time although classes in my high school start 10 minutes later than they did in primary school.
- I'm going to go back to the subject of rules yet again. Another rule was that you were not allowed in the buildings at all during recess or lunch unless "wet weather" was called, in which case you had to go into a designated building depending on your year level. There was a time when access to the library was permitted during recess or lunch, but I think that was dropped when I was still in lower primary school.
- In year 6 we had to write down all of the books we were reading. I filled in two sheets. After that, I couldn't be bothered- probably because I was too busy reading.
Well, that's almost all from me. Apparently some cyclone or whatever is due to hit south of here, so we're going to get a thunderstorm and I should turn the laptop charger off.
