Weekly Reflection: when life gets in the way?

This week was one where life definitely got in the way of studies.  My grandfather has been unwell this week and on Wednesday his wife died.

My poppa is a grumpy old bugger who is likely defy all medical warnings about the dangers of smoking and drinking and will probably live to 100. When the prognosis of an inflamed heart came out, one of my uncles remarked that it was probably a case of the cigarettes igniting all the vodka in his system. Nevertheless he really loved his wife, and the old man cut a desperately sad figure at the funeral on Friday.

After the funeral, we spent the afternoon talking about his exploits in Japan where he was a member of Jayforce which included 3 weeks in the clink for being AWOL and visiting houses of, ahem, private Japanese citizens. Granddad’s experiences in Japan certainly wasn’t the stuff you read about in textbooks, but they make for good stories nonetheless. I’ve often joked the inspiration for Grandpa West came from my granddad.

To top off my week I now a cold. I was fully prepared to get sick during and even after my Teaching Experience, however somehow I managed to get sick BEFORE setting foot in a classroom.

So study this week has taken a back-seat to other stuff and I’m ok about that. Too often we think that education can only take place in classrooms with these people called teachers imparting knowledge. But really education is, not a preparation for life; education is life itself. My thanks to John Dewey for that last quote.