Home schooling - anyone else had a bit of a shock??

[Billhook]

On 06/05/2020 at 11:34, Steve Bullman said:

Can’t see what all the fuss is about personally, just need a bit of discipline 

 

 

IMG_2216.MOV 5.62 MB · 35 downloads

I suspect that my GT Grandfather, who sadly died in 1940 long before I was born, would have said something along the lines of the Monty Python 4  Yorkshiremen skit,  "You think you had it tough, well let me tell you when I were a lad....."

My father certainly had a brute teaching him when he was about eight.  The headmaster was called Barber and when Mrs Barber had been giving him a hard time he used to come into the classroom with a face like thunder.  Father always recalled the time when he came in like that and his eyes went around the room until they alighted on a boy called West.  "Ah West, you haven't had a beating for a week, out here boy!"

Father met West several times over their lives at Weddings and funerals and they always talked about the brute Barber.

When Mrs Barber died the whole school was made to file past her open coffin.

Apparently all the parents thought he was great.

Edited May 8, 2020 by Billhook
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[topchippyles]

9 minutes ago, Billhook said:

I suspect that my GT Grandfather, who sadly died in 1940 long before I was born, would have said something along the lines of the Monty Python 4  Yorkshiremen skit,  "You think you had it tough, well let me tell you when I were a lad....."

My father certainly had a brute teaching him when he was about eight.  The headmaster was called Barber and when Mrs Barber had been giving him a hard time he used to come into the classroom with a face like thunder.  Father always recalled the time when he came in like that and his eyes went around the room until they alighted on a boy called West.  "Ah West, you haven't had a beating for a week, out here boy!"

Father met West several times over their lives at Weddings and funerals and they always talked about the brute Barber.

When Mrs Barber died the whole school was made the file past her open coffin.

Apparently all the parents thought he was great.

One tough cookie. Remind me of me ?

[Billhook]

Another surprising thing going back to Gt Grandfather who was born in 1852 was a letter written to him by the old shepherd before he went off the South Africa in 1875.  You might think that a shepherd at that time, who basically spent much of his life living in  shepherd's hut would be illiterate but the letter was in the most beautiful handwriting and heartfelt and very moving.

I think that those Victorian village schools with the strict Victorian school maam were excellent at educating all the children of the village.  Of course backed up by the discipline of the Church at that time.

My handwriting along with most of my post war generation is appalling, most pre-war handwriting is beautiful.

[breffni]

1 hour ago, Big J said:

I had a quick look on Google, and the consensus seems to be that there are a very small number of elderly with minimal English, and also young children in Welsh speaking communities, though they quickly learn English once at school.

 

It honestly just seems like a wasted effort to me. Teach in two languages, as clearly that's a great idea, but ensure that both are useful. Imagine if they were bilingual as a matter of course in Spanish? They could seamlessly explore from Mexico to Argentina and everything inbetween. Angelsey to Pembroke doesn't quite hold the same appeal.

 

I know it seems like I'm unnecessarily driving home a contentious point, but educacation has to be prioritised. You can't learn everything, and nor should you try. I just believe that ensuring everything we learn is as useful as it can possibly be is important.

What's next? Stop teaching kids with learning disabilities as they don't contribute much? Did you not suggest planting the uplands in Sitka Spruce? Maybe you should go back to school if that's what you think is good idea. 

[topchippyles]

3 minutes ago, breffni said:

What's next? Stop teaching kids with learning disabilities as they don't contribute much? Did you not suggest planting the uplands in Sitka Spruce? Maybe you should go back to school if that's what you think is good idea. 

I was on him like a rash  ?

Edited May 8, 2020 by topchippyles

[Stere]

Sounds like you want to Bring back the welsh knot and canning for speaking Welsh.

 

 

Welsh Not - Wikipedia

EN.WIKIPEDIA.ORG

 

How about all the 1000's of other smaller languages around the world and regional  dialects? Dead languages? world would be boring place without the cultural diversity if they all died out.

 

.

[breffni]

40 minutes ago, Big J said:

Moorlands, in the form that we find them now, are not natural landscapes. Far from it. Given that there is limited ecological benefit of maintaining them in their present state, and that they are ecomomically useless (in their present state), I'd say planting them with sitka is a bloody good idea. In the UK we import 80% of our timber, and the likelihood is that in a post covid world that imports will be hamstrung to a presently unknown extent. If nothing else, surely if makes sense to grow the timber we need on our doorstep rather than import it from afar. One of the main fuels for the CHP plant in Kent is imported eucalyptus chip from New Zealand, for instance. 

 

Plant the flat lowlands with fast growing fuel timber (euc, willow, pop etc), plant the hillsides with native broadleaf for habitat and biodiversity and plant the uplands with softwood for structural timber. Simples. The UK's 13% forest cover is laughable.

What about any wildlife that lives in open moorland? Or the lowlands you're planning to plant? 

[Squaredy]

2 hours ago, Big J said:

Languages are tools and allow the speaker access and participation in societies that speak them. My point with regards to Welsh is that everyone who speaks Welsh also speaks English. And English is also spoken by another 1.5 billion people, so objectively, it's a much more useful language. If the time and expense of teaching someone Welsh was put into one of the World languages, the children growing up there now would have far broader horizons.

 

Also, anecdotally from contributors to this thread, it appears that the English teaching is suffering to an extent due to the Welsh teaching. I may of course be wrong.

 

The UK is woefully awful at languages as a whole. Compared to our European neighbours, we're generally pretty mono-lingual. The Swedes teach English from an early age with a third language being taught slightly later. As such, they all have pretty much perfect English by the time they leave school. 

There is no denying the logic of your argument, Spanish or French would be a far more useful language.  But as has been pointed out local cultures are also important and of course in Wales there is a strong resentment to everything being anglicised due to hundreds of years of blatant repression from Westminster governments.  This is why the Welsh language society has a lot of power.

 

 Is it really a good use of resources to put so much emphasis on Welsh language?  Is it really money well spent to have reversing warnings on dustbin lorries in Welsh and then English in Cardiff (a largely English speaking area)?  For an English only speaker they may have been run over by the time the warning gets to the English version!  
 

My wife and I sent our kids to a Welsh language school largely because they have a much better reputation and because they say it helps with learning generally to be bilingual at an early age.

[difflock]

My take on the teaching of minority languages, for which there is apparently passionate burning support for in the local communities, is wtf does its teaching  then need to be so generously government funded?

Surely passionate volunteers and parents at home could pass it on, IF there is such community support?

And bilingual road signage is just plain stupid, especially if safety related.

And dont get me started at the mulitlingual written signs and other shite within the "underfunded" NHS.

Marcus

[Mick Dempsey]

If the Welsh really wanted to piss off the English they should teach them modern languages with the same fervour that they teach Welsh.

Imagine a bright young generation holidaying, doing business and influencing the world at large whilst their English peers stood by, dumb as posts.

But if they want the next generation to continue to live in an open air museum or a ‘reservation’ they’re going the right way about it.