Every so often, one of my colleagues gives out a lulu of an assignment. Got a good one today.The classes were given a list of artists, including:
Remedios Varo
David Alfaro Siquerios
Frida Kahlo
Jose Clemente Orozco
Xul Solar
Francisco de Goya
El Greco
Salvador Dali
Diego Rivera
Pablo Picasso
The kids are to do research, write a two page paper, and make an oral presentation to the class. Oh, and they also have to create, on canvas, a reproduction of one of the artist's works.
Yes. They have to create a painting on canvas in the style of a famous artist.
So you're probably thinking that this is Fine Arts A.P., which we do in fact offer in this school, a college level art course. Because where else would a high school student be asked to create a painting on canvas (and a reproduction, no less)? Oh. That would be in a Spanish III class.
I told the girl who was looking for Xul Solar -- which turned out to be his last name, btw, and he was more known as a writer than an artist, which he came to later in life -- that if I had gotten this assignment in high school, I would have cried and told my mother that I was not going back to school.
This was pretty much my reaction in 9th grade when, after reading the Odyssey, our teacher told us that our homework that night was to write an epic poem. I remember trying to ask questions, to clarify what she wanted, but she would only repeat the assignment, told us to write what we thought she wanted, and then did that zip-the-lip-and-lock-it thing. I went home and cried, but my mother made me go to school anyway. I got a very poor grade on it, and when I asked the teacher why, she said it was because I hadn't written what she'd wanted. Crying, in school now, I said "But you wouldn't tell us what you wanted!"
I mean really, it's not a game here, people. The point of school and/or teaching isn't to show kids that you have more power than they do and can torture them and make them cry. I know it sometimes looks that way, but that's because there are idiots working in every field, ergo, some of them are teachers.
In the continuing saga of The Magic Hearing Aids, they didn't work this morning, but when I tried it again at about 1:30 pm, they worked fine. So there I was with the iPod running and I could hear it and I didn't want to turn it off because it was working! Unfortunately, so was I, so I just let it play Mozart quietly, and I could still hear conversations and stuff, and since I don't wear headphones, no one was the wiser. After school, a boy came into the library wearing headphones and fiddling with an mp3 player on his belt, and I didn't have the hypocritical heart to tell him to take the headphones off -- school rule -- since I was still listening to Mozart.
So when I got home, there was a message on the machine from R that she had forgotten her sandwich for her dinner break at home, and if I was going out, would I drop it off? I had offered to do this last week, but despite the apocalyptic weather that was going on out there, I was looking for an excuse to go somewhere, and where better than the Giant Bookstore Coffee Shop? I rarely have those lovely coffee drinks any more -- way too many calories there -- but I have one when I visit her at work. I think part of the charm is having her serve me, heeheehee; it's a real table-turner. Also, I had fun watching her work while I was waiting on line and before she saw me, because she is really so pleasant to customers and so efficient. I hated working retail when I did it in high school, but both my kids are good at it. It's nice to see them behave like real grownups. And I had a soy latte, which I've never had before, and it was really good.
I'm going to go make some nice tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich. It feels like the perfect meal for an apocalypse.
