Posts by Bob Munro
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Not only are you an elitist bastard Simon, but an incredibly intelligent one!
Although it was not aimed at me, I'm proud to call myself an 'elitist bastard' in this context. I don't for a minute forget when I'm watching TV news that I'm watching a carefully choreographed performance that is inserted between the advertisements.
That's why I love the Moana Jacksons and Annette Sykes of this world when they pop up in these contexts. They remind me that there are many more interesting worldviews out there than the one being beamed at me.
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Sorry - first line above makes no sense. Should be word 'book' in there somewhere.
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I am firmly in camp "dial down the emoting" when it comes to newsreaders. Bland is fine.
Yes - they could all take a leaf out of the Maori Television frontpeople. Professionalism under fire, esp. in last few weeks.
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...and as for that creepy character that fronts Ferrit. I wouldn't leave him alone in a room with young children.
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Yes - They didn't want their bouncing boobs associated with Californication's bouncing boobs.
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On a related note, Family First and the catholic church really, really want you to watch Californication. Why else would they put out a press release about perverted sex & drug use in it?
By the look of this article on Stuff
advertisers have turned away with only minimal pressure.Family First said Cadbury, Ferrit, Burger King, CRC and Finish had asked that their ads not be shown during the programme...
TV3 marketing director Roger Beaumont said there had been "a few dozen phone calls".
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Our daughter attends Unlimited Paenga Tawhiti school
in Christchurch and went to Discovery primary before that.
I'm very much hoping to get my son to go to Unlimited year after next. He wants to go to Riccarton like all his friends, but I look at what Unlimited offers in comparison with a traditional high school and I get all excited.The above is way back on page 2. But I’d like to expand for the record on what can happen in a school where there is a pervasive sense of enterprise and innovation.
I think one of the greatest successes of these two schools is the level of socialisation that is achieved. Some of it is hard to imagine when you think of your own school days.
Both schools are in Christchurch’s CBD. They use the wider community resources such as libraries, swimmimng pools, parks etc. Things may have changed as they are constantly adapting, but while our daughter was at the primary Discovery school the older children were allowed to move around the city in small groups (I think it had to be 3 or more) unsupervised. A student earned a ‘trust licence’ to be part of this scheme. Safety checks and balances are in place, e.g. each group had a cell phone and had to txt in within a certain time period when they had reached their destination. So you would see primary aged children on the central city streets going about their business in the same unruffled way as the adult shoppers and office workers. It’s rather wonderful to behold.
At the secondary level, form classes called ‘home bases’ are vertically integrated by age so all age groups intermingle. Because of the focus on the individual learner’s goals rather than the need’s of the organisation as a whole it breeds independence and self sufficiency. Overall I’d call it maturity, so that especially amongst the students who have been in the system since they were young, there is little evidence of what we think of as negative or typical teenage behaviour.
For example: last year our daughter was in the local Shakespeare competition. The Unlimited School group prepared and presented their piece without any noticeable teacher input (I think it was there, just not visible), then afterwards sat down in the front row and supported the following schools’ presentations.
Other school’s had teachers organising their students through the performances and as soon as they had finished and were out of the limelight they would settle as groups back in the audience, lose interest in proceedings and start txting friends and generally interacting with each other loudly and rather rudely from the point of view of those still to present. This just as an example I observed as a parent, although obviously not an unbiased one.
I haven’t touched on the educational successes of this form of education but happy to do so if anybody’s interested.
But just to say again this experimental education is being driven by entrepreneurs (or any other name you want to give people who innovate and make things happen), who originate from the business community and the ‘system’ appears to tolerate it. Even ERO seems to be able to get it’s head around it although I understand not without difficulty.
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And finally, anyone out there know anything about Utah?
Oh and be careful crossing the roads, especially with young children. The streets are so wide because they were built so that a bullock train could do a U-turn without backing up. You're a long time exposed to the traffic till you make the other side.
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This may not be much practical help in finding things to do in SLC, but as an associative link it's not, I'd wager, too bad.
Yay! The original blogger Dooce makes it on to PAS. The circle is complete. The greatest snow on earth (it says so on the Utah number plates) lies up Little Cotton Wood canyon but that I guess may be not your number one priority?
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yes - but what happens with the stuff on the macbook - where does it go? get printed and presented or sent as emails, turned into movies, go onto online communities, where your daughter can work collaboratively, blogging for group discussions that are recorded
Yes to all of the above. The notebooks are rented so we amortise the cost over three years. In general tech costs are coming down rapidly and there's even the $100 dollar computer out there.
This is glass half full-empty stuff. Nothing's ever perfect but there are 'entrepreneurs' out there in the education system leading the way and the system now does seem flexible enough to accomodate this, even if John Minto isn't.