Saturday, January 16, 2010

What did you read at the beach?

One of the things I love about other people's baches is reading through the bookshelf. You can always rely on an eclectic mix of paperbacks left behind by previous holiday makers and a stash of ancient tomes that have to have come from someone's great-aunt's deceased estate!

This summer we trekked north to Henderson Bay in the far north of New Zealand. This beautiful beach with surf, sand, rocky headlands, fishing, diving and pohutukawas typifies the images that come to mind when talking about an NZ Summer Holiday. We stayed in a small cottage and camped around it as the whanau expanded. The bookshelf here was behind the back door and you wouldn't want to begin to psych
oanalyse the contents.

One book that provided hours of entertainment was "The Children's Hour With Uncle Arthur - Book 1", by Arthur S. Maxwell.
Wholesome, Truthful, Uplifting, Inspiring Stories for Boys and Girls. Complete with more capital letters than I have seen in a long time. It was a collection of improving homilies for children of the 1940's, and was illustrated by a selection of the most hilarious photos and paintings.

Thought you might enjoy this one....

(If you can't read the caption, click on the photo and it will open in a new page)

8 comments:

  1. I was brought up on 'Uncle Arthur' and his stories. Brings back lots of memories. I have spent lots of time in Raglan and Hamilton over the break, mostly reading modern stories to my lovely granddaughters but, I have to say, I have managed to fit in quite a few detective novels for myself. Happy New Year Dorothy.Should be a great one.

    Jay

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  2. While camping for 4 weeks at Waikawau Bay, Coromandel , I read "Leading and Learning with Habits of Mind" by Art Costa. I have decided to read on non fiction book followed by a fiction book - in my persuit of life balance.

    Costa proposes that leaders have two main responsibilities - first to be the head learner. And second, to develop other leaders. We do this by managing internal and external resources to bring out the best in each person. In addition we lead by aspiring others toward common visions - for both how we work together and what we believe about that work.

    So more power to your collective leadership elbows.

    Hope to see some of you as the year progresses.

    Sandy

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  3. @Sandy. Thanks for dropping by and sharing your holiday reading. I like the mixing up fiction/non-fiction idea. I am such a bookworm that I read fiction regardless (often late at night ;) Those ideas of Costa's fit into the 'common sense model' - so obvious but rarely seen! I do hope this is a good year for you and that we get to catch up.

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  4. I hope to see you at ULearn this year. I want to set up a ICT cluster for the inner city schools and be the lead school in 2011 -if the funding is still available. I am inspired by the work achieved with Manaiakalani.

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  5. i read old mac guides, mac addicts, fishing magazines, never anything that has more than 50 pages or less than 50 pictures. lots of reading putts tho

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  6. @Podgorani We had a few fishing and hunting mags on the go too. @Sandy Good luck with the ICTPD cluster. You would need to get on with the planning for it soonish if you want to get an application in by August (or whenever the deadline is) though. It's the networking/negotiating with the other schools involved that takes the time at the beginning.

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  7. Thanks for the heads up Dorothy. Is your ictpd ehsas still going - if not what is your role this year? I've just put up a principal blog for my school with a link off the school website. I still refer to the work I did with you when I was at GB! More power to your elbow Dorothy!

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  8. @Sandy ICTPD for us finished in 2006. Our Literacy EHSAS work came to an end in 2009. Manaiakalani continues in our cluster as The Tamaki Transformation Project (TTP) has recognised the work we were doing with student literacy outcomes - and seen the research so far- and has made Manaiakalani the education arm of the multi agency TTP to renew the Tamaki area over the next few years. So same group of schools and more big dreams :)

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