7 things you probably don’t want to know about me

I have been tagged by Nergiz Kern so now I need to repeat the rules and write seven facts about myself before choosing seven other people to tag :-)

I had no clue about this event that seems to be happening – but have read back several layers and it is interesting to get to know your on-line friends better. Anyone who knows me in real life will already know these things, but most on-line friends will not.

The rules say you have to:
• Link your original tagger(s), and list these rules on your blog.
• Share seven facts about yourself in the post - some random, some weird.
• Tag seven people at the end of your post by leaving their names and the links to their blogs.
• Let them know they’ve been tagged by leaving a comment on their blogs and/or Twitter

So here goes:
1. I live in the UK, have a wonderful, long suffering family who seem to put up with me :-) though I am sure my husband would gladly swap me for a newer model any time!

2. I was teaching in a primary school in about 1995, acting as the school ICT co-ordinator and I won an ICT competition giving me a modem and a free ISP service. The parents’ committee agreed to fund a phone line into my room and immediately started a lottery to pay for it. Having got the internet in my classroom the challenge was to make it useful – and what a challenge – there was little written for children in those days. I set about writing websites based on world religions – about which I know nothing, learned a lot, but have forgotten again – to use in my teaching and they are all old fashioned by today’s standards but still used very widely so I don’t like to take them away! Whilst trying to convince the school of the usefulness of the web :-) there was an earthquake in Turkey, right where one teacher’s son was living and working. She came in sick and worried because she had not heard from him and lots of people had been seriously injured or killed. Mid morning I got a message from Turkey “All communication systems down except the e-mail system. Tell mum I am okay.” There was no question of its usefulness after that. My school began to comprehend the power of the web!

3. With my one phone line we did a huge variety of internet projects, writing stories and poems with other schools, we took part in the Cat in the Hat around the world project, writing diaries etc. in each place he visited and posting photos on the school website (hand coded – no wysiwyg then), we swapped beanie babies with another school, again sharing diaries and photos, loads of e-mail projects, most of the pupils had e-pals – it took up all of my early mornings, breaks and dinner times to keep it going – how did I find the energy? The school website was huge, we made a diary of the school pond, all of the performances, etc. We did all sorts, it was very exciting and spawned loads of conference talks. That was probably the most exciting time of my career.

4. I am pretty much terrified by butterflies – so In Second Life I go near them, stand in the middle of them etc., it has not helped so far I still vacate the room or even the house if one comes in. I don’t mind spiders or wasps though, so I do the spider and wasp bit the rest have to do the butterfly bit :-)

5. I started teaching in secondary school in the mid 70s, teaching music and drama. As I taught drama I was considered both part of the Humanities department and English department. Large scale financial problems across the whole of the UK meant that teachers were not replaced so when an English teacher left I was asked to take over his classes. English was considered more important than drama or music - so a total dyslexic who can hardly string half a dozen words together ended up teaching English! I only lasted for a couple of years there, it was just not me and not fair to the pupils.

6. I always wanted to write. I have written children’s stories, songs, endless ICT things for my job including articles, projects, reports etc., but I depend on friends or colleagues to help with editing. My inability to write coherently drives the people I work with round the bend and makes me very sad. I always thought that if I practised it would improve but it is never going to happen, I don’t have whatever it take to structure words into a sensible, cohesive text. Other people find writing easy, I am continuously amazed by that. I agonise for ages over a sentence, then someone will change it and make it work – simple :-) All I hope for these days is that the recipient of anything I write can actually understand it.

7. I love Egypt – I can actually see us attempting to go there to live at some point in the not too distant future. I say it is too far away from the family and I will settle for anywhere on the continent – but my husband is pretty convinced he wants to retire to Egypt.

So now for my seven tags – I guess people really hate you for this :-)

 
Pollyglott / Gizmo,( Gizmo keeps her real name hidden) http://pollyglott.blogspot.com/

Graham Mills / Peter Miller, http://tidalblog.blogspot.com/

Dudeney Ge /Gavin Dudeney, http://slife.dudeney.com/

Wonderalica Alturas/ Alicia Barbitta, http://focusingles.blogspot.com/

Anna Begonia/Antonella Berriolo http://internetaula.ning.com/profile/AntonellaBerriolo

Aristotle Smit /Brian Smith http://www.briansmithonline.com/

Daf Smirnov /Dafne Gonzalez http://slenglish.ning.com/profile/DafneGonzalez

So looking forward to reading all of your posts :-) Wishing you all a very happy 2009!