tonygoodson

Take Me Home Country Roads

Visited my childhood last week.  Back to the country roads of Cheshire (nr Manchester, England).  So good to be back home (I keep expressing joy with song titles or lyrics!)

I'd started blogging/writing about my childhood in 2002, so it was good to revisit the writing in reality, 9 years later.  How was it?  Did reality warp or destroy the memories or writing?  I'd been warned that going back to London and Manchester, from Australia, things would appear much smaller than in my mind's eye.

In fact, on the whole things were the same or larger, such as the road in our street where we played football as kids.  What most struck me in going back to Handforth and into the The Valley behind our house where I played out my childhood, is the march of nature.  Nature is relentless, people aging, buildings and structures under threat from 50 years of nature knocking.

It's amazing how the acres of my green grass childhood are now overgrown with new and thick vegetation.  Rivers have changed courses over those 50 years.  And other parts have remained unaltered. Even the 1960s graffiti has survived. 

I can feel a novel inside me, set in the 60s with my childhood memories as the background rather than the theme of the novel.  But I don't yet know what I'd like to write about as the main them of a novel, with this childhood 60s stuff in the background.  A Kestype novel perhaps, Kestrel for a Knave?

I can't explain, just how green and beautiful Cheshire looks on a visit, after 9 years of living in Australia.  I'm happy to be living in Melbourne, a city near the sea (ok, Bay), but Cheshire sure looks lush and green.

Things I like

I thought I’d do a recap on things I like right now, instead of the slight blogging bias towards whinging, complaining and ranting! It’s easy to write about the things I like, I just look out across my table/desk and see what’s lying around and closest to me;

Podcasts – I’m loving listening to Adam Carolla, Fighting Talk, Danny Baker, Sportsweek, 606 Football Phone-in, TWiT, Jonathan Ross, Desert Island Discs, and where has Christian O’Connell gone?

Audio Books – WoW!  Audible audio books, the two I’ve listened to recently are fantastic, The Outliers read by Malcolm Gladwell, and A Short History of Nearly Everything, by Bill Bryson, which I’m certainly getting my money’s worth on that audio book!

iPhone – Yes, easy to use, this is my first phone which gives me web and email access, some of the apps, audio books, maps,  access to everything

Keyboard – 15 bucks for a Microsoft keyboard.  Excellent.

Sansa Clip – My portable, cycling, walking, on the train, mp3 podcast player.  Excellent.

My Job – Loving the job.  Not easy on some days, but it’s something I can really get my teeth into.

Piano – My 6 year old son has cleaned me out of every simple piano duet I know, in less than 2 months.  Playing piano duets with your kids, a dream come true!

Using old stuff – I’ve resurrected my old Samsung LCD screen, it’s nearly 9 years old but going strong, as a second screen for my netbook.

Cheapo Copy Aftershave – The alcohol works a treat inside my shoes!!

And finally, Ergonomic Cycling HandleBar Grips!!  I can’t explain how much better my riding position is, being able to rest the palms of my hands on these grips.

“When the dog bites, when the bee stings, when I’m feeling sad, I simply remember my favourite things, and then I don’t feel so bad!!”

Gold Coast 2010 v Benidorm 1970

The parallels are remarkable!  The thing is, my Dad married my Mum, and had 2 kids, me and my sister.  I am at the same age now as when my Dad was married, married my wife and have two kids of same age.  So 40 years on, I have a direct comparison of life.

I’m on a Gold Coast holiday in Queensland, Australia.  Holy Shit, I thought as I arrived, this is like Benidorm!!  And I wondered where I was 40 years ago this year, err, Benidorm!  Yep, World Cup year, 40 years ago, I was in Benidorm, Spain, during the World Cup.  40 years later, I’m with my kids, World Cup year, in the Gold Coast, Surfer’s Paradise, Australia.

What’s changed?  The swimming pools are more landscaped and there’s a bit more shade!!  Same people, Aussies in Australia, not Brits in Spain, and no Spanish waiters to play football against!

Now you’d think that the quality of life would have improved, but other than aircon and TVs in the room, not much has changed, except Factor 30 instead of frying oil.  We are probably the first generation with an equal or lesser financial quality of life than our parents, and I was thinking how those package holidays of 40 years ago were all inclusive.  “Like Club Med.” my wife said as I tried to explain 1970s package holidays, “Yeah, but at a fraction of the price.”  Everything was inclusive then, except the drinks.  Flights, hotel, transport to and from the hotel, food.  The lot.  I guess many of the package tour and airlines of that era went bust, so maybe it wasn’t such a good business, but surely it’s possible to still put low coast all inclusive holidays together, here in Queensland.  Maybe it happens, but I haven’t heard anyone bragging about it.

