Good Morning,

It's Spring Equinox today.

  This morning, as I looked at the news, and pinned or posted to various sites, I remembered that I now have a blog. A blog where I can talk about my rather off-centre and often irreverent view of "Life, the Universe and Everything" an apposite quote from "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" (Douglas Adams). By off-centre I do not mean rude or crude, however I have an unrestrained habit of putting various ideas and facts in a different order of prescience, based on my quirky sense of the ridiculous.

I am not interested in voicing my political, religious, or often contentious beliefs on anyone, but I am passionate about literacy and numeracy, even then, I'm not out to preach, condemn or blame or inflame anyone. I do have very strong views about cruelty and domestic abuse, discrimination, social justice and injustice and here, these issues will be excluded. I want my blog to be positive rather than negative in my own whimsical style.

I have read science fiction stories all my life and have watched so many of the ideas, concepts and precepts become fact in our everyday life. on Google+ , pinterest and Twitter I have a category SciFi to SciFact I would like to share with you all. the criteria for this has changed to include events or eventualities that may exceed my estimated longevity. so much has happened in my lifetime it will make a book of its own. I am writing my autobiography as it is quite bizarre, as childhoods go though, unfortunately, not an uncommon occurrence.  How do they phrase it  "7.5 billion people in April 2017 and 7.5 billion unique stories" to be told.

 As an aside, have you looked at the Woldometer for our population numbers, it's really amazing knowing every tick is a for a new baby born somewhere, I understand the world situation but that discussion is for a different forum.

Some of the other categories I will use are:  About Words, About Books, Going Green, and Our Biography my way of categorising our history from 'whoa to go'.

I'd like to tell you about the books I'm writing, actually the first one is more like a magazine as the subject it self is very large. As I've mentioned Literacy is a passion of mine, I don't have academic qualifications but fell in the deep end of "English". My son, Patrick was not succeeding at school, at the end of grade1, I was told he was 'ineducatable'. I wasn't amused nor could I believe the explanations. The school year ended and I had 6 weeks of summer, I'm a very good researcher and I looked at the curriculum and the methodology used in the classroom, arranged to take Patrick to an Occupational Therapist, for evaluation. There were a few areas of concern although he was exceptionally bright for his age.

I read all the old school textbooks I could get my hands on, and met Constance Thompson who used spelling and grammar rules from an earlier curriculum. Constance, had a waiting list of pupils to be tutored as her methods were successful. I must mention an aspect of my own primary school.

I didn't really attend the first 6 grades as we were always moving, sometimes in the middle of the night. There were correspondence lessons every now and then. My mother, Mary did her best, but had been raised in orphanages in the 1920s and '30s. Educating children was not the main focus of orphanages then. My Mother was an amazing woman read any book, magazine or newspaper she could to teach herself. I inherited my love books from her, as well as an insatiable curiosity. Having a child struggling in the school system motivated me to find out why and how to help him. I learnt so much from Constance, and 2 other tutors, Pamela & Sheila, also using the same approach. I was always good at making games and stories to teach him practical skills, and have added to my repertoire over the years.

Foremost, this is about Literacy and I wrote "The Story" about our language, how and why we speak, why we have different words for the same thing. In "The Story", there are various levels depending on the age of the students, as I fracture, simplify and twist history to suit my approach to reading, writing and speaking. I offer no apology as "The Story" is based on truth and I explain to older students that there is a wonderfully rich and amazing history behind my "Whimsical Fractured Fairytale".

I have been teaching and tutoring for 30 years and by the time people find me the student, unless they're in preschool, are struggling, most of my students are convinced there is something wrong with them, and they are closed off. I needed a way to break down the barrier and gain their attention before I can effectively teach them. This is where "Whimsical Fractured Fairytale" comes in handy as well as some of the resources I have collected over the years. I have a collection of magazines and books from 1880, peculiar bits and pieces like the longest word in the English language. as well as days dedicated to serious purposes, today is Rhino Day & Hobbit Day while others have a lighter theme like Make a Hat day on 15th September. in honour of Rhino Day

A wine vessel in the form of a bronze rhinoceros with silver inlay, from the Western Han (202 BC – 9 AD) period of China, sporting a saddle on its back   

  I'm a bit tired now and my hands shake so it's time to stop