Anyone who knows me can pretty much skip this post entirely. It'll be of no interest to you to read about my college studies.
I won't go through a year-by-year analysis of modules and courses, but I can break it down into three major categories: Religion, English, and Education.
The Religion aspect of my Undergrad degree covers:
- Church history,
- Liturgy,
- Scripture,
- Philosophy,
- Ethics, and
- World religions.
What that meant was trying to balance my strengths and weaknesses across several completely different fields in an effort to attain the best possible grade for Religion overall. As it happens, the history and scripture modules were always my worst in terms of grades. I put it down to (a) the amount of material and (b) the marking style of the lecturers. It's a known fact that grades at third level vary according to the student doing the writing, and the lecturer doing the correcting.
All in all, it was interesting. I loved the Religion and Science module we had in third year, and surprised myself with a high grade in one of the scripture exams in first year. And, it's safe to say, I'll never want to be examined in Religion as a field of study - like that, anyway - ever again.
The English aspect of the degree was split into:
- Fiction,
- Poetry,
- Theatre, and
- Film.
Yes, we got to watch movies as part of our lectures. Yes, it was fun. And, if you did the same course as I did, it was all scarring. Blue Velvet is just one of the prescribed texts that will forever haunt me.
The English lectures were my favourites by far, because they focused on my longest-standing interest. While I came to enjoy Religion and Education lectures, I had always been excited about what we were studying in English, whether it was Shakespeare, Tragedy, Epic and Romantic Poetry, or Adaptations - even if I had no interest in reading the text, I loved learning about them.
The Education aspect of the degree was split more dramatically than anything else into two sub-categories: theory, and practice. The theory consisted of learning about the history of education, child psychology, methodology, and other such things that are Department-prescribed. The practical aspect of it... well... did I ever tell you the story about someone throwing a table at me in the middle of class?
I won't name names, but it happened. It's my horror story. It was a one-off event, in a heated situation, and I had to learn on the spot how to handle that - because no amount of theory of education can prepare you for the real thing!
Teaching practice was, and will probably always be, the most difficult and formative experience of my life as a student. I couldn't just talk to the students blankly about the topics - which usually covered someone I might have studied myself in college. I had to figure out how to make it interesting and engaging and relevant to them - even if that meant asking them, openly, what was the first thing they thought of when they thought of Muslims? (I won't lie, 9/11 and terrorism were offered as answers most of the time, a fact of which they were ashamed. Don't worry, I set them straight during my time as their teacher - they really didn't know any better.)
Of course, that was just my Undergrad degree. From September onwards, I'll be entering the world of the Masters, with war stories from the classroom to share with people when we're introducing ourselves to one another!
Showing posts with label english. Show all posts
Showing posts with label english. Show all posts
Monday, July 14, 2014
Wednesday, February 12, 2014
Short Story Writing for Leaving Cert Students
Last night, a former teacher of mine reminded me of a couple of things. Firstly: I'm a writer who knows things about writing. Secondly: I'm a teacher who has some experience teaching creative writing. And thirdly, I'm old.
Okay, not that old. But I'm old enough to have sat my Leaving Cert and to have written and published several books since. I'm old enough to have gone through college. And I'm experienced enough to have written a lot of short stories in my time.
The point is, I was asked for advice, and I was able to give it, and I think it's about time I put together a post on this for all the English teachers (and English students) out there.
1. Keep it simple. You have a limited amount of time and space in which you must write your story. You can't create an in-depth universe in the few pages at your disposal. You can't write a story spanning, in detail, a few years. You don't even have weeks. Try to fit the action into one day - two or three at most. Other things to avoid include: acts of terrorism, natural disasters, or mass murders, especially as a means of ending the story. (The old favourite, it seems, is to kill off everyone in the story with a volcano exploding.)
2. Plan in advance. Before you write anything, plan the story. Figure out your primary characters. Jot down 2-3 keys scenes you'll include, and know your ending. I can't stress the importance of this enough. You'll have a limited amount of time to write your story, so knowing how it'll come to an end is important. Otherwise, you run the risk of simply writing until it's finished. That's fine if you don't have a time limit, and if you have the patience to rewrite anything to make it more coherent, but in an exam situation, time is precious.