The airlines would love it.  The hotel and accommodation places would love it, the restaurants and food places wouldn’t love it, because that’s where the money is made now, charging us day after day for food and drinks.

But you know, kids are kids, and what they want is to be in the swimming pool all day, with their friends.  Just like me 40 years ago.  C’mon Ingerland to Go Aussie.

Learning to be a Creative Genius

Déjà Vu, I come here to write about 10,000 Hours to Become a Genius, and realised I’d already used exactly the same title when writing about exactly the same subject last November.

So let’s call this Part II.  I’ve realised recently that for 42 years I’ve been struggling.  Struggling to fit into an education and white collar working system that has a very narrow confine on what is intelligence.  And I’ve fitted in, I’ve had to, but at great cost to myself and talents.

At aged 6, I was highly mathematical, spatial, chess, sporty, but I couldn’t handwrite properly, struggled to spell, couldn’t draw well, struggled with English comprehension.  I was a classic geek, shy of girls (but loved them really), crap dancer.

My 10,000 hours of genius, didn’t go into a single subject but across a number of subjects.  Sport, Man United, Chess, Maths, Sport, Current Affairs, TV, General Knowledge, Newspapers, Encyclopaedias, Science.

That inability to write and draw, and remember language, has been a blight on me ever since.  I’ve been blessed with enough intelligence to survive it, but I shouldn’t have to survive life.

So now my oldest child has just come through being 6, and my youngest is fast approaching 6, I’m really attuned to what’s expected of them in education, and what they can and can’t do.  But here’s my own breakthrough and realisation.  Genius may not be nature.  It might be nurture.  We find our talents out early on for ourselves, or someone helps us.

I say this because, I’m noticing some things my kids aren’t learning for themselves.  That doesn’t mean they can’t do something, just that they don’t know how to.  Jay’s reading is great now he’s started school, and I should know, I taught him (proud Dad), but his handwriting and drawing are behind many of the kids in his class.  Mmm funny, but that’s me at school all over again.

Now, for the last few years, I’ve been looking for a cartooning book to help me learn to draw for when I’m training and writing on boards and flipcharts.  I made a concerted effort to find a book this week, for my sake and now for Jay’s.  And hallelujah, I’ve found it. 1001 Awesome Things To Draw.  A fantastic book.  Suddenly I’m a genius cartoonist (and so is Jay) just by following the rules.  Neither of us can naturally draw, but who can.  The untold secret is that many children and adults, learn to draw using the rules, without telling the rest of us, what the rules are.

It’s the same with Improv.  You may look at Who’s Line is it Anyway and Thank God You’re Here, and watch in wonderment at how those performers and comedians take on random situations and be so funny.  It’s rules based.  There are basic Improv rules, which if you follow with a few hours of practice, I’ll guarantee most people can get up there and perform very well.

 

And I’ve just bought a book on design and layout, How to Understand and Use Design and Layout. It’s rules based again, along with some artistic genius!  It’s taken me years to find a good book on Design and a good book on Cartooning, and now I can be an Artistic genius like the rest of you.  Now I just need to find those 10,000 hours!

Happy Festivus

Not happy with Christmas, but feel something is lacking?  Then give Festivus a go, and have a “Happy Festivus from the rest of us”

I’m not sure to what degree Festivus is celebrated in the world, beyond Seinfeld, it seems to be based on real events dating back to Feb ‘66.

Take part in;

• Airing of Grievances
• Feats of Strength
• Festivus Miracles
• Buy your Festivus Pole
• And the Festivus Dinner!

Let's Go Fly a Kite

My kids bought me a kite for Father's Day last week. The kite crashed and burned today, so it set me thinking about buying a proper stunt kite, but they're expensive.  I was also thinking about the kites I had as a kid, and went hunting for the Rotor Plan Kite, I think my auntie in Australia bought me, when she was visiting the UK.

