There is a sort of corollary to an education system which is driven by examinations – and that is cheating.
Yesterday in a geography and civics examination there was a patently orchestrated attempt by three girls to copy each other’s work. I gave them ‘significant’ looks which in past schools have conveyed a whole system of ethics, but here with the pampered darlings of the very rich, it was as if I was looking a foreign language at them! They continued with impunity!
I decided that I would not create a situation inside an examination room where most of the candidates had finished the examination and, in the best traditions of adolescents throughout the known universe, were bubbling with incipient mutiny. I merely decided to put their papers in a separate pile and give a covering note to the teacher.
The separation was noted and gave rise to semi hysterical enquiry. As Stoppard so perceptively points out, “there’s an art to the building of suspense” or something like that. It at least gave the girls something to think about last night: if they even considered that they might have done anything wrong which cannot be cleared up by money.
Today, the resourceful head of English removed a mobile phone which appeared and then disappeared from the desk of a pupil taking an exam. Even more resourcefully she gave the offending item to the IT teacher and asked him to ‘explore’ its depths.
Lo and behold! Within its electronic entrails was discovered a cornucopia of questionable material. This included photocopies of pages of Latin (yes, we teach this) information that was necessary for the previous day’s paper.
From my anecdotal observations I think that cheating is endemic to the culture of the school. Seeing people write tiny notes and then roll them into even tinier volumes does give one pause for thought! It will be interesting to see the fallout from these examination days!
As the term progresses towards the Easter holiday, it is easy to tell that the staff and pupils are ready for the vacation. As indeed am I!
The holiday will give me an opportunity to consider my options for the next academic year and what I should do. There is never a dull moment.
And that leads me neatly on to my epic operatic experience last night.
I have to say that the whole evening, night and early morning which was the sort of time scale that Der Meistersinger von Nürnberg demands from the audience/congregation/Wagnerites or whatever the people who listen to these self indulgent, slightly distasteful ideologically questionable musical voyages call themselves.
The publicity for the opera has the image of the graphic of the gentleman from the sign for a male toilet with the head composed of a child’s drawing of a house composed of the word Nürnberg in black letter. This image is repeated throughout the 256 page combined libretto and programme.
After the glorious overture the curtains part to reveal oversized tables with a giant kitchen chair.
There are images from nursery rhymes and fairy stories throughout the evening/night/morning. The world turned topsy turvey – at one point the tables we see at the beginning seem to have gravitated to the ceiling. There are nods in the direction of Hansel and Gretel and A Midsummer Night’s Dream and other bits and pieces along the way. The production by Claus Guth produces some interesting pictures but whether it adds anything substantial to the opera I don’t know.
The more I listened to the music and read the English version of the libretto on the led screens in front of each chair, the more problems I found in sympathizing with the central theme of the opera.
If the central character in the opera is Hans Sachs (ably sung by Albert Dohmen) then I have considerable difficulty in responding to an interfering, arrogant, elitist masquerading as a liberal. The end of the opera with Sachs’ paean to ‘sacred German art’ and his insistence that it ‘will endure’ together with the uneasy knowledge that this was one of Hitler’s favourites needs more than a little fantasy wrapping in the production to lessen the discomfort of the message.
The music, however, in parts is majestic and wonderful.
The production lasted six hours and I cannot pretend that it held my interest during all that time. There were longueurs but by the time we had reached the third act and its two hour stretch without interval I was on the side of the music and enjoyed the sound even if the pictures on stage were a little less satisfying!
The Orchestra Simfónica i Cor del Gran Theatre del Liceu were excellent and sustained their quality throughout the evening.
David (Norbert Ernst) looked disturbingly like Robin Williams in short trousers, while the long trousered Robert Dean Smith playing Walther von Stolzing sung well, but lacked the power and a certain degree of lyricism that the role demanded.
The whole of my attitude to the opera has been coloured by the disgraceful behaviour of the parking garage that I used.
Deciding to try another one rather the my usual spot near the statue of Soller, I found myself in a confusing garage where, instead of parking in the open, one had to drive into a sort of cage and then one’s car disappeared into some sort of metallic honeycomb of spaces. The price of my car being returned was €27 – at the present rate of exchange a crucifyingly large sum to pay for even an extended Wagner opera’s length of stay.
Perhaps time will soften the blow of the price of parking.
