Sometimes there just doesn’t seem to be enough hours in a day to fit in what needs to be done, and there seems to be not enough weeks in the year for the school curriculum.
There are forty academic weeks to the Australian school year, little enough time for what needs to be learned. The problem is the school year is not exactly forty weeks.
There are several public holidays to be removed, and then there are “student free” days also to be taken out. If we remove the school camp that all students seem to be attending these day, sick days and time spent out of school for one reason or another (sports, museums, etc.) then we have a shortened academic year.
This all puts our teachers, and students, under pressure as a larger amount of acquired knowledge is squeezed into a reduced amount of attended time.
“A” initially stood for Academic Year but now I think it should stand for “Attendance”.
So, how do you make a better student? Don’t add to the problem by reducing your student’s school attendance by removing them from school for a week’s holiday because it is more convenient.
A little boy was climbing a mountain in the snowy weather with all his supplies. He saw chameleons coming out of a rock. This surprised him because he was climbing in Australia. So, maybe they were sucked up in a tornado? Next, he saw tweetie-birds. But he kept walking up the slope because his home was half-way up the mountain. He kept climbing past the witches’ hut, which he’d never seen before because it was not real. He was really surprised that day on his climb.
One Christmas Eve one thousand years ago, in the workhouse where the elves were making sure all the presents were working, a reindeer named Kyle was humming to himself while watching the elves work. He was unhappy because Santa didn’t choose him to lead the sleigh. As he went looking for Santa, he ran into another reindeer who told him to go away. It all got better for Kyle when Mrs Clause heard him singing and told him how special he was. That Christmas Eve was one that Kyle would never forget.
On Christmas Eve, the McDermids decided to go to the shopping centre to buy presents. They already knew what they wanted to buy from watching television. Mr. and Mrs. McDermid saw Santa at the shopping centre and pointed, but the children thought he was a scary clown. They wanted to go straight home and that night, when they should have been asleep, the children got up to wait for Santa. It was the scary clown who came down the chimney with some presents.
Only on dark nights when there is no moon, from a big house in the city, the ginger and black cat leaves to go out adventuring. She is small, friendly and adventurous. She goes, with her friends, to an underground river where there is a little house that is full of woolly pink balls and cat food that tastes like marshmallows. They play for three hours, eat for one hour and then they sleep until they wake up. On dark nights the cat goes home and then she goes to sleep.
Ryan the Rhino had one mission in life and that was to become an undercover member of Charlie’s Angels. The problem was he couldn’t shoot a gun, he was too big and he was not agile on his feet at all. At the Charlie’s Angels course, the gun slipped from his hand and when he bent down, a huge crack meant he had a tear in his pants and the whole class cracked up. His cheeks flamed bright red and he stomped out of the room, which showed the Angels that he was not light on his feet. A trainer said to him, “Ryan, I’m sorry but you can’t be an angel”, but Ryan never gave up his dream of joining Charlie.
Type ‘student’ into Fotolia and you have 14337 pages of pupils sitting quietly at their desk diligently working away. DREAM ON.
When John and Jeff came to the ditch on the way to school, Jeff slipped and hit his head on a stick. The ten-year-old twins were alike in many ways as both were playful and blonde. John came down to Jeff to remove the stick from his head when suddenly a vicious alligator burst from the water and chased them up the slope and all the way to school. The teacher opened the window and through a baton at the alligator and the kids ran into the school room. The teacher said, “That’s what happens when you’re late for school’.
On a rainy, cold winter morning in Dublin, Alex and Fiona watched in amazement as everyone around them slowly disappeared into the foggy air. They heard a loud cheer and clinks and clanks that could be sword fighting and they realised they had somehow been transported into the middle of a gladiator fight. A big, strong man charged over and forced two golden swords into their hands and told them to fight for their life. Alex stabbed with his sword at a highly-scarred, fierce gladiator who collapsed with a gasp, and Fiona fought a ferocious lion who bit off her leg. Suddenly the cheering crowd disappeared into the foggy air and they rushed to the Dublin hospital to save Fiona’s life.
It was a beautiful day on the beach for Samantha because she loved all the people and dogs surrounding her. She loved laughter and barking. She heard some people singing “Happy Birthday” and then she had a great idea. She bought ice-cream for everyone because it was her birthday too. Soon everyone was singing “Happy Birthday” to Samantha as they licked their ice-creams.
XtraMile Tuition Strategies (North Brisbane) - 0415 049461 