30 days hath September

We had a premonition of the change of seasons two weeks ago, but since then it has felt like unending summer. Not even a nip in the morning air. Regardless of temperature, the plants and animals judge for themselves. I have had a sasanqua camellia blooming for a week now. They bloom earlier and earlier, but never before the end of October. The summer season was all off for butterflies and caterpillars. I wonder what the fall will bring to the garden.

"Summer's first green is gold. Her hardest hue to hold," wrote Frost. Now all the seasons slide into each other in Florida. Every year is different.

Steinbeck was right

Steinbeck was right about the banks. Created by man, they become a monster, and no man is in control.

The SAT and the Bible

E. D. Hirsch Jr. has an editorial in the New York Times yesterday, Monday, September 19, 2011, entitled "How to stop the drop in verbal scores." He quotes from the Bible to explain the Matthew Effect, which he holds accountable for declining SAT scores.

Hirsch quotes: "For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath." Hirsch goes on to say that "those who are language-poor in early childhood get relatively poorer, and fall further behind, while the verbally rich get richer."

No context is given. What was Matthew talking about before and after this? Vocabulary acquisition? Background knowledge? Income tax? Hedge funds? Fashion week?

And which translation is he using? It sounds like King James, which means it was a translation into English from the Greek, only once removed from the original texts.

Here is yet another example of sacred texts called upon to perform miracles. Fortunately, they are up to the task.

Hirsch has a point that deserves to be acknowledged. The SAT is 90% vocabulary. It is an American standardized test. If you have most of the SAT words in your reading vocabulary, you have a better chance of constructing meaning from the relationships between words in the texts.

Behind Hirsch's argument is his famous work, published in the 80's, expounding cultural literacy. Teach these well-known allusions to your students, and they will have a context for understanding texts from the western canon.

What is missing from Hirsch's argument is the miracle that happens every time a reader encounters a text, whether they know all the words or not. No test can measure that relationship.

Two ways of looking at two rivers

In "Two ways of looking at a river," Mark Twain laments that when he became a licensed river boat captain, his youthful romance with the beauty of the river was changed forever. Every detail that had previously brought him delight was now a signal of the changing conditions and dangers of the river. He makes his point so clearly that it seems beside the point to notice the rhetorical devices, the shift in diction and tone, and the imagery and sound effects that accomplish that shift.

I sympathize with the student who came to me privately, during my first year of teaching ninth graders preparing for the IB program, and said, "It is wrong to analyze literature." She spoke with respect and a sincere desire to communicate to me her strong feeling. Ahead of her lay the unimagined wonders of 11th and 12th grade IB literature study. I don't remember the words I said to her, but the meaning of my reply was, "Well, this is what we do, and there is something to be gained from it: an understanding of what is true about life and human nature."

There are some poems that I never want to mark and scan, some novels that I have no desire to study. They are still magical to me, like Twain's first view of the river at sunset. I see their craft, but I see it out of the corner of my eye. When I read them, I do not need to say anything. They say it all for me.

Ask Me

Some time when the river is ice ask me
mistakes I have made. Ask me whether
what I have done is my life. Others
have come in their slow way into
my thought, and some have tried to help
or to hurt: ask me what difference
their strongest love or hate has made.

I will listen to what you say.
You and I can turn and look
at the silent river and wait. We know
the current is there, hidden; and there
are comings and goings from miles away
that hold the stillness exactly before us.
What the river says, that is what I say. 

William Stafford 

Butterfly day

I share this birthday with D. H. Lawrence.

Like his poem, "Butterfly," I am full of questions about what understanding I could be receiving from this moment, and what course I should be steering into the future. From noticing something as small as a butterfly moving through the garden to remembering something as big as the fall of the twin towers ten years ago, I wonder what patterns are forming as each second ticks by, and what strong winds are shaping the course.

Butterfly by D. H. Lawrence

Butterfly, the wind blows sea-ward, 
     strong beyond the garden-wall!
Butterfly, why do you settle on my
     shoe, and sip the dirt on my shoe, 
Lifting your veined wings, lifting them?
     big white butterfly!

Already it is October, and the wind
     blows strong to the sea
from the hills where snow must have 
     fallen, the wind is polished with 
          snow.
Here in the garden, with red 
     geraniums, it is warm, it is warm
but the wind blows strong to sea-ward,
     white butterfly, content on my shoe!

Will you go, will you go from my warm
     house?
Will you climb on your big soft wings,
     black-dotted,
as up an invisible rainbow, an arch
till the wind slides you sheer from the 
     arch-crest 
and in a strange level fluttering you go
     out to sea-ward, white speck!

Labor Day

Tomorrow is Labor Day, 2011. One day of the year is dedicated to honoring working people. The other 364 days are devoted to throwing up roadblocks in their paths. This laying of blame is not a phase that will pass. It is just the latest verse in a long song.

To honor working people on Labor Day weekend, I will: 1. work unpaid hours reading papers, 2. complete chores around the house and in the garden, 3. work unpaid hours preparing lessons, and 4. sew on a project. We won't be sailing because a tropical storm is moving through the Gulf. Some rain would be most welcome.

I can add that the pleasure of the paid hours, in other words, time spent with students, offsets the unpaid hours reading papers. And it's nice when the papers are thoughtfully prepared, but it's also rewarding to see the improvement that comes from practice with guidance.