I loved it.  Rotating wings which took it into the air.  Very different from your usual kite. I thought I'd be able to find it, and pictures of the kite, on the internet, but there's only one reference I can find, which exactly describes the kite I had, which you can see the drawing on the left, Rotor Plane Kite.  There are some updated versions of the kite, so maybe I'll go buy.  Ahhhh, childhood memories.  It's set me thinking about what my Top 10 childhoodtoys were.  In fact, I just realised, I've already written about it 5 years ago.  Toys.

• Scalectrix
• Subbuteo
• Secret Sam (always wanted a Johnny Seven) (Holy shit the power of the Internet I’ve put a link in to Secret Sam!)
• Mattel Hot Wheels
• Corgi Cars and later Track
• Yellow Jensen Interceptor Corgi Car
• James Bond Car
• Bat Mobile
• Mouse Trap
• Airfix Models
• Monopoly, Cluedo, Popping Hoppits, Pick Up Sticks
• Chess
• A Doll! A Black Doll! Teddy. Leo the Lion. Sooty. Mickey
• Roller Skates
• Small Tricycle, Big Tricycle, Small Bike, Big Bike, Raleigh
   Europa Racer (Just Like Sporting Superstars)
• Man City Football Kit (oh shit I’m a Man Utd fan)
• Bow and Arrows with Target (the real thing)
• Dart Board and Darts
• Sport Equipment too numerous to discuss here and now
• Casey Football (Lace Up)
• Leather Football Non-Lace Up
• Kites, especially my yellow and red rotating wing plane
• Blow Football
• Pea Shooter, Cap Gun, Spud Gun, Rocket Caps
• Catapult Planes, Wind-Up Balsa Planes, Helicopter Band launched thing!
• Bilofix (Wooden Version of Mecanno)
• Plasticine and Play- Doh

Fun with Peter and Jane!

This reading thing with Jay (aged 4) is getting serious.  It's very clear to me that he's whole word reading and not Phonic reading words.  Phonics which has been all the rage for decades it seems, breaks words down into their constituent parts, and identifies the variations in short and long vowels, as well as different sounding letters.

Jay is lapping up the individual sounds.  He wants more and more.  However, he has almost no ability to run the sounds together into words.  That's ok, he's 4 and I'm starting him a year early.

However, once I realised this, I picked a word he'd love, and let him learn that one word whole, so he has an anchor for other words.  The chosen word is...."cat".  Now he's identifying "cat" throughout the book, and of course his own name "jay" if that were in the book.

But get this, c...a...t, "Yes that's right Jay, cat.  Now this word is similar." r.....a.....t.  What do you think he read the word as after he sounded the r,a, and t? He said, "similar"!!  Very funny.  But I suddenly realised he can't see the relationship between cat and rat.  No idea, even if I rhyme them, or cover the c and r.

So I started to delve into how I learned to read.  In the UK in the 60s we had the Peter and Jane books or Janet and John, which are whole word books now out of fashion.  But get this, the research for the books was based on the fact that 12 words account for a quarter of our language, and 100 words account for half our language so it makes sense to learn those words, especially if like Jay you seem to like whole words.  I'm really tempted to buy Peter and Jane books, and Go Dog Go as a learning to read book, and let's see if he can learn in weeks as opposed to months.  I'm betting he can.  He loves it.

Let's soldier on with phonics, which to me seems easier for the teacher to teach than the reader to learn, which is maybe why it's been "successful"

Teaching Kids to Read

I'm far from being an expert on teaching kids to read, but having taught my older one Georgia, who is now 6, to read, and now starting with Jay who is 4, I noticed this article in The Guardian today, Union reading guidance to move away from phonics 

Citing mounting evidence of a crisis in children's happiness and mental health, the National Union of Teachers will today debate calls to scrap the most restrictive elements of the national curriculum and reverse a government order that literacy be taught through phonics.

The book I used to teach Georgia is Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons by Englemann Haddox and Bruner.  This is definitely a phonics book, which breaks words into their constituent sounds. It worked at first, and we got to page 300, and then Georgia gave up when the orthography was removed.  Orthography is additional signing and closing of letters together to give kids an idea of how words like "sh" sound or variation in short and long sounding vowels.

It was also very clear to me that whilst phonics is a good way for anyone to teach someone to read at the beginning, in reality we as humans use pick up "whole" words.  I can see it with Georgia, who recognised the whole word, not the breakdown of it, just like us, as adult readers.  If she or we come to a word we don't recognise, we use a number of different strategies, of which I reckon phonics is a small proportion of the tools.

