The fire flickers, casting long shadows on the ground. Eight hunched over figures are gathered around the warmth of the fire. We sit on ancient wooden benches with various blankets strewn across our legs. “Charlotte, it’s your turn to tell a ghost story,” Tim says in a monotonous manner. The light of the fire glints
All These Childish Stories… Are They Really Worth Picking Up?
It seems to be an unspoken general rule that when you leave childhood behind, you stop reading, and sometimes even looking at, the books that you loved. As a child, I read many books by authors like Nick Butterworth, Beatrix Potter and Jacqueline Wilson, but I have to admit that after I entered my teens
Listen and Trust Your Inner Voice
As a young boy, his teachers said he was too stupid to learn anything. As an employee, he was fired from his first two jobs on the basis of being “unproductive”. As an inventor, he made one thousand unsuccessful attempts at inventing the light bulb. When asked by a reporter how it felt to fail
College is for Dummies: A Parent’s Guide to Preparing Your Pockets for a Bachelor’s Degree
Dear Parents, Before you drop 250K on that overpriced college education, stop to consider this: ● Is college the right choice for my child? Does little Johnny even want to go to college or is this one of those times where the “everyone else is doing it” phase kicks in? College is not for everyone.
The Downside
Steve Jobs, known for his internationally acclaimed technologically based Apple products, stated “Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And more important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.” Mr. Jobs was regarded as an innovative entrepreneur whose own inspirational journey to the top is reflected in
Dear Mister Bill Gates
Dear Mister Bill Gates, I write this letter to you in accordance with an essay I am attempting to write. I wish to stress the importance of this essay as the main price is, I believe, $2500. No token prize, I think you will agree. The subject matter of the essay is the following: does
Expectation vs. Reality
Formal education is an imperative factor of socialization and it equips individuals with the skills needed in preparation for the maintenance of a civil society. However, I strongly encourage the formal education system to widen its capacity for the implementation of informal socialization, inclusion and improvement of the performing arts as well as the practice
The Pertinency of Broadening the Minds of Students through Education
The word “education” was derived from the Latin word “educat or educare” which means to bring up, to develop, to educate fully all the potentialities of an individual. To educate means; to give intellectual, moral, and social instruction (Oxford dictionary, 2011). It is an action or process of giving instructions, either directly or indirectly so
Eyes in the Wood
Marley was jittery and nervous. Her stomach twisted and turned, and she flexed her sweaty fingers together anxiously. “Are you sure we should do this, Paige?” The taller blonde fingered a lighter between her red lacquered finger nails, and barely glanced back at her sister. “It’s the only option. You know this, M… It’s only
Wonders of the Whale
Look at this picture; can you see what I can see? If not, look deep so very, very deep at this photo. Tell me how the ocean waves make your feel? You should be feeling mellow right about now. Tell me how you see the very, very gracefulness of how the whale is coming out
Public Housing Escape
Why is it 3 am? Why am I tired and yet awake? Why is everyone so different? Why don’t they like me? Every night my body wakes up yet my mind is so numb; since, my mind is numb all I do is sit and think. I think about what I’m going to say to
The role of educators in society
Should the role of education be to prepare students for working life, or to broaden their mind? On one note, it can be agreed upon that many educators have done their best at preparing students for working life. These days it is a lot easier to prepare oneself for a job than to actually find
Fulfilment Through Great Ideas
Most people are constant in their acknowledgement of education as a key factor for human development. The notion of education evokes images of classrooms and lecture halls, in the thoughts of many. But education should transcend the narrow confines of classrooms and lecture halls and embrace creative self-pursuits to enliven new ideas in our minds.
The Righteousness of Abnormal
I do not like anything about school. My primary and secondary school days were mildly excusable, mostly because when I was there, I had not been able to totally convince myself that finding the value of ‘X’ and battling with quadratic equations were the same as teaching me how to flush our pit toilet a-fter
What is this X?
My youngest uncle is unemployed. He has been searching for a job since he graduated from the university in 2015, and I have heard my father complaining that the recruitment agencies and employers are wicked people. “They do not want the poor to see light at all”, he had said three weeks ago. ” How
Normality is an Illusion
What does it mean to be normal? In this modern age, normality seems to be an illusion when one looks at the mass globalisation and the mixing pot of cultures, languages and religion. I work in healthcare and our sector is obsessed with normality. Your cholesterol level means nothing to me unless I can compare
Student: job holder or knowledge holder?
In my view, nowadays the role of education is useful only for getting marks in education and finding jobs but not for knowledge. Some students only want to get knowledge instead of marks. Hence why they are not ‘developed’. Students leave their technical knowledge behind after getting a job. This is due to today’s competition,
Ink In My Veins
Tattoos are becoming a popular phenomenon that is seen everywhere. Today’s youth are getting permanent tattoos to become cool and trendy but these are not just pretty pictures. For some, tattoos may be art but, for me, a tattoo is a mark that shows who you really are. Growing up, my parents always said that
The Broad Way is Safer
“Nobody realises that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.” – Camus. Nothing messes with the mind like filling some forms. You are having a swell time navigating from one column to the other, deftly putting your familiar details in the required areas until you reach the part marked ‘Religion’. There are options
What Does it Mean to be Normal?
What Does it Mean to Be Normal? “Nobody realises that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.” – Albert Camus. What is “normal”? According to the Oxford Dictionary, normal is “conforming to a standard; usual, typical, or expected”. In life, some things are undeniably normal – a temperature of 98.6 degrees, twelve months