what do you see?

What do you see when you look at this photo? A car? A particularly clean and shiny car that has been meticulously polished? A car so clean that even the tyres sparkle?

What do I see when I look at this photo? And what do I see when I look at my alphabetised DVDs, and my colour coded post-it stocks, and my overly sharpened pencils?
What do I see?
I see that I have a huge pile of exams papers to mark, of grades to collate, of reports to write; and the king of procrastination is sitting on his throne.

mr C does math -- badly

I was going through my file today and I stumbled on something that I had been working on whilst subbing maths in a local grammar school. While I was there I was inspired to break out of the little box that constrains me, that stamps the label ‘literary arts and humanities’ on my forehead. I wanted to do something that would shatter the boundaries of perceived consciousness forever. I wanted to be the first English teacher to discover a modern mathematical law.

For too long we have been told that there are those who are good at creative tasks, those who are good with their hands, those who are good at seeing the big picture, those who are good at problem solving, those who are good with people, those who are good with shapes, those who are good with numbers, those who are good with words, those who are good with money, those who are good at spending money. Can we not shave off harsh corners and become more rounded individuals? Can a mathematician not write a sonnet? Can an artist not paint a scientific truth? A sociologist not gaze in wonder at a rock formation? A Historian not appreciate the idiosyncratic features of a foreign language?
Can a writer not master calculus?

If Leonardo Devinci teaches us anything it’s that we can multiskill. A painter, a mathematician, an inventor, an anatomist, a sculptor, an engineer, a botanist, a technologist, a musician, a linguist, a scientist, an author… Now he would have made a damn fine substitute teacher.

So I set about creating a formula that would change the world – and possibly make carbon neutral space travel a reality. I sharpened my pencils, looked out my most accurate rulers, protractors, compasses… and began

So there we have it. Mr C’s law of… well, I don’t know what it’s a law of. I only said I’d come up with it – I didn’t mention actually suggesting what it does. However I did take a stab at explaining how it works for those who, like me, feel more comfortable in the realms of literary classics than mathematical genius

And for those who struggle with my infantile scribbling:

The quality of κ is not constrain’d,
It droppeth as the gentle rain from the hypothenuse
Upon the adjacent beneath. It is twice factored;
It factors the χ that adds and the ў that subtracts.
‘Tis greatest in the versin; it becomes
The triangle better than cosine;
His right angle shows the definite integral, 2α + κν;
It is enthroned in the hearts of trigonometric functions;
It is an attribute of Leibniz himself;
And mathematics pure doth then show likest Leibniz
When trigonometry doth season calculus. Therefore literaturalist,
Though poetical prose be your plea, consider this:
That in the course of geometry, none of us
Should see polynominals. We do pray for prime numbers
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render…
…The ratio of κ (to ½π²)

I thank you.

welcome to the nineties

For someone with my reputation for loving gadgets and technology you may be surprised to know that I relied on dial-up internet access right up until yesterday. I may have embraced digital photo and video editing years ago, been building websites for a decade, creating flash applications et al et al… but until yesterday I was still listening to that ring tone followed by a whine and praying that it would connect so I could spend three hours downloading a 15 second youtube movie.

It was a golden time filled with hope, anticipation and ultimately disappointment. I would cross my fingers that I could connect, three attempts later and my 23kbps would fill me with joy unbounded. I would write a couple of short novels as the % download complete bar would tick slowly along; and then somewhere between the 85%-90% mark windows update would discover I needed something important and bring the whole connection to a snails pace before dropping it completely.

It took a month, some bizarre telephone conversations to Delhi (I presume), three BT engineers, three BT vans, several trips to the telephone exchange and three separate routers – but now the bad old days of dial-up are at an end. I should apologise to anyone who had an emergency telephone incident and couldn’t find an engineer to fix it for two days – they were all at my house. Nice guys they are too.

So broadband has made my life better? It has enabled me to go on the computer, complete my tasks in seconds and then log off and do something fun?

Ah, no. If only. Now I just fill that time with even more useless, inane tasks. Now I’m spending even more time online, but doing less – how does that work exactly?

must try harder

If there is one task I can't stand doing it is writing reports. In my job I do these for pupils at the end of each term - I would have thought I'd be an expert by now. Fortunately the range of things I have to report on in Learning Support is vast and makes the process much more straight forward. It is in my subject teaching that I struggle.