So now with Jay, I've started him on the phonics book, but I'm recognising, that just like Georgia, he wants to move around the book, he has limited attention, he likes to "cheat" by memorising or guessing the whole word, which suggests that phonics isn't natural.

So my advice.  Start with phonics, and move very quickly away from it, especially if your child isn't taking to it.

Lifestyle Buying Decisions

We're moving house for the first time since we arrived in Australia 6 years ago, and it's a good time to re-assess our lifestyle and our purchasing decisions.

I say that, because it was fascinating to arrive in a country with a clean slate and work out what purchasing decisions we made and why.

Firstly, we spent a high proportion of our savings on buying two used cars, which we still have, however, I haven't used my car for over a year!  It's remained on the drive, a combination of cost of repair and cost to put back on the road, but also moving towards a Greener lifestyle.  You do sometimes need the flexibility of two cars with two young kids now at school, but what we save on money and the environment by not having a second car can sometimes be spent on hiring a car, or taxis, and it certainly has encouraged me to use public transport and cycle.  When I arrived, I drove everywhere, now I cycle or take public transport for most of the time.

Next....I've just signed up for Skype Pro.  I have a Skype-In 03 Melbourne number, Skype Pro gives me free calls to anywhere in Australia with the exception of mobiles, with a 6 cent connection charge per call, and a monthly $3 fee.  WoW!  So far so good.  I've been conferencing on Skype both to Skype users and several landlines all at the same time, for over an hour!

What it does mean is I need stable Broadband, so bizarrely I've come a full circle and would like to stick with Telstra Cable!!  In fact, I might pay more for an upgraded service to a higher speed.  I'd move to ADSL if it's reliable.  Is it?  Can you guarantee that, now I'm using VoIP even more?  We'll still keep a landline, and of course there are our mobiles which have evolved to low cost Nokias and Vodafone Pre-Paid.

I'm just looking at all the other bills.  I guess we'll take whatever utilities are already at the new place.  Foxtel?  I've given up on TV and cable.  Annie my wife, still has some TV addictions.  Let's see on that one.

A Nintendo Gamecube has recently entered our lives, Mario Kart and Sonic.  Three of us are happy with that!  Wi-Fi to keep the kids off my laptop.

We're looking to go out less and entertain more at home, now having a bigger place.  I'd love for both kids to be within walking distance of school, but that's not quite there yet.

And the junk and old toys in the garage?  Mmmmmm.  We've just put the main baby things up for sale via an agent who handles eBay sales.  Maybe next time we'll sell direct on eBay.

I've written all this, because I'm excitedly looking forward to the new place, and at the same time looking back to how things have changed and what I'd have done differently starting 6 years ago. 

What is a Great Father?

I'd like my epitaph to be.

"He Was a Great Father"

Even before I had kids, I knew that's what I wanted to be remembered for.  It would have been difficult but not impossible to achieve, without my own kids.  And now I have kids, I've been wondering what is a Great Father.  Funny, but a friend pointed out, that only I can see myself as a Great Father, realising I've done my very best, but my kids may not notice or appreciate it!!

I was looking back recently at my parents.  What did they do well, and what could have been better.

There are some material things which were great as kids.  Great holidays, the excitement and smell of new cars, a newly hired TV, Dad's new gadgets, eating out in Manchester, Big Birthday presents.  Letting friends come round to wreck the house.  My parents not being too mad at smashed windows from the football!

Some things didn't count for much, or we didn't notice it.  A big house, financial security, new clothes, schools (as long as it wasn't boarding school or too rough).

It would have been nice for my parents to be world experts in anything I suddenly took an interest in.  That may have been too much to ask!!

A few other things to consider, which I'm learning about now as a parent and things I appreciate my parents for. Being available not just present.  Not arguing in front of us.  No shouting.  Physically playing with us.  Joining in games.  Giving space and privacy.  The fine line between forcing musical practice and letting it go. The same with homework.  Big birthday presents carefully thought out.  Dropping off and picking up from school.  Being there on the sideline and understanding my sport.  Talking Football.  Letting us watch grown up programmes. Almost no censorship. Protecting us from bullying kids or parents or teachers. Lots of chocolate! Lots of pocket money.

I don't know if you can ever achieve Great Fatherhood.  Who knows how my kids will change in personality and what they want, if anything, as they grow older.

On the other hand a few high doses of Ritalin may sort it all out. I found this film The Drugging of Our Children, completely shocking.