TEACHING STUDENTS TO WRITE SHORT REPORTS

I arrived in Busu High School in Papua New Guinea in 1995 and was given grade 9 English. It took months to realize why this should be. That was the year before grade 10 and internal results were entered fo the Grade 10 internal assessment.

I took the 3 grade 9 English classes and was saddened that the students all sat in their desks like dodos. They knew very little about anything.

At that time, I had bought a portable TV with a cassette in the top. I decided that the way to have students write was to teach them about the world. Then they would write about it.

Each Sunday night, I taped the most exciting story on the TV program 60 Minutes. On Monday morning, I would bring the TV into the 3 classes and we would watch the program. Then we would talk about it. I would give the world picture. That would take up the lesson.

I also went to the video library and hired a range of movies that we wrote on. I recall the movie Zulu and the gruesome story of the suicides of the followers of Jim Jones in Guinea. We learned so much about the world in that year.

We talked about the programs and I would place 10 questions on the blackboard. The students would answer in a sentence. If there was time, we would watch the program again. Students started talking and abandoned their code of silence.

Next day, I asked the questions from the previous day. Then I would have them write a paragraph based on the answers to those questions.

Next day, I would have them take out the paragraph and circle any words repeated. They would then rewrite the paragraph. I would collect the answer sheets and correct each paragraph.  They would rewrite the paragraph with corrections.

A month later, I reminded them about the story of the Kangaroo Hunters and would give them 25 minutes to rewrite from memory. This was speed writing in preparation for the Written Expression exam. The task was repeated about 20 times in the year. Writing skill improved.

About 12 months later, I had left the school and the grade 9 students had gone on to grade 10. One day, I met the Principal down town. I asked how the students went in the exam. He said that most gained Distinctions and Credits.

EDUCATION IN COUNSELLING STUDENTS

There is ample opportunity for schools in Papua New Guinea to set up a study that has both an educational and counselling function for students starting from Grade 6.

There is the Personal Development course that starts in primary school and goes through to high school. It should help all students to answer life questions that will confront them in only a few years to come. There is the question of domestic violence.

The boys and girls should start to think about the qualities of the person they would marry. They look at family and the roles of parents in looking after children. The teacher is partly a counsellor in helping students to move to the next phase of their lives.

Then there is the Language and Literature study that introduces students to resource material on a range of topics. There are often topics that mesh with the family focus on Personal Development.

By the time the students have finished their course in grade 12, they should be able to express in their own words their response to a range of topics. They should write short essays on each of the following:

Domestic violence

Family love and caring

Role of parents

Responsibilities of father and mother

The man I would marry.

The woman I would marry.

Problems of living in Papua New Guinea

Needs of a wife

Needs of a husband

Needs of children

The teacher as counsellor should be able to promote these topics in every grade. As the students mature and move from grade to grade, their ideas will grow. By the time they finish school, they should be ready to be mature adults.

If all students achieve this then Universal Basic Education has a purpose. The purpose of school is not just to give a place at university. 

It is also to help a young person to have a positive life with a spouse and kids in a family. The present education focus should be on preparing the next generation to be loving family members.

FOOLISH TEACHERS KILLED MEMORIZATION

Sixty years ago, students memorized what they studied. It was a key faculty of the mind to be exercised. They memorized the multiplication tables, poems and mathematical theorems. They committed lists to memory for Biology, Chemistry and Physics.

Memorization enabled students to grow to adulthood with information permanently planted in their brains. It was important to memorize to learn the rhythm and music of language. 

As a child, I would be required to learn a poem for homework. Even today the weak-strong rhythm is part of everything I speak and write. 

But then there were fool educators in the United States who decided that memorization was a lower level of learning and had to be removed. It may be a lower level if promoted by itself but in conjunction with other thinking skills it is a key area to be developed.

My mother used to say that as a 14 year old, she had to learn all the capes and bays around Australia. Perhaps that was going too far but it certainly developed the skills of memorization. We are told to "use it or lose it". That applies to the mental development that goes with memorization.

Today in Papua New Guinea, the skills of memorization are long dead, except the skills of singing. Students no longer go home to learn lists of information. There is no point in asking students to write lists from memory in exam. Most could not do it.

So memorization has been replaced by the cruel and useless task of answering objective questions. Students have become intellectually lazy. They know nothing. They tick and flick responses that are already on paper. How do students study for an objective test exam?

We read in the media of the study into mathematics and science teaching in the world. The USA comes 28th at last count. Singapore and South Korea come first. A large part of this is that their students have to work hard to memorize mathematical and scientific processes.