You see I also teach a couple of periods of drama. I love drama, and I love teaching drama. And the fact that I only teach one class makes it something I look forward to as a bit of a change. It also means that I don't have too many reports to write. Thirteen to be precise.

Why am I struggling to come up with thirteen individual comments? There are teachers out there who have hundreds. I know each of the children personally. I can describe them in great depth. I can see dramtic potential (or lack thereof) in each and could talk about it for hours. But putting it down in one short phrase without resorting to cliches is proving to be a difficult task.

Keen, hard working, attempts everything to the best of their ability.

An energetic and enthusiastic pupil with a great imagination.

Shows good understandingpleasant and cooperative has a good grasp of the basic skills required.

an excellent independent learner.

They really should teach us how to do this stuff during teacher training. My brain has gone blank and I've turned to this blog as my favoured method for procrastination. There are web sites out there to help come up with things to say - but the NI Education network (C2K) has blocked them. Typical!

cup of tea anyone - i'll put the kettle on.

And so it begins - and so immediately I go into automatic maximum level procrastiantion mode with deflectors at full. I hate this time of year. This is the time of year when I begin applying for jobs. I hate applying for jobs.

The reasons why I need to apply for jobs annually are complicated so I won't bore you with them. This year it is even more important - yet still I sit typing a blog instead of a CV. I have two application forms sitting very neatly in a yellow folder along with practise sheets and relevent information - colour coded of course. I could have filled them in at any point during my Easter break - I could have filled them in during the weekend - I could have; but instead I have an incredibly tidy room, a shiney car and a computer which has been spring cleaned, defragmanted, updated, virus scanned and disk checked within an inch of its life. The keys are spotless but I have yet to use them to type up the forms.

Why is it that we are so reluctant to do the things that actually matter - or is it just me? Does anybody else find making choices that will actually affect their future incredibly difficult? Am I the only person who prefers cleaning toilets to updating resumes and CVs?

I keep thinking to myself that I'm waiting until I have a clear mind, that I will begin as soon as I am in the right mood. But, lets face the truth, the very act of thinking about the application forms is clouding my mind and putting me in the wrong mood. I will never be in the right mood to fill in forms describing my academic status and employability. Still, the deadline isn't for a week and I always end up getting it done eventually - It's just a bit of procrastination and that's not hurting anyone, is it?

Well according to the Counselling Services at the University at Buffalo it can be very damaging. They claim that procrastination...
can lead to feelings of guilt, inadequacy, depression and self-doubt... Procrastination has a high potential for painful consequences.

So now I'm feeling guilty, inadequate, depressed, self doubting... and scared.

Thankfully they have a checklist to help me out (I thought they might)
· Recognize self-defeating problems such as; fear and anxiety, difficulty concentrating, poor time management, indecisiveness and perfectionism.
· Identify your own goals, strengths and weaknesses, values and priorities. Compare your actions with the values you feel you have. Are your values consistent with your actions?
· Discipline yourself to use time wisely: Set priorities.
· Work in small blocks instead of long time periods. For example, you will accomplish more if you work in 60 minute blocks and take frequent 10 minute breaks in between, than if you work for 2-3 hours straight, with no breaks. Reward yourself after you complete a task.
· Motivate yourself to work: Dwell on success, not on failure. Try to work in small groups. Break large assignments into small tasks. Keep a reminder schedule and checklist.
· Set realistic goals.
· Modify your environment: Eliminate or minimize noise/ distraction. Ensure adequate lighting. Have necessary equipment at hand. Don't waste time going back and forth to get things. Don't get too comfortable when studying. A desk and straight-backed chair is usually best (a bed is no place to study). Be neat! Take a few minutes to straighten your desk. This can help to reduce day-dreaming.

So now I'm all up for it and raring to go. I'm closing up now to go and fill in some forms - well, as soon as I've got over the irony of procrastinating by writing a blog on the dangers of procrastination... and made myself a cup of tea... and filled in some education reviews... and double checked my timetable for this term... and changed the yellow file for a green one...