Text Review: The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

I finished reading The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon in January, but have delayed the review until now.

Anyway, it’s the text under Standard English Module B – Close Study of Text.

This book is a really easy read! There’s 278 pages with 233 chapters (but the chapters are numbered as every prime number) and an appendix.

I think most students will enjoy (or at least appreciate) this book, because the language is so straightforward and it presents a very different perspective to the books that we would typically read. For those who haven’t read it yet, the 1st person narration is from the perspective of a boy with Asperger’s Syndrome. From what I understand (and what my Psychology friend) has told me, it’s a mild form of autism, where the person has difficulty understanding social situations, facial expression and body language, empathising and essentially seeing things from another person’s point of view.

So reading this book is quite an experience! You come to understand and perceive the narrator’s world from a perspective that is very different from your own. However, in a way, his perspective can also be very insightful – there’s interesting commentary on lies/truth, human nature, emotions and life/death. In this sense, the writing is quite clever – it’s deceivingly simplistic in its language, yet it carries so much meaning in both what it says and what it doesn’t say.

Another thing that I did enjoy about the book is how it is self-reflexive. It makes references to itself and its own writing, because in the story this book is being written by the boy. As such, there’s interesting features like images, diagrams, footnotes, bolding and the appendix which is quite unconventional.

You certainly empathise with the main character, who struggles in a very complicated world, because of his Asperger’s Syndrome. However, I found that towards the end of the novel (as he leaves for London) that the character’s inability to act/think like myself (the reader) became quite frustrating. Is that just me?

Anyone else have any thoughts on this text?

Should I Bother With Non-Calculator Maths

I met my new Year 9 Maths student today. I was really shocked when I soon found that he:

• Cannot multiple double digit numbers together – for example, 24 x 15.
• Did not know what the order of operations was.
• Cannot work with negative numbers.
• Is slow at adding, subtracting, multiplying, dividing basic numbers.

So essentially he was missing much of the basic foundations of maths! The question is: how do I tackle helping him?

Should I work through all the basic non-calculator arithmetic?

Being able to do non-calculator maths is essential. It makes you that much faster at calculations and it is also part of the Year 10 School Certificate exam. But at the same time I’m thinking that learning all that will take forever and he is already really far behind in class.

Or should I skip straight to teaching maths using calculators, since he is behind in that too?

Having a look at his Maths exam, there were things like Pythagoras Theorem and the area/circumference of a circle, where you are allowed to use a calculator. If I just start tutoring him in these areas with a calculator, he will be closer to catching up with the rest of his class. But at the same time, he’ll still be unable to do the basic non-calculator maths work!

I guess the real difficulty is that his level of maths is probably Year 6 or 7, and I’m wondering whether I should tutor him at the Year 6 or 7 level, or just try to tutor him at the Year 9 level that he should be in.

How useful do you think non-calculator maths is?

Visual Techniques: An Index

Please comment if you can think of any to add or don’t understand what something is.

Angle

Background – what is placed at the back of the image

Body Language

Border

Bullet Points

Font – the size and style of the text; bold, italics, underlining

Foreground – what is placed at the front of the image

Chiaroscuro – the dramatic use of light and dark

Close Up Shot

Clothing/costume

Composition – the way things are arranged and placed in the visual text

Contrast

Colour – this can be symbolic, create contrast, draw attention etc.

Facial Expression

Focal Lines – same as Vector

Focal Point – where our eyes are drawn to

Frames – this is used in cartoons

Gestures

High Angle ShotLight/Shadow

Lines

Long Shot

Low Angle Shot

Manipulation - for example, cutting and pasting a head of someone onto the body of a dog

Medium Shot

Numbered Points

Palette – the range of colours used by the composer

Perspective

Shapes

Sign

Size

Symbolism

Vector – an object that directs our eyes towards the focal point. E.g. the subject in the visual text is pointing or looking towards a certain direction. Our eyes will follow the direction that they are pointingor looking in.

Merry Christmas from Tutor Tales

Hey guys,

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year in 2010!

Congratulations to everyone on their HSC marks and ATAR – I trust that you all did well.

I wish you all the best for the UAC offers and whatever you go on to from here.

TT

Text Review: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

So I just finished reading The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald!

It’s the text under Advanced English Module A – Elective 2: Texts in Time and used in comparison with Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s sonnets.

The book is quite an easy read – only 134 pages in my edition split into 9 chapters.

However, I can’t see many students actually enjoying reading this book and its story (please correct me if I’m wrong about this). Firstly, the story is too short for you to develop any real connection to any of the characters, not even the narrator Nick Carraway. All the events that happen seem rather poetic (read: random) and somewhat contrived to make social critique. As I result, I read this with a kind of strong disdain for all the characters. I felt no sympathy or anger or anything – my reactions were more like “Huh.” and then I read on. There is really nothing admirable about any of the characters!

I do admit, however, that Fitzgerald’s writing style is lovely. The descriptions and what he evokes from an atmosphere is definitely “poetic” as all critics seem to say. Some of it is really quite beautiful and as an Arts in Communications: Writing and Cultural Studies student, I have to admit…I’m jealous.

But that in itself does not carry the story forward.

Perhaps what is also frustrating is that the narrator Nick Carraway is so much of a narrator, an observer, in this story that he rarely takes action. He does not “drive” the story in a sense. As such, you feel like he is rather meandering around what is happening. And you never feel invested in anything that he does and feels (e.g. his relationship with Jordan). And since the entire story is narrated by him, you cannot help but feel detached from everything that happens.

Nonetheless, it’s a short and easy book to read.

Anyone else have any thoughts on this text?