For a recommended break-down on how to spend your time in the exam, see this page: http://www.leavingcert.net/skoool/examcentre_sc.asp?id=326
3. Have some ideas before you go in. Knowing what sort of story you could feasibly write before you go in is a good idea. (Writing it all beforehand and trying to reproduce it under pressure is not.) Have a look at different photo prompts online if you need ideas. Getting used to them beforehand is also a good idea, given the trend of there being a photo prompt question on the paper. Look through news stories for inspiration, too. You never know what will peak your interest and what you can use in your exam. Remember, in typical situations only one person will read your story.
A weekly photo prompt blog you can check it (run by yours truly) can be found here: http://writingpromptphotos.tumblr.com/
For easy to read, and sometimes ridiculous, news stories, I regrettably point you in the direction of the Daily Mail: http://www.dailymail.co.uk
4. Know your characters. One of the easiest ways to prepare to write a story without knowing the exact conditions of the story, is to prepare a few characters in advance. Create a protagonist in love; create a protagonist who wants to travel; create a protagonist who wants revenge. Mix things up a bit. Write male and female characters. Write characters of various ethnicities. Don't be afraid to create a genre-defined character. Give your characters depth, a background, an attitude, a way of looking at life. When you get the question - sometimes a line to include, sometimes a photo prompt, sometimes a lot more open than that - you could include one of your prepared characters. If you can't, create one on the spot. You should have plenty of experience in creating an interesting character. The most important thing to remember is that how your characters act and think is more important than how they look.
5. Know how to create interesting settings. A room isn't simply defined by what you can see. Think about the other senses we possess: hearing, smell, touch, and thermoception (the sense of heat and cold) are perhaps the most relevant here. Use them to create an atmosphere in a room, a depth beyond what we can see. When you've figured out how to use those properly - I advise describing your bedroom using those six senses (the five listed above, plus sight) and try describing others areas, like a nearby park, a shop, and a restaurant - it's time to turn to the cultural and social aspects of the setting. Paper 2 in Leaving Cert English deals with the Comparative Study. One area of this is the Cultural Context question, in which you need to dissect a piece for the culture created. The greater your understanding of factors such as religion, employment, crime and education on an environment, the better. You won't necessarily need all of the information, but it helps to create a more interesting setting (and write a more interesting story) if you can make use of them.
Above all else, practice.
Going into your Leaving Cert only ever writing stories (or essays, for that matter) when your teacher tells you to isn't necessarily a good idea. You should practice writing in your spare time - call it studying, if you have to explain it to a parent or guardian. You should aim to write a story at least every couple of weeks. It counts for half the marks of Paper 1, and deserves the attention. (As a further bonus, developing your writing skills will help you across the board, science and maths based subjects aside.) If you want a change of pace from trying to come up with your own ideas all the time, try out some fan fiction.
If you have access to a Kindle (or Kindle App on a smart phone or tablet) and you want to read more from me on this area, you might consider my two books on the matter:
Okay, not that old. But I'm old enough to have sat my Leaving Cert and to have written and published several books since. I'm old enough to have gone through college. And I'm experienced enough to have written a lot of short stories in my time.
The point is, I was asked for advice, and I was able to give it, and I think it's about time I put together a post on this for all the English teachers (and English students) out there.
1. Keep it simple. You have a limited amount of time and space in which you must write your story. You can't create an in-depth universe in the few pages at your disposal. You can't write a story spanning, in detail, a few years. You don't even have weeks. Try to fit the action into one day - two or three at most. Other things to avoid include: acts of terrorism, natural disasters, or mass murders, especially as a means of ending the story. (The old favourite, it seems, is to kill off everyone in the story with a volcano exploding.)
2. Plan in advance. Before you write anything, plan the story. Figure out your primary characters. Jot down 2-3 keys scenes you'll include, and know your ending. I can't stress the importance of this enough. You'll have a limited amount of time to write your story, so knowing how it'll come to an end is important. Otherwise, you run the risk of simply writing until it's finished. That's fine if you don't have a time limit, and if you have the patience to rewrite anything to make it more coherent, but in an exam situation, time is precious.
