OH, COME on! Why are the Palestinians and Israelites fighting and killing people? Isn’t the COVID-19 already killing enough people?
This is one of the few times the world has united to achieve one outcome – defeating COVID-19 and yet some people still want to fight.
Stop for a while and work on stopping the pandemic. Don’t worry, there will still be plenty of time to fight later but if we don’t stop the pandemic there might not be enough people left to fight.
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How much is that puppy now?
Puppies have become the new must-have toy over the COVID-19 time, the must-have accessory.
Many of the COVID-19 lockdown restrictions permitted walking a dog and thus there was a need for dogs.
The simplest rule from economic theory is that if there is a demand beyond supply then prices rise and so puppies cost thousands of dollars.
Similar upsurges in interest occurred with home gardening so there was a run on vegetable seeds, library borrowing went up and people returned to old hobbies and there were queues outside hobby shops.
But what will happen when life returns to normal?
The gardens will go to weeds, the jigsaws will be put away but what of all the now grown-up dogs? They are too “valuable” to give away. They can’t be returned easily. They cost money and walking them each day will get boring.
There is just another, quite sad, example of how COVID-19 has changed many people’s lives and not always for the better, even if they were never affected by the virus itself.
How long will it take before we can safely return to the old ways?
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A sucker for a test
This week the students of Australia in years 3, 5, 7, and 9 are undertaking tests in Literacy and Numeracy and they don’t want to in many cases. One of the more unusual suggestions mentioned in the paper was giving the students a lollipop like when you get an injection. That was apparently the best suggestion for helping them to cope!
These tests conducted worldwide by P.I.S.A., actually only in 80 countries, show that we are performing badly. The rationale for the local tests are that they will provide helpful information for parents, teachers and educational experts but all the teachers and parents actually get is a dot on a line that goes from below expected result to above expected result.
The tests are done mid-year, by which time any competent teacher would already know their students and their abilities and the results are not available till later in the year. NAPLAN stands for National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy but I often called them NAPALM tests because of the damage they cause to the students’ confidence.
As this occurs annually, so does the usual reporting of concerns with the tests, concerns with the quality of teachers and the hope for improvement next year. (dfitzger@melbpc.org.au)/PN
