writing matters.

Poetry is the mathematics of literature. Many students suffer from “poetry anxiety,” which operates on the same logic as the more commonly talked about “math anxiety.” This anxiety involves a hands-off, get-that-away-from-me style of learned helplessness: “I can’t do it,” “I don’t understand poetry,” or “I prefer subjects with rules and clear answers.” Although children start out with a playful, delightful experience of language as “primarily poetic,” they too often learn to drag their feet when it comes time for a poetry unit in school (Fleming and Stevens 160). And no wonder. Poetry, like math, often makes students feel inadequate, slow, and stupid, particularly when many of their peers seem to be able to effortlessly navigate the ambiguities of poetry. As Sheila Tobias argues, however, this perception is usually incorrect. She describes how a major source of learned helplessness with math is the “widespread myth…that mathematical ability is inborn, and that no amount of hard w

The performance I took part in at The Cultch on May 30th wasn’t exactly about anything. The general plot of the three-scene “Mump and Smoot (with Thug) in Something” was that Mump (Michael Kennard) and Smoot (John Turner) visited a café, a wake, and a doctor’s office, interacting sporadically with the impassive, intimidating Thug (Candace Berlinguette). As the lights dimmed and dark, pulsating music began to play, there arose an atmosphere of tense excitement, as promised by the event’s description in my pamphlet: “Enter a giddy, scary world of pure imagination, as the duo turns conventional clowning on its head in this darkly humourous work that ranges from zany to macabre. Not for children!” Now, I am no child, but I had never been to a clown show before. I had no idea what “conventional clowning” was, let alone what a zany and macabre twist from two “clowns of horror” might look like (mumpandsmoot.com). As improbable as it sounds now, typing from the safety of my living room, I be

"A poet’s work is to name the unnamable, to point at frauds, to take sides, start arguments, shape the world, and stop it going to sleep." - Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses The educational value of teaching students to become proficient in the intricacies of reading, speaking, and writing in English cannot be overstated. Bertolt Brecht, arguing that “literacy empowers in a Marxist sense,” directs the following imperative to those of the lower classes: “Learn the ABC, it’s not enough, but learn it. Don’t let it get you down! …You who are starving; grab hold of the book” (qtd in Fleming and Stevens 65). The discipline of English is invaluable to people of all classes in North American society as we know it. No other language in the world is spoken and understood as widely. In my personal experience, however, I’ve often been told a different story—one that depicts studying English as a fascinating but ultimately useless endeavour. In what follows I want to weave

Boys are struggling more than girls in Canada’s current Education system. A plethora of rambling articles and video blogs are popping up to expose the problem and propose solutions. As usual when it comes to delicate social issues, I’ve found some helpful and some not. Many are offensive, qualifying their overarching essentialist gender claims with statements reminiscent of the tried-and-true schoolyard immunity idol, “No offense, but…” The majority of commentaries on this topic blame our “feminized” Education system. Some even expose a cloak-and-dagger “War on Boys.” To me, that sounds a lot like all those white men out there who are convinced that they (we) are a threatened minority with less and less voice, power, money, and political clout. I hear most of this is as just whiny noise from the system’s rusty gears, which are finally— finally —starting to move the needle on the equality meter somewhere other than the 100% male dominated everything that it’s been stuck on since a