PNG probably comes near last narrowly beating Outer Bessarabia and Easter Island.

MANY PNG STUDENTS KNOW NOTHING ABOUT ANYTHING

Teachers and students will do well if they can pull themselves out of the cultural mud. Some schools have done that.

So many students in PNG know nothing about anything. They sit in class and wait for the teacher to put a summary on the blackboard. They write the summary down and that is what they do for all their school lives. They do not think and could not put a view on any topic.

So much of school in this country is anti-intellectual. Brighter students remain silent for fear of being punished by the slower students. There can be no group work in class as most students will sit and contribute nothing. Some students will not speak during their whole stay at school over several years.

They have no experience in putting ideas together. That is why the examinations are based on objective questions. Students are not being tested on their ability to explain a concept. Most could not do it. They are tested on single facts through objective questions.

Through Universal Basic Education, the Government plans to remove examinations and put all students through to the end of high school. That is a waste of time for so many students.

The more capable students have been terrorized by the cult fights between the schools. The leaders of the cults are mainly the lower level students who are not school focused. They want to show the academic nerds that they are the leaders not the nerds. The cult fights disrupt school activities.

In government schools, it is against regulations for teachers to make individual test results known by the class. There is a reason for this. The brighter students are being protected from the lower level students who may bash them out of school.

It also means that many students can go all the way through school without accounting for their low marks. They are on a permanent holiday at school. Their report cards go into the river on the way home.

There has been a downward spiral in standards in this country mainly through a lack of English skill among so many students, a lack of interest in the world and complete lack of interest in memorization. Please click:

frustration of an expatriate teacher 

familypositiveliving.blogspot.com/.../frustration-of-expatriate-teacher.ht...

Oct 9, 2011 - FAMILY POSITIVE LIVING - AIDS HOLISTICS. faith, hope ... Teachingin a rural high school is frustrating for an expatriate teacher. Having

EXAMINATION PAPER SECURITY

When there is evidence of cheating in a PNG school exam, the blame goes to the Department of Education and the Measurement Services Division. But the breach of security may take place on route to the hundreds of schools.

Consignments of envelops can be opened at the airport or on the way to the school. Envelops can be breached by teachers before or after being placed in the safe.

Perhaps a better approach would be to change the format of papers away from the objective questions that have plagued Education for years. Focus could be on solution of problems by short answer questions.

For each subject, the Department could produce a booklet containing up to 200 test questions to cover the year's work. The students perfect each question. No indication is given on the questions to appear in the exam. The questions could be practised in the internal exams.

Then in the week before each external exam, a notice comes out on radio, television or the newspapers that the exam will cover 8 test questions 17, 24, 32, 55, 76, 81, 87 and 92 with alternatives 2, 67 and 95. Such notices could be given for every subject.

A wise old thinker once said that out of every silly idea comes the key to a brilliant plan. Let us hope that this report gives a clue to such a plan. 

Education is not only about passing the end of year exams. It is about the skills and knowledge that students take away with them into adult life. 

OBJECTIVE QUESTIONS KILL EDUCATION

In the high schools of Papua New Guinea, there is a deep and foolish focus on testing by objective questions in many subjects. This causes problems for students who may find difficulty in understanding the question asked:

The population of Papua New Guinea is rising because of:

a. high birth rate,

b. reduced death rate,

c. migration from West Papua or 

d. drift to the cities.

What is the answer? Each response is partly correct. But students will fail if they do not choose a. Objective questions have pushed schools into a lazy and incompetent approach to learning. The students often lack the English to answer. So they tick and flick whatever they think is the answer. 

Objective questions make it easy for students to cheat. They would find it more difficult to cheat with short answer questions.

The Department will stop the cheating if they published in the months before the exam, a list of 80 short answer questions to cover each subject. Students would be told that 5 of these questions will appear on the exam paper for each subject.  Each question would require a quality reasoned explanation by the students.

Students can work in study groups and practise the answers. There is no such accusation as cheating that can be made. All students are working from the same published questions. Focus in schools would change to writing skills not just mindless tick and flick responses.

They would force students away from the horror of difficult objective questions. Many teachers are incompetent at objective question design. Many deliberately make the questions too difficult. Some will make questions not valid by incorrect response alternatives.

A student can know the answer but be confused by the alternatives in objective questions. That is not a valid test. If objective questions are set, the Department must have a test bank. 

