Woman and Child First

It Means I'm 6 foot 2, I'm Intellectual, I'm Bullet Proof.

ANDREW DENTON: You are a Kokoberra woman.

TANIA MAJOR: Yes.

ANDREW DENTON: Grew up in Kowanyama. What does being a Kokoberra woman mean?

TANIA MAJOR: A Kokoberra woman means I’m from Kowanyama in a right Aboriginal community, in Cape York.

ANDREW DENTON: Aha.

TANIA MAJOR: I’m from a particular tribal group. It means I’m six foot two, I’m intellectual, I’m bullet proof.

ANDREW DENTON: Mhm.

TANIA MAJOR: And it means, don’t mess with me Andrew Denton.

LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE

TANIA MAJOR: Cos I can see on your head.

ANDREW DENTON: I’m not messing with you Tania.

LAUGHTER

- From Enough Rope 26 May 2008

This 26 year-old Young Australian of the Year 2007 is a complete inspiration. In respect to discussions of indigenous people in this country, I can (with relief) say I have never heard so much commonsense, honesty and intelligence come from anyone's mouth as it does from Tania's.

And shit she's funny. Watch the video, it's grand.

The Dragon Will Be Slain

"Fairy Tales are more than true; not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten."

G. K. Chesterton

Thanks Simon. (We're still big fans)!

Mr. Incredibubble And He Is!

I found this on my new favourite blog Hoyden About Town. It needs to be seen by every living person. What a guy!

(Note to self: Get red cape, 20 litres detergent and two long sticks).

The Arrival: Me, Ben and Shaun Tan

My curiosity whetted, I nailed the local librarian and came home with this book.

Whooee. This guy is a REALLY GOOD DRAWER.

Believe him when he says his drawings are 'visually complex'...and 'for older readers'. I was stumped by the sequence of pictures and hey I'm really old.

My really young (9 year old) son said when I showed him a page:

                            "I don't get it".

Ah hee hee, I love kids. However, The Arrival is a darkly beautiful  depiction of a migrant experience with an almost breathtaking visual imagination behind every frame. I will continue to seek this man's work out. He's very very good.

Shaun Tan

Most of my time is currently spent writing and illustrating picture books, which have reached quite a broad readership in Australia and overseas via foreign publication and translation into several languages.  They are best described as ‘picture books for older readers’ rather than young children, as they deal with relatively complex visual styles and themes, including colonial imperialism, social apathy, the nature of memory and depression. -Shaun Tan

I love to share incredible talent with young people. But even more satisfying - talent with an edge.

Shaun Tan: Born 1974 in Perth WA, he was known at school as a "good drawer".

Rosie Flo And Johnny Joe

I love these colouring books by UK illustrator Roz Streeton. They are so much more interesting and indeed interactive ( enough with the i's !) than your average derbrain colouring books.

In designing the books, I have paid attention to all things which irritated me as a child.- Roz S.

Clever woman.

You add your own heads, arms and legs. What mad joy I could have! I want one for myself. So does my daughter. There's also a boy's series (Johnny Joe's) which Ben's keen on too. Let's buy em all goddammit!

Via the gorgeous Book By It's Cover

A Greater Good

Although I haven’t seen good research to substantiate this theory that mothers’ happiness directly influences the happiness of their children, a fairly extensive body of research has established a substantial link between mothers who feel depressed and “negative outcomes” in their children, like acting out and other behavior problems. As you might imagine, when we mothers feel depressed it is not good for our children’s happiness. -Christine Carter, Ph.D.,

Yet another reason to look after yourself. I repeat, to nourish and nuture oneself as a woman, a mother is NOT a luxury, it's an essential.

The above snippet comes from a blog that looks closely at the "Science of Raising Happy Children".

Can't remember how I stumbled on it, but I'm really enjoying reading from it. Over to the sidebar for you, Half Full Blogversations!

Painting by Kim Richardson

Girls Into Women

"Are we are losing the war for girls' self-esteem? We are fighting the media, popular culture, teenage stresses and peer pressure for the minds, values and habits of our girls. Girls' self-esteem plummets around age nine:

• Girls face depression twice as often as boys by age 15.
• 20–40% of girls aged ten have started dieting.
• Girls as young as 10 confront "teen" issues such as sex.
• Eating disorders among the most common mental health problems in girls.
• Low self-esteem leads to dangerous sexual behavior.

The good news is that despite these pressures, parents have more influence on their kids than they think." - article from NYU Child Study Centre.

I always love to read that last sentence. Let's be positive and firm with our girls. Let's show them how it is to live as a strong and self-determined person. They need that from their parents now more than ever. This article has some good reminders about creating confidence within our daughters.

The strongest messages come from us, their parents. This is good to remember!

Teaching: An Art Form

This year my private practice has been suspended due to gaining full-time employment until December, in public schools as a School Counsellor. I've been doing this work since 1988, give or take a couple of babies and several city/town/house moves.

This position, particularly working as a casual/relief counsellor usually means remaining on the periphery of the staff at a number of schools at any one time. It can feel isolated. Teachers' quite rightly don't see you as one of them anymore (though I taught primary school classes as a pre-requisite to this) and you're only there 1 or 2 days a week. So I always try to make my services relevant and my 'self' accessible.

But today I became a teacher person again and barged myself into a presentation on the instruction of reading and writing. (Quite frankly I think that this was invaluable to my job anyway - makes sense to see what is being taught when you are advising on Learning Difficulties!)

Stephen Graham presented an extremely straightforward model of "Explicit Teaching". Yes! Simple teaching for complex ideas. User friendly. He gave a couple of demo lessons and once again I am humbled by what an outstanding job most teachers do.

How difficult it is to have a group of children in front of you and skillfully instruct them in some of life's most important tasks - reading and writing.

It's not a bad experience either, to see that most of these people genuinely like children. And the kids love them back.

Driving home I reverted back to memories of being an idealistic 22 year old primary school teacher. When goals of modelling excellence and being an influential person in a kidlet's life were real. Too many of us in Education take what we do for granted. This work is really.... very... important.

Here's to the teacher's who have made their art their life's work.

Let's give them more money and stop complaining about their holidays. They earn every bit of both.

An Interesting (Informal) Statistic

Whilst sitting watching the unfolding of a Kindergarten lesson today, I noticed two (2) things.

1. That Kinder teachers who enjoy their job are entirely fabulous to watch in action and

2. That at any random point in time you can look out onto a group of 4 - 6 year olds and at least two (2) of them will be picking their nose.

I like spending time in Kinder classrooms, those guys haven't hit earth yet.  One little dude today ran up to me and said, "Hey I'm going to choke you!"

"I love to see what a fantastic job I do as the School Counsellor!" I thought. He remembered me!

So I said, "Hey Jimmy!" and suddenly realized his name was Felix.*

Untalkative Bunny pictured during a session with a psychiatrist.

* Not real names