For a recommended break-down on how to spend your time in the exam, see this page: http://www.leavingcert.net/skoool/examcentre_sc.asp?id=326
3. Have some ideas before you go in. Knowing what sort of story you could feasibly write before you go in is a good idea. (Writing it all beforehand and trying to reproduce it under pressure is not.) Have a look at different photo prompts online if you need ideas. Getting used to them beforehand is also a good idea, given the trend of there being a photo prompt question on the paper. Look through news stories for inspiration, too. You never know what will peak your interest and what you can use in your exam. Remember, in typical situations only one person will read your story.
A weekly photo prompt blog you can check it (run by yours truly) can be found here: http://writingpromptphotos.tumblr.com/
For easy to read, and sometimes ridiculous, news stories, I regrettably point you in the direction of the Daily Mail: http://www.dailymail.co.uk
4. Know your characters. One of the easiest ways to prepare to write a story without knowing the exact conditions of the story, is to prepare a few characters in advance. Create a protagonist in love; create a protagonist who wants to travel; create a protagonist who wants revenge. Mix things up a bit. Write male and female characters. Write characters of various ethnicities. Don't be afraid to create a genre-defined character. Give your characters depth, a background, an attitude, a way of looking at life. When you get the question - sometimes a line to include, sometimes a photo prompt, sometimes a lot more open than that - you could include one of your prepared characters. If you can't, create one on the spot. You should have plenty of experience in creating an interesting character. The most important thing to remember is that how your characters act and think is more important than how they look.
5. Know how to create interesting settings. A room isn't simply defined by what you can see. Think about the other senses we possess: hearing, smell, touch, and thermoception (the sense of heat and cold) are perhaps the most relevant here. Use them to create an atmosphere in a room, a depth beyond what we can see. When you've figured out how to use those properly - I advise describing your bedroom using those six senses (the five listed above, plus sight) and try describing others areas, like a nearby park, a shop, and a restaurant - it's time to turn to the cultural and social aspects of the setting. Paper 2 in Leaving Cert English deals with the Comparative Study. One area of this is the Cultural Context question, in which you need to dissect a piece for the culture created. The greater your understanding of factors such as religion, employment, crime and education on an environment, the better. You won't necessarily need all of the information, but it helps to create a more interesting setting (and write a more interesting story) if you can make use of them.
Above all else, practice.
Going into your Leaving Cert only ever writing stories (or essays, for that matter) when your teacher tells you to isn't necessarily a good idea. You should practice writing in your spare time - call it studying, if you have to explain it to a parent or guardian. You should aim to write a story at least every couple of weeks. It counts for half the marks of Paper 1, and deserves the attention. (As a further bonus, developing your writing skills will help you across the board, science and maths based subjects aside.) If you want a change of pace from trying to come up with your own ideas all the time, try out some fan fiction.
If you have access to a Kindle (or Kindle App on a smart phone or tablet) and you want to read more from me on this area, you might consider my two books on the matter:
 |
| Available on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk |
 |
| Available on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk |
Thursday, December 2, 2010
Being a Teacher
People seem to underestimate the work involved in being a teacher. I can say this, without conviction, because I have been doing some of the work of a teacher. If you think it's just standing up in front of a class and talking for the day, you're wrong. At primary level, which I've been getting lessons together for, there's a lot of creative thought necessary.
Why?
Because children don't want to listen to someone drone on about everything day-in, day-out for eight years. They need activities, stimulation, colour, videos, music, and time away from being spoken at about all the subjects they don't care for.
So what does a teacher have to do?
Let's put this into context: I have three classes to teach in January - 2 Religion and 1 English, every day for two weeks. For each of these three classes and for each of the weeks, I need to prepare what's called a Scheme of Work. I normally like scheming. This involves so much more than just minute preparation and a lot of winging it, though. Each scheme needs to cover the AIMS of the week's lessons, CONCEPTS & DEFINITIONS involved in the lessons, RESOURCES that were used to prepare the lesson and a DESCRIPTION of each of the five lessons per class per week.
