by Since I last wrote I’ve spent three hours with my youngest student, over two sessions. It’s felt closer to three days. What on earth do I do with him for 90 minutes?! He’s a nice kid, and he turns six next month. Last night I had a long chat to my university friend, and we agreed that things are fundamentally different below the age of about seven. The language stuff becomes secondary. The whole concept of reading gets tricky. Simple games with dice are no longer so simple. What exactly is six plus five? Is that even a number? At that age, it’s hard even to get kids to sit still. In the last two sessions I’ve done Simon Says and “Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes”, and one or two other bits and pieces involving animals or food; otherwise I’ve just let him play. I’m not complaining in any way here. Dealing with children so young is an interesting challenge for me, and one I certainly haven’t solved yet. (I wish I’d stood my ground when I first met his mother, though. An hour is plenty long enough.)
On Sunday and Monday I created and introduced a new card game. First I sourced 52 images from the internet; for each letter of the alphabet, two pictures began with that letter (for instance, umbrella and unicorn for U). Then I painstakingly printed and cut out all the images, and glued them to pieces of card. I added a 53rd card that acted as a joker; I was going to allow it to stand for any letter, but figured that would make life too easy for anyone who happened to draw the joker, so instead I allowed it to represent any vowel. At the start of the game each player receives seven cards, and you pick up and offload cards rummy-style. The winner is the first player to have cards showing images beginning with seven consecutive letters, such as QRSTUVW. The game was a success, I’d say. It helped with my students’ vocabulary and got them to think about the alphabet and vowels and words that begin with Q and W and the like, that basically don’t exist in Romanian.
If I find the time I’ll try and create some more games. I’ve got the idea of a pizza-related board game running around in my head, as well as ones that involve building skyscrapers and climbing mountains, although actually making those last two might prove beyond me.
Last weekend I had a Skype chat to my cousin in a fairly wet Wellington. We spoke later than we normally do, and the boys were either elsewhere or tucked up in bed. Normally when I ask about the boys, everything is always damn near perfect, with their achievements running the gamut from A-pluses to gold medals to virtuoso performances in underwater debating. But this time, with the boys away from the camera, it was different. The oldest and youngest boys were still going great guns, but the middle one seemed to be suffering from significant mental health issues. He’s only 14, but that’s plenty old enough, unfortunately. It was sad to hear that, and it made me wish I was still ten minutes’ drive away, and could pop round and chat to him. I suggested to my cousin that with all his schoolwork and extra-curricular activities, his life is quite high-octane for a 14-year-old, and maybe it would help if he slowed down a bit. That might not be the reason at all, though. Quite possibly he’s being bullied at school.
Boris. He got voted in as prime minister by a two-to-one margin. No surprises there. My friend from Birmingham suggested we could be heading for a general election, which he tips the Tories to win, and a no-deal exit. Looking at the people he has brought into his cabinet (and those he’s replaced) I can’t think much beyond “holy shit” at this stage.
