Author: KokkieH

On Writing

No, this is not a review of Stephen King’s book (though that’s coming, once I’m done reading it).  I merely wanted to write something about writing and most post titles on my blog begins with ‘On’.  Not much you can do with that.  Maybe I should start thinking up more creative post titles…

But what I wanted to say is, writing is hard.  I was told when I started out that it took discipline and perseverance, and that I must develop a thick skin to deal with critique, criticism and rejection, and that it’s a lonely road, and that success isn’t guaranteed, but no one actually said it’s hard.  Even if you enjoy it, it’s hard.

I finally finished the second chapter of my novel yesterday.  In fact, I wrote most of it yesterday.  I had started with it in the middle of February.  Many days passed when I wrote not a single word; when I did not even open the file on my computer. Continue reading “On Writing” →

On Congratulations

Yesterday evening at 8:30 South African time I became an uncle for the second time.  No, please don’t offer any congratulations.  That’s the whole point of this post.  This morning I made the obligatory calls to my father and stepmother (their first grandchild) and to my step-sister and brother-in-law to offer my congratulations.  Then my wife asked a very intriguing question:  For what am I congratulating them?  What did they achieve? Continue reading “On Congratulations” →

On the importance of context

My wife is a remedial teacher at a primary school situated in a coloured township.  (See bottom of post for a short explanation of the terms ‘coloured’ and ‘township’ as they are used in South Africa.)  Her school has a large proportion of children experiencing barriers to learning (the new, politically correct term for ‘learning disability’), and her job is to help them catch up in those areas of the work (generally Math and language skills) where they are struggling.  Some days she comes home dejected, convinced that she’s not making any progress, the next she’s so excited about a kid that had a breakthrough she can’t stop chattering about it.

Yesterday, though, she regaled me with a story of something that happened in her colleague’s second-grade class that made me think about the role that contextual analysis play in tasks such as teaching.  Her colleague was trying to teach the children about subtracting.  She used the terms ‘take away’ and ‘make less’ to explain the concept, but to no avail.  The children simply could not get it. Continue reading “On the importance of context” →

On biting off more than you can chew

I think I’ve mentioned before that I’ve started with my Master’s Degree this year.  Yesterday I finally received the last of my prescribed books.  Here’s how they all look together.

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Seeing them all stand neatly in a row like this, I’m starting to wonder what on Earth I’ve let myself in for.  I have to pass oral exams on all of these before I can submit my research proposal for my thesis, which I want to do by October.  Guess book four of A Song of Ice and Fire will have to wait.  It’s all non-fiction from here.

Wish me luck.