After that, there then has to be a Lesson Plan for each of the lessons in each of the classes for both weeks. For me, with only a fraction of the work of a fully-qualified primary school teacher, this is still a huge amount of work: 15 lesson plans per week! New teachers would use lesson plans for a while until they had everything more or less prepared for the duration of their time teaching a particular school year, only tweaking things when necessary. However, this means an estimated 8-9 lesson plans per day, which amounts to 40-45 per week, for 37 weeks of the year (I'm told). That's 1,480-1665 per year. Bare in mind that many teachers stay with the same class group for two years, so they don't repeat a year until after they've done the same workload again.
That's a LOT of preparation...
And it's only the beginning! Teachers still have to prepare worksheets and resources for all of these lessons, and... yes, you guessed it: they have to teach the lessons. But it's not over after that. There's also this thing children hate called HOMEWORK and it has to be collected. Fun times, yeah?
And this is what I've signed up for, only with secondary schools instead. This means less freedom for lessons, but less subjects to cover. That doesn't make it easier, it just means that I'd have to teach up to six years worth of material. Yeah, that's more lesson plans the first time around. And with the way the curriculum is in English, it'd mean having to change the plans every year for fifth and sixth class, based on what texts are on for their Leaving Cert exams.
That doesn't sound like fun... why are you doing this again?
I ask myself that every time I have to do the preparatory work. I guess I just want to teach. I want to pass on knowledge, maybe make a generation of people excited about books and reading and, if I'm lucky and good enough, half-way decent citizens. Religion teaching isn't just "Yay God and all that"; it's about encouraging pupils to make an educated choice about religion; it's about teaching morals and values that have real importance in the world; it's about promoting equality and understanding and removing all the presumptions about other religious faiths, which I find to be of high importance given South Park's attacks on Judaism and Islam, even they're meant to just be funny; and it's about helping pupils to progress in their faith development.
Their...what?
Faith development; it's part of Robert Fowler's study of what he calls the stages of faith. They're not specific to Christianity, though a lot of the work was done in a Christian context. The stages of faith present a stage of someone's life, allowing them to understand the world in different ways to others of different stages. It's generally accepted that there are very few stage six people who ever lived... one of them is Jesus, another is Mahatma Ghandi. See? Universal! And Religion in schools is about helping people with their faith development so that they can understand the world in new lights. It's all very fascinating, really.
And this is what being a teacher is about?
Well, this is an idea of what being a teacher is about. Contextually, this is really what being an English and Religion teacher is about. Maths and Science teachers wouldn't be as concerned with faith development, I wouldn't imagine! But the workload is the same. It's a lot to do and a lot to teach, and while it's not as easy as people think, so far it's been as fulfilling. And I haven't even taught my lessons, yet!
Why?
Because children don't want to listen to someone drone on about everything day-in, day-out for eight years. They need activities, stimulation, colour, videos, music, and time away from being spoken at about all the subjects they don't care for.
So what does a teacher have to do?
Let's put this into context: I have three classes to teach in January - 2 Religion and 1 English, every day for two weeks. For each of these three classes and for each of the weeks, I need to prepare what's called a Scheme of Work. I normally like scheming. This involves so much more than just minute preparation and a lot of winging it, though. Each scheme needs to cover the AIMS of the week's lessons, CONCEPTS & DEFINITIONS involved in the lessons, RESOURCES that were used to prepare the lesson and a DESCRIPTION of each of the five lessons per class per week.
After that, there then has to be a Lesson Plan for each of the lessons in each of the classes for both weeks. For me, with only a fraction of the work of a fully-qualified primary school teacher, this is still a huge amount of work: 15 lesson plans per week! New teachers would use lesson plans for a while until they had everything more or less prepared for the duration of their time teaching a particular school year, only tweaking things when necessary. However, this means an estimated 8-9 lesson plans per day, which amounts to 40-45 per week, for 37 weeks of the year (I'm told). That's 1,480-1665 per year. Bare in mind that many teachers stay with the same class group for two years, so they don't repeat a year until after they've done the same workload again.
That's a LOT of preparation...
And it's only the beginning! Teachers still have to prepare worksheets and resources for all of these lessons, and... yes, you guessed it: they have to teach the lessons. But it's not over after that. There's also this thing children hate called HOMEWORK and it has to be collected. Fun times, yeah?
