Cranky Queenslander

This just in via the Australian; Bureaucrats still don’t know how to teach kids to read and write. While they continue to flap about wondering what to do next, we continue to pump a generation of kids through our school system that can barely read and write.

The solution is simple, and should be implemented immediately;

Step 1; Define minimum learning outcomes for all school grades. Ensure teachers are fully aware of what they are being paid to teach the kids (and that might require the watching of less movies at school), and test the kids to ensure the teachers are doing the job.

Step 2; Identify the kids that are, for whatever reason, struggling with the basics, and setup after school tutoring classes with specialist teachers who can help.

Step 3; If kids really struggle, hold them back a year. There is no point sending them on to more complex studies when they don’t understand the stuff that came before.

Step 4; Pay teachers what they are worth; If one teacher can teach even the slower students to the minimum standard or better, then they should be paid more than a teacher who cannot.

There are probably a hundred other good ideas that will never happen in our socialist society, such as requiring parents to attend parent teacher interviews regularly. When I visit my son’s teacher at this time, she is usually just sitting there twiddling her thumbs, because many parents don’t even book an appointment, and of those that do, many don’t show up.

Perhaps that could be a good place to start; Holding parents accountable for their children’s education as much as the teachers?

I can’t help but think that drawing attention to the pre election talk of Kevin Rudd’s communist leanings and love for communist China would make me seem like a bit of a sensationalist, but I can’t help myself.

Word through this past week that Kevin and his crack team of legislators are going to force all Australian ISP’s to censor the internet, blocking permanently web sites that they deem inappropriate.

They are using the word “illegal” to determine what sites will not be visible to Australian eye’s, but that is just a nice way to make most people feel like this is not a problem.

Take a look at China. They use the same rhetoric about their censorship efforts. They block stuff that they say is illegal, but we all know their definition leaves a great deal to be desired, at least by freedom loving western standards.

The fact is that Australia is supposedly a free country, and we should not be subjected to mandatory censorship. We all have it within our power to perform our own censorship on our own internet connections, decided what is best for ourselves.

It’s time to get in touch with Minister Conroy and voice your disapproval now!

Suggested Reading;

Ars Technica | Crikey

I read recently about the alleged extreme fire risk with the building that houses the Kindercraft centre at City Hall in Brisbane.

What wasn’t explained was what this fire danger was. Are they allowing the kids to experiment with matches? Do the staff enjoy a cigarette inside the building? Are they using flammable liquids as play toys? Why is it that this building is a terrible fire risk, and any other building isn’t?

Every childcare centre I have ever been in is full of things that burn, why aren’t they all fire traps?

And lastly, if it is such a terrible danger, why is it only a danger because there is a childcare facility there? The tenor of the article seems to imply if we filled it with adults they would be just fine.

There are probably very good answers to these questions, it’s just a pity the courier mail couldn’t devote a column centimetre or two to explaining them.

While we all hope that Channel 10 has finally realised that serving up tripe like Big Brother serves no purpose other than to relegate the station into insignificance, we also hope the courier mail can choose its words more carefully;

Also discerning for Ten was how it started this week.

Perhaps an english scholar can correct me, but ‘discerning’ doesn’t seem quite right in the context; I would have thought ‘disturbing’ would have made more sense. 🙂

Four children allegedly barged into a 47 year old womans Beenleigh home recently, pinned her to the floor and stole a variety of items before fleeing, and later being arrested.

Reporting in such cases is always a bit thin, as they are children, but even so, I’d like to know how old these children were. Then I’d like to have their parents asked how it came to be that their children were out robbing and bashing people at 5pm on a Saturday afternoon.

I don’t think it’s too much for the Department of Children’s services to look into the families of these children and see what else is rotten there. As a society we need to try and stamp out this kind of evil before it infects more family and friends of these low lifes.

Checkout the latest scandal involving our esteemed leader Anna Bligh in the courier mail; Seems she doesn’t see anything wrong with accepting a free stay in a 15 million dollar mansion paid for by a Theiss director; Theiss, as readers would know, make a lot of money on State Government contracts. Nothing sneaky going on here eh?

I think the labour party has been in government too long and forgotten about ethics and morals; It simply isn’t proper to take gifts from people involved in government contracts, and Anna should apologise for it and ensure it doesn’t happen again.

Seeing as I have a few misguided friends who drive Holdens instead of the vastly superior Ford product, I thought I would quickly draw attention to this article in the courier mail showing that Ford’s are more fuel efficient. 🙂

Now I’m reading that the wicked camper folks (who most people would know send out dilapidated looking graffiti emblazoned combi vans into the world) are in trouble with Premier Bligh; Apparently one of their campers has "Save a whale, harpoon a jap" on it.

Big deal. Its a joke. It’s mildly amusing, and generally meaningless, until a bunch of politicians with nothing better to do weigh in and make a fuss, then its front page news.

If Anna is so worried about this comment, she better get down the nearest intersection and start flagging down cars with bumper stickers, because I can assure Anna if she lived in the real world she’d see a hell of a lot more offensive stuff on cars than this wicked camper.

Come on, get a life and get on with important things!

Seriously. Yellow Cabs has had to sack some Muslim cab drivers because they refused to allow passengers with Guide Dogs into their cabs. The good news is that they have been sacked, and nobody is complaining about their rights.

A small win for Australians there, hopefully this is the start of some common sense prevailing. Yeah, I doubt it too.

Carole Park residents on Sinclair Drive have been suffering with increasing noise levels since bushfires in 2003 burnt down the noise barrier that was erected to mitigate the growing noise levels from the Centenary Freeway.

As the traffic level of the freeway has increased, so has the noise, and finally residents get upset enough to start writing to their local representatives. You’d think they’d rush to organise a team to go out and repair the barrier upon having this pointed out.

No. Instead of actually fixing the problem, State Member Anna Palaszczuk and Councillor Milton Dick have come together to hold an information night. I’m not making this up. Seriously. An information night? What kind of information do these people need? They know the barrier is gone, they know the noise is hard to live with, how about you just repair the barrier?

This Cranky Queenslander wonders how much of this crap has to go on before people will stop voting for these fools.