Friday Two Cents: We All Have Roles To Play

All the world’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances, And one man in his time plays many parts.

These words were from the play As You Like It written by my favourite writer William Shakespeare. 

Shakespeare and Me.

I was watching Hamlet and these lines keep coming into my head over and over again.  Why? Why was I hearing these words? These lines don’t even come from this play.  Then it hit me; we are all acting.  You see everyone is acting, we are all playing many parts and Shakespeare knew this.  

You see we all have our parts we just call something else;  husband, wife, child, son, daughter, doctor, mechanic, teacher, student and these roles change depending on the moment.  

Follow my thinking for a moment; when you get dressed in the morning you don’t just put on clothes, you are putting on your costume.  During the school year I have specific clothes I wear at school when I am a teacher, yet once I get home I change out  of them and wear something else at home.  When I go out, the costume changes depending on the occasion.  Out to dinner with friends, one way, going to the coffee shop another.  We wear the clothes/costume to perform the role we are about to play.  

This revelation came to me during the play but I connected it to not having to dress up for my role as a teacher in the public.  I did not realize how much my public persona is affected by my role as a teacher, yet during the summer break I wear what I need for the moment and not worry about what others think of me.  I dress for me, not my audience (the public).  

I have always maintained that teachers need the full two months of summer to recharge and be fresh for the start of the new school year.  This realization only strengthens my thinking.  During the school year teachers have to act a specific way, to play their roles as it were.  But not until the summer can teachers be themselves, shed the chains of public restraints and truly play the part they were born to play. Themselves.  

Having a little fun at the exhibit

Friday Two Cents: Organizational Skills Need to be Taught

In the course of my readings, I came across an article that at first made me upset with the state of my home city Toronto, but then I started laughing and thinking this issue is only a continuation of the inept management and lack of organizational skills with the city.  

The article was in the Toronto Star which compared the time it took to complete other man-made structures and achievements to the Eglington LRT (light rail transit).  The LTR is a light rail system that travels the length of Eglington Ave for 19 km, with 25 stations along its path.  The project was started in 2011 and was supposed to have been finished in 2020.  I say supposed to because there has been over cost, construction, timing and legal issues that has pushed the completion date to who knows when.  

Just this past May, the transit commission will not be opening the system this year and maybe not until 2024 or 2025 sighting construction problems and miscommunication to blame. With them reporting the delay, my rage and frustration with the system and the city started rising.  Yet the article went on to site other projects that were much larger in scale and their time line to completion and that made me laugh but also think about the reasons behind the delays.

Here is a quick list.  

The CN Tower — 3 years

The Canadian Pacific Railway — 4 years

Hadrian’s Wall — 4 years

The Hoover Dam — 5 years

The development of the nuclear bomb — 6 years 

The Channel Tunnel — 6 years 

Landing a man on there moon — 8 years

The Roman Colosseum — 8 years

The Panama Canal — 10 years

The 407 Highway in Ontario — 10 years

The Eglington LRT — 12 years +?

Looking at this list made me realize that things do get done but only if people are organized and focused on the goal.  On many occasions I have given my students assignments and I would say about 10% of the work did not get done on time or at all.  In most of those cases a lack of organization was a big factor.  

This article has taught me that organizational skills is not something many people have.  It is a skill like any other that needs to be taught and nurtured.  A lesson I will bring to the classroom, with many own lessons this coming year.