And this is what I've signed up for, only with secondary schools instead. This means less freedom for lessons, but less subjects to cover. That doesn't make it easier, it just means that I'd have to teach up to six years worth of material. Yeah, that's more lesson plans the first time around. And with the way the curriculum is in English, it'd mean having to change the plans every year for fifth and sixth class, based on what texts are on for their Leaving Cert exams.
That doesn't sound like fun... why are you doing this again?
I ask myself that every time I have to do the preparatory work. I guess I just want to teach. I want to pass on knowledge, maybe make a generation of people excited about books and reading and, if I'm lucky and good enough, half-way decent citizens. Religion teaching isn't just "Yay God and all that"; it's about encouraging pupils to make an educated choice about religion; it's about teaching morals and values that have real importance in the world; it's about promoting equality and understanding and removing all the presumptions about other religious faiths, which I find to be of high importance given South Park's attacks on Judaism and Islam, even they're meant to just be funny; and it's about helping pupils to progress in their faith development.
Their...what?
Faith development; it's part of Robert Fowler's study of what he calls the stages of faith. They're not specific to Christianity, though a lot of the work was done in a Christian context. The stages of faith present a stage of someone's life, allowing them to understand the world in different ways to others of different stages. It's generally accepted that there are very few stage six people who ever lived... one of them is Jesus, another is Mahatma Ghandi. See? Universal! And Religion in schools is about helping people with their faith development so that they can understand the world in new lights. It's all very fascinating, really.
And this is what being a teacher is about?
Well, this is an idea of what being a teacher is about. Contextually, this is really what being an English and Religion teacher is about. Maths and Science teachers wouldn't be as concerned with faith development, I wouldn't imagine! But the workload is the same. It's a lot to do and a lot to teach, and while it's not as easy as people think, so far it's been as fulfilling. And I haven't even taught my lessons, yet!
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Journey of a Thousand Miles
The ancient Chinese (or is it Japanese.. sorry, I'm confused now) proverb says The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. As far as I'm concerned, this is utter nonsense. Yes, it's stating the truth, the obvious truth that you have to begin before you get anywhere, but come on! A thousand miles - a single step won't do you much good unless it's onto a rocket that will fly you a thousand miles.
In my case, my journey begins rather boringly with not a step, but a chair, a laptop and a pre-registration form. My journey begins for real after that, I suppose. This is more like packing. And where am I going, I hear you ask? College!
Yes, this wee little blogger is on his way to the wider world where he gets to become scared of things like six year olds and paste until finally he escapes all that for fourteen years olds and clay. Admittedly, I won't be going near the clay, but teenage boys in art rooms like to throw clay about the place. It's annoying. I haven't even begun studying to become a teacher and I find it annoying.
Teacher, you ask? Yes, teacher. My course is one part Religion (well, really two parts Religion), one part English (proof there is a God, justifying the second part Religion) and one part Education. We'll do all sorts of fun stuff like discuss good and evil in Star Wars, watch the Simpsons, read loads of books and partake in four areas of work experience, one each year. How cool is that going to be?
This is the biggest thing that's happened to me since... ever! I'm actually going to doing something that counts towards my future (unlike the Leaving Cert, which is also like packing for this journey). And by the end of the course, I'll be qualified to teacher people Religion and English in secondary school. Yay!
Don't worry though. This isn't the end of my blog. Not by a long shot. If anything, it's actually helping my blog! You're probably wondering now how a college course will help my blog. Scroll up a wee bit there. See where I mention "read loads of books"? Yeah, that's what's going to change. Yes, I read books, but I've been writing a lot lately, instead of reading the books I want to read. College will broaden my selection of books reviewed on this blog, and maybe get me into reading a lot more than I already am. Fun fun fun!
The only downside to college, and this is both big and small; none of my friends are going to be there. They're all going to a different school so I'm stuck with, wait for it, my twin! Agh! I thought I was rid of him when I left secondary school, but obviously not. Still, it could be worse... Not a lot worse, mind you, just worse.
More fun things happening though; the college has two socities I'm currently interested in. A magazine and a film society! Hurray! I was already on a magazine and I vlog weekly (sometimes more than once) so they're perfect for me. Next in line - Niamh's birthday party! I love nights out like this. I'm not really a night life sort of person, and I don't drink, so my times out are always for something special like a birthday. And it's Niamh's birthday! And two days later, my Debs! Yay again! Niamh is going with me to that too. She'll be in turquoise, I'll be in a black tux with a silver waistcoat and silver cravat. In a limo. With a kareoke machine. Fun fun fun!
