The Saintly Soapbox

The other day my departing year 12 class provided me with a gift and a card. Residing in the card was this poem one member of the class (Andrew Solomon) composed. The card explained it didn’t rhyme as that was too hard, as many key words have a double meaning in engineering, e.g. upsetting is a forging process. Anyway a gem like this is to good to be left in a card so I’m publishing it here. I hope my class don’t mind. I should admit they misspelled Darth Vader, I have fixed that in the version below, some errors simply to great and must be addressed.

Engineering

By Andrew Solomon

Confronted by a class of nuts
On your first day last year
Some heads screwed on backwards
Others just cross threaded
You would’ve found abrasive personalities wearing
If it weren’t for your tungsten carbide shell

Some topics we found riveting
But others were a bore
Moulding sure was a drag
But somehow we managed to cope

The trial results were upsetting
But like spring steel we were resilient and forged ahead
You were happy to answer our questions
And anything about the force
would get your normal reaction
And we’d digress from an inclined plane to Darth Vader
But as work became harder we began to fatigue
And felt the same pressure, as if we were hydraulic oil.

In October we emerged from our concentration cells
to face the HSC,
Pitting our skills against the rest of the state
Did we nail it or fail? You’ll just have to see.

This poem meant heaps guys, you were a great class to teach. Thanks so much.

At a DET conference for Head Teachers. Keynote speaker was David Warlick. He then gave another presentation on Professional Learning Networks. An engaging speaker whom I believe really hits on the fact that education is vastly different than it was. The kids we are teaching have to be taught to learn not just taught knowledge. We must equip them to be discerning consumers of the many new learning sources.

Check out his site for more information. Or have a look at his blog 2 cents worth.