General Discussions

[PaulP]

My three grandsons are at primary school and their school is brilliant.  Their teachers are devoted, energetic and great at imparting knowledge and building a thirst for knowledge (helped by parents and grandparents!).  Their curriculum is much broader than it was back in my day (the dark ages) but that hasn’t hindered reading, writing and mathematics - my oldest grandson is in year 6 and is doing year 8 mathematics.  The fact that his teacher picked up the need to challenge him with more advanced mathematics speaks volumes for him and the school.

Of course there are dud teachers - I had more than my share - but most do a very hard job very well.

It's a thankless job. I think teaching kids in primary and selective high schools would be the go. If I was a teacher, I would steer clear of normal high schools. And in the public sector, having savage funding cuts year after year must take its toll after a while. It's a real credit to the teaching profession that our outcomes are at the level they are, all things considered.

[Gointocarlton]

I wouldn't think anyone on those reality shows is a fair representation of their demographic / profession - I haven't looked into it, and nor do I intend to, but I'd bet London to a brick that all those contestants are specifically chosen because they exhibit psychopathic tendencies. 

Nonetheless, he occupation was a teacher and she couldn't string two words together nor pronounce them properly. Like the show, she was embarrassing.

[capcom]

My wife and daughter are teachers, brilliant ones at that (no bias) so I wouldn't tar them all with the same brush. However, if you want to see how low the standards have plummeted and if you can bring yourself down to the level, purely for investigative purposes, watch a few episodes of Married At First Sight that just finished. There was a young lass on the series that was a teacher, good lord I wouldn't entrust her with teaching a dog/cat let alone a child.

I don't recall saying that nor ever implying it GTC.  I did learn about Aboriginal culture heavily in 1971 and '72 and got a 98 / A score in the Australian History Matriculation exam later that year.  And a free scholarship to University on the back of the other three "A" scores I managed in other subjects.

But I strongly object to the fantasies of Bruce Pascoe being paraded as fact.

And I was at pains to stress a well rounded education, something that is sadly lacking in today's classrooms.  God knows the number of CVs I've dismissed after a single reading because of grammar and spelling, simple math by mind, not machine ... the very basics of communication.

We have a third grade education system yet all the amenities and comforts never present when I went through high school.  We just had an abundance of quality in the teaching ranks

[DJC]

I don't recall saying that nor ever implying it GTC.  I did learn about Aboriginal culture heavily in 1971 and '72 and got a 98 / A score in Matriculation later that year.  And a free scholarship to University on the back of the other three "A" scores I managed in other subjects.

But I strongly object to the fantasies of Bruce Pascoe being paraded as fact.

And I was at pains to stress a well rounded education, something that is sadly lacking in today's classrooms.  God knows the number of CVs I've dismissed after a single reading because of grammar and spelling, simple math by mind, not machine ... the very basics of communication.

We have a third grade education system yet all the amenities and comforts never present when I went through high school.  We just had an abundance of quality in the teaching ranks

I have checked every primary source Pascoe cites and he has used them faithfully.

While I think that the desire to classify pre-contact Aboriginal economy as agricultural rather than hunter-gatherer is an over reaction to stereotypical views of Aboriginal people as wandering nomads, there is substantial evidence of sophisticated plant husbandry and storage and trading of surplus production.

I have worked quite a lot on the aquaculture sites in Victoria’s southwest and they provide evidence of generational planning, communal engineering, resource husbandry and social organisation that is at least as sophisticated as 19th century agricultural societies ... and that’s what should be taught in schools.

[ElwoodBlues1]

I was taught zero Lods both at Primary and High School, today I'm appalled by that fact.

Same here, I was taught nothing about indigenous culture and my introduction to it was Syd Jackson in a Carlton jumper and two foster boys we had at the Technical School I went to. Reg and Arthur were 18 years of age in Form 4 as it was then and I had never seen an aboriginal person close up before and knew nothing about their culture. They were great cricketers and scared the crap out of other schools when we played them, no helmets, batting gloves with those green rubber spikes and Arthur pushing off the boundary bowling at a rapid rate, the other teams would hit the ball in the air just to get caught and get to safety.
But the sad reality was if it wasnt for sport I wouldnt have had any idea what they were about and they could have been from mars which is a sad reflection on the White Australia policy era.
My wifes sister is married to a part aboriginal gent and he is as white as anglo saxon me but always refers to himself jokingly as a black fella but he too had zero education in indigenous matters and he told me he was told by teachers he would be better off pretending he was fully white..

[Thryleon]

I was taught at a catholic school

Remember an aboriginal man come speak to us on two occasions about the dreaming, their art, their weapons.  We did some aboriginal drawings of native animals and matchstick art where we used dots lines and earthy colours with white paint on black paper.

That was the 90's

Ive learned more at work in public sector health.

Out in public I've been threatened with a knife by one and his mate.  Unfortunate incident/misunderstanding on a tram where things got heated for no good reason.

Its where I established theres good and bad in all races.

[LP]

The Victorian government has become the country’s largest employer to include the term “chestfeeding” in a workplace agreement as part of a broader push to use gender-inclusive language.

I think it's time we kibosh the lot, politicians, bureaucrats and social workers, it costs us billion$ for wearing this sort of tripe!

[Baggers]

The Victorian government has become the country’s largest employer to include the term “chestfeeding” in a workplace agreement as part of a broader push to use gender-inclusive language.

I think it's time we kibosh the lot, politicians, bureaucrats and social workers, it costs us billion$ for wearing this sort of tripe!

I just don't get it. Are we embarrassed to use the word 'breast'?

[capcom]

Someone's gotta justify this feel good garbage.  No better sucker than the taxpayer.

[cookie2]

And what are we to make of "bottom feeder" under this new regime??