Before each question is accepted into the test bank, there has to be a trial by teachers and students with the majority choosing the correct response.

A short answer can give the solution to a small problem which requires the student to write 6-10 lines on the subject. Preparation in class has the double purpose of promoting writing skills. It would stop cheating and become team study.

So many students can not write their ideas. Many have a working vocabulary of 300 baby words. So when they prepare an assignment in high school or university, the trick is to copy from a book without acknowledgment. This is called plagiarism.

Students must be tested on what they know, not on what they do not know. Teachers must help students to achieve success. Many teachers in PNG think their job is to fail students.

Bruce Copeland BA BEdSt (University of Queensland)

Teacher in Australia and Papua New Guinea.

Since 2011, Geoffrey Nape ex-speaker of the Papua New Guinea parliament has made my life hell by stealing my elder daughter by child trafficking while I was recuperating from tuberculosis. He took a 14 year old girl and claimed her as his own.

He thinks that as a white man I am stupid and cowardly and afraid to confront him and his drunken Chimbu tribesmen. He has recently made veiled threats that if I give him trouble up to the 2017 election, I will die.

Now this paedophile Chimbu wants to take my second daughter 17 years old. He has horrified my first daughter who does not want her little sister as her sister-in-law. But Nape is the boss in that family.

He tells me he is a Chimbu chief and has made my family Chimbu and subject to all his commands. That means that I have to hand over my second daughter to him. I will kill him if he takes her and makes her pregnant.

I plan to move out of Port Moresby with my younger daughter. But Nape forbids it. He says she is a Chimbu and subject to his commands. This fool plans to be elected in 2017 and become Prime Minister or Governor General.

I have been alone bringing up my daughters from babies. But Nape has other ideas. My children’s mother has mysteriously arrived by air from the highlands. It has to be that Nape paid the fare. He now says that she is my wife after 17 years separation. He demands that I look after her.

He says that I have no right over my daughters as an expatriate and that he will negotiate to keep my second daughter through the mother.

He is supported by a great herd of Chimbu drunks around his palace in North Waigani. As the father of my first daughter, I am not allowed to enter his property and would be bashed by the security guards if I tried. He will pay for them to fly to Chimbu to vote.

He would be most unfit to serve in high office if he should be elected in 2017. He is a liar and con-man. He seems to prefer sex with young girls.

He cannot keep to the same view twenty minutes at a time. He will send me a text one minute calling me his brother. Half an hour later, he will send a text calling me a stupid arsehole. There seem to be a few mental connections loose.

He will tell me that I am the father and have the right to care for my daughter. An hour later, he will text that he is her chief and I have to get his permission to take her out of Port Moresby. He is nuts.

He is doing his best to stop me and my daughter from leaving Port Moreby. He says his Chimbu tribesmen will stop us. My younger child belongs to him so the creep thinks. I am just a Chimbu tribesman.

Recently he sent a text : “You must always abide by my management. If you don’t obey me, I will penalize you from my tribe and you will be cast out. You will be assessed by your day to day life. If I feel you should return to the tribe, I will notify you.”

Does this mean I have to become a fat Chimbu drunk? No thanks chiefy. Just keep away from my daughter. Point your penis somewhere else. He abuses me for not accepting that he is the top political figure in the nation.

He says that when he takes control of my daughter, he will ban her mobile phone. That is to block any contact with her father. She will not be allowed to have friends. 

She will be escorted to school and brought back to his palace and locked behind a steel gate. Then she will leave school on becoming pregnant to Nape.

He will be a Prime Minister or Governor General with no gender equity. My daughter will belong to him way past the age of consent. She will not be allowed to meet her father.

MASTERY EXERCISES IN FRICTION - SCIENCE

This sequence of mastery exercises has been prepared to demonstrate Mastery Learning to the Papua New Guinea Department of Education.

So much nonsense has been written about this strategy that it is time to demonstrate beyond all doubt. The inventor of Mastery Learning intended breaking skills down to basics from the higher level skills.

The idea was for the teacher to take a concept such as heat / friction and set down an inventory of every possible application. Then the students and teacher would solve the problems.

The teacher knew the related theory having used the theory to identify the practical applications. But the students are not advised yet. They work out the related theory having solved the problems.

But some fool teachers in the United States removed the basics and increased research. They called it Outcome Based Education and blamed the founder Dr Benjamin Bloom for its failure.

Mastery Learning was intended to pass the slower students and lift high the more capable students. It was a response to the US Government paranoia on the Russians sending up the satellite Sputnik.