More stuff happening too! (I know, this list of great things happening is unfairly long, isn't it?) The Literary Den, with our fabulous new blog ( http://literaryden.wordpress.com ) all set up, are releasing a couple of things in the near future. One is our soon to be annual fiction anthology in aid of The Laura Crane Trust, and the other is a couple of t-shirts that will raise money towards funding the administrative stuff for the Den (like the website, and removing ads from the forum) so that we can give more back to the public. So excited about showing them all off on my YouTube channel too! ( http://www.youtube.com/writeranonymous )
I think that's it for now. I know, long blog post compared to some of my others ones. And this is only what i know right now! In the future, I'll be trying to add blog posts about NaNoWriMo and some music I'm listening to, and obviously more reviews of books and stuff like that. Until next time, though, take care!
In my case, my journey begins rather boringly with not a step, but a chair, a laptop and a pre-registration form. My journey begins for real after that, I suppose. This is more like packing. And where am I going, I hear you ask? College!
Yes, this wee little blogger is on his way to the wider world where he gets to become scared of things like six year olds and paste until finally he escapes all that for fourteen years olds and clay. Admittedly, I won't be going near the clay, but teenage boys in art rooms like to throw clay about the place. It's annoying. I haven't even begun studying to become a teacher and I find it annoying.
Teacher, you ask? Yes, teacher. My course is one part Religion (well, really two parts Religion), one part English (proof there is a God, justifying the second part Religion) and one part Education. We'll do all sorts of fun stuff like discuss good and evil in Star Wars, watch the Simpsons, read loads of books and partake in four areas of work experience, one each year. How cool is that going to be?
This is the biggest thing that's happened to me since... ever! I'm actually going to doing something that counts towards my future (unlike the Leaving Cert, which is also like packing for this journey). And by the end of the course, I'll be qualified to teacher people Religion and English in secondary school. Yay!
Don't worry though. This isn't the end of my blog. Not by a long shot. If anything, it's actually helping my blog! You're probably wondering now how a college course will help my blog. Scroll up a wee bit there. See where I mention "read loads of books"? Yeah, that's what's going to change. Yes, I read books, but I've been writing a lot lately, instead of reading the books I want to read. College will broaden my selection of books reviewed on this blog, and maybe get me into reading a lot more than I already am. Fun fun fun!
The only downside to college, and this is both big and small; none of my friends are going to be there. They're all going to a different school so I'm stuck with, wait for it, my twin! Agh! I thought I was rid of him when I left secondary school, but obviously not. Still, it could be worse... Not a lot worse, mind you, just worse.
More fun things happening though; the college has two socities I'm currently interested in. A magazine and a film society! Hurray! I was already on a magazine and I vlog weekly (sometimes more than once) so they're perfect for me. Next in line - Niamh's birthday party! I love nights out like this. I'm not really a night life sort of person, and I don't drink, so my times out are always for something special like a birthday. And it's Niamh's birthday! And two days later, my Debs! Yay again! Niamh is going with me to that too. She'll be in turquoise, I'll be in a black tux with a silver waistcoat and silver cravat. In a limo. With a kareoke machine. Fun fun fun!
More stuff happening too! (I know, this list of great things happening is unfairly long, isn't it?) The Literary Den, with our fabulous new blog ( http://literaryden.wordpress.com ) all set up, are releasing a couple of things in the near future. One is our soon to be annual fiction anthology in aid of The Laura Crane Trust, and the other is a couple of t-shirts that will raise money towards funding the administrative stuff for the Den (like the website, and removing ads from the forum) so that we can give more back to the public. So excited about showing them all off on my YouTube channel too! ( http://www.youtube.com/writeranonymous )
I think that's it for now. I know, long blog post compared to some of my others ones. And this is only what i know right now! In the future, I'll be trying to add blog posts about NaNoWriMo and some music I'm listening to, and obviously more reviews of books and stuff like that. Until next time, though, take care!
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