But I think not!
Yesterday in a geography and civics examination there was a patently orchestrated attempt by three girls to copy each other’s work. I gave them ‘significant’ looks which in past schools have conveyed a whole system of ethics, but here with the pampered darlings of the very rich, it was as if I was looking a foreign language at them! They continued with impunity!
I decided that I would not create a situation inside an examination room where most of the candidates had finished the examination and, in the best traditions of adolescents throughout the known universe, were bubbling with incipient mutiny. I merely decided to put their papers in a separate pile and give a covering note to the teacher.
The separation was noted and gave rise to semi hysterical enquiry. As Stoppard so perceptively points out, “there’s an art to the building of suspense” or something like that. It at least gave the girls something to think about last night: if they even considered that they might have done anything wrong which cannot be cleared up by money.
Today, the resourceful head of English removed a mobile phone which appeared and then disappeared from the desk of a pupil taking an exam. Even more resourcefully she gave the offending item to the IT teacher and asked him to ‘explore’ its depths.
Lo and behold! Within its electronic entrails was discovered a cornucopia of questionable material. This included photocopies of pages of Latin (yes, we teach this) information that was necessary for the previous day’s paper.
From my anecdotal observations I think that cheating is endemic to the culture of the school. Seeing people write tiny notes and then roll them into even tinier volumes does give one pause for thought! It will be interesting to see the fallout from these examination days!
As the term progresses towards the Easter holiday, it is easy to tell that the staff and pupils are ready for the vacation. As indeed am I!
The holiday will give me an opportunity to consider my options for the next academic year and what I should do. There is never a dull moment.
And that leads me neatly on to my epic operatic experience last night.
I have to say that the whole evening, night and early morning which was the sort of time scale that Der Meistersinger von Nürnberg demands from the audience/congregation/Wagnerites or whatever the people who listen to these self indulgent, slightly distasteful ideologically questionable musical voyages call themselves.
The publicity for the opera has the image of the graphic of the gentleman from the sign for a male toilet with the head composed of a child’s drawing of a house composed of the word Nürnberg in black letter. This image is repeated throughout the 256 page combined libretto and programme.
After the glorious overture the curtains part to reveal oversized tables with a giant kitchen chair.
There are images from nursery rhymes and fairy stories throughout the evening/night/morning. The world turned topsy turvey – at one point the tables we see at the beginning seem to have gravitated to the ceiling. There are nods in the direction of Hansel and Gretel and A Midsummer Night’s Dream and other bits and pieces along the way. The production by Claus Guth produces some interesting pictures but whether it adds anything substantial to the opera I don’t know.
The more I listened to the music and read the English version of the libretto on the led screens in front of each chair, the more problems I found in sympathizing with the central theme of the opera.
If the central character in the opera is Hans Sachs (ably sung by Albert Dohmen) then I have considerable difficulty in responding to an interfering, arrogant, elitist masquerading as a liberal. The end of the opera with Sachs’ paean to ‘sacred German art’ and his insistence that it ‘will endure’ together with the uneasy knowledge that this was one of Hitler’s favourites needs more than a little fantasy wrapping in the production to lessen the discomfort of the message.
The music, however, in parts is majestic and wonderful.
The production lasted six hours and I cannot pretend that it held my interest during all that time. There were longueurs but by the time we had reached the third act and its two hour stretch without interval I was on the side of the music and enjoyed the sound even if the pictures on stage were a little less satisfying!
The Orchestra Simfónica i Cor del Gran Theatre del Liceu were excellent and sustained their quality throughout the evening.
David (Norbert Ernst) looked disturbingly like Robin Williams in short trousers, while the long trousered Robert Dean Smith playing Walther von Stolzing sung well, but lacked the power and a certain degree of lyricism that the role demanded.
The whole of my attitude to the opera has been coloured by the disgraceful behaviour of the parking garage that I used.
Deciding to try another one rather the my usual spot near the statue of Soller, I found myself in a confusing garage where, instead of parking in the open, one had to drive into a sort of cage and then one’s car disappeared into some sort of metallic honeycomb of spaces. The price of my car being returned was €27 – at the present rate of exchange a crucifyingly large sum to pay for even an extended Wagner opera’s length of stay.
Perhaps time will soften the blow of the price of parking.
But I think not!
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