MASTERY LEARNING IN SCIENCE

The sequence in Friction below consists of 70 small mastery exercises appropriate for primary school students supported and guided by the teachers. All have a common theme of friction. Solving one problem provides the key to the next problem and so on.

This module in friction could be submitted to a design team of science teachers who might be able to add dozens more exercises. The sequences could be rearranged and added to from the class room.

Some problems may be easily solved by students. But they may not have thought of the issue in that way.

Problems that are interesting could be given more focus by teacher and students. They may not have thought of electricity generated by friction from blood passing through the blood system. Then they learn that sharks can detect the electric pulses from fish and swimmers.

They may not have thought that the world depends on friction. Without friction, we could not walk, climb or run. Cars could not run. Pulleys could not work.

We start with the real situations and explain what is happening. Then we work out the theory behind the scenarios. This is INDUCTIVE LEARNING. There is no focus on theory as we see in classes today. We answer the problem and the question WHY?

 
S

What happens when we rub our hands together?

Explain how villagers make fires with sticks.

Feel tires of a car that driven a long way. What do you feel?

What happens to moving cars if we pour oil on the road?

When do most moving cars have accidents?

Do drivers have to move slower or faster during pouring rain?

How does friction cause danger to a racing car?

Why do many cars have accidents on a bend in the road?

What causes a vehicle to overturn and roll?

How does a propeller make the boat go forward?

How does a propeller make an aircraft go forward?

Why can flies and lizards climb walls?

What problem would a snake have in moving if no friction?

Explain how friction is reduced in the skin of an aircraft?

Is there high or low friction in a bird’s feathers?

Explain the structure of a lizard’s feet.

How do we light a match?

Is it better to light a match on a match box or a window?

How do we stop the hinges on doors from sticking and squeaking?

How do we keep the engine of a car cool and running smoothly?

Why do we have to change the oil in an engine?

Why are there crackling noises when we comb our hair?

Do we hear the noises on a hot dry day or a cool wet day?

Why is there loud noise in thunder?

Why does black dust gather on a ceiling fan?

What are the best boots to wear on the Kokoda Track?

Why are there grooves on the rubber sole?

How do football boots increase friction?

How can friction cause explosions in mines and factories?

What happens to our hands when we slide quickly down a rope?

If we wear shoes for many months, what happens to the soles?

What causes electricity in our bodies?

Sharks detect electricity in fish. What causes electricity in fish

and other animals?

Draw a shark and dolphin. How do they reduce friction?

How do ship designers reduce friction?

How do we know there is electricity in our bodies?

Why do car tires lose their rubber?

Why do some tires lose the rubber quickly?

What is the best to slide on - rock? water? coral? or mud?

What is friction?

What occurs when there is friction?

Give examples of friction causing heat?

How do we reduce friction between pieces of steel rubbed together?

What would happen in the world if there was no physical friction?

What are the best tiles for the floor of a bathroom?

What holds a nail in place on a piece of wood?

What causes landslides in the highlands of Papua New Guinea?

How does friction help us to climb a rope?

What happens when an engine seizes?

How does friction occur between people?

What causes friction between people and animals?

What happens to the temperature of the relationship when friction occurs?

How do we remove friction between people?

What are the polite ways of reducing friction between people?

What is the highest level of friction between two groups of people?

Advanced problems in friction

Why does an asteroid trail fire on entering the earth's atmosphere?

What is the main problem facing space shuttles returning to earth?

What is a friction rash?

How do we treat a friction rash?

What causes an aircraft to lift off on take-off?

How does a violin player make sound?

These problems explore all possible aspects of friction. This is an exercise in exploration of the practical scenarios.

Students learn general knowledge as well as knowledge of friction. They learn to explain in their own words, written and spoken.

Students could be interviewed one at a time at the teacher's table on 5 problems. Most students in PNG schools never speak.

It is not just effort in mindlessly copying theory into a student's work book as we see in PNG schools today.

By the end of 2015, this sequence in friction could have 80 more exercises provided by class room teachers, students and design team teachers. The Department would develop a memory bank of exercises.

Teachers could be invited to submit their new exercises to the design team to be included in the next edition. Teachers are becoming involved.

There is always revision. As students grow intellectually, they will see all earlier problems in more complex ways and with more connections.

We already see in the exercises above the links with static electricity, motion, physiology and personal relationships.

By end of grade 8, some students should be able to achieve 100% correct of the (say) 1200 science and biology mastery exercises. One book said 60% correct 60% of the time. Students can do better than that.