Finding himself unemployed, Cyrus Henshaw does something he swore he would never doa "he applies for and receives a teaching position! He is gradually honed into a teaching machine under the tough tutelage of a domineering principal, an eclectic group of faculty misfits, and a horde of unconcerned students. Telling Tales Out of School is a must have for anyone that has ever taught, or thought of teaching. Not only will Dale Davis' wit keep you laughing, you'll also fall in love with all of the colorful characters."
In a life wrapped up in greed, ignorance, revenge, love and deceit, the author takes you on a thrilling and exciting journey of various Kenyan characters who all board an express bus to Mombasa, the country's coast. Meet Mumbi, an eleven year old girl whose father, a Mungiki sect religious fanatic, wants to forcibly circumcise her then marry her off to a sect member. Her seat mate is Sr. Maria, the selfless nun who is determined to save the girl, and who confronts the thugs that hijack the bus but later has to plead for their lives when her fellow passengers vow to lynch them. Chege, the naive son of a remarkably poor polygamist, gets a second opportunity in life, when he is sponsored to go to college, but in the bus he meets Ndugu Musa (Brother Moses), a reformed' jailbird who is eager to befriend him after he learns that the over-trusting villager carries his college fees in cash. Kanini is a pregnant rebellious teenager on her way back home to make peace with her parents after eloping. Loud-mouthed Othis is a promiscuous megalomaniac, taking his materialistic girlfriend to Mombasa on holiday; oblivious that there are hijackers within ear shot of their conversation and that an uncompromising brownie teacher, bearing him a grudge from the past, is also onboard and that she will go to any length to even the score. Then there is Tony, a Kenyan home on holiday from America, who carelessly accepts a painkiller from a stranger in the bus. As they struggle through the rough road, the heavy downpour and the hungry Tsavo man-eaters, can the pregnant girl make it through the journey and will the passengers who learn that they cannot trust each other all arrive in Mombasa, on time and in one piece?
WHICH UNIVERSITY CHALLENGE PRESENTER FAILED HIS ELEMENTARY MATHS O LEVEL SIX TIMES? FOR WHICH DRAGONS' DEN INVESTOR WAS FLOGGING LEATHER JACKETS A LUNCH BREAK ACTIVITY? WHICH ENVIRONMENTALIST WAS EXPELLED AT PRIMARY SCHOOL FOR ATTEMPTING TO POISON HIS CLASSMATES WITH DEADLY NIGHTSHADE? WHICH ADVENTURER AND EXPLORER SPENT HIS TIME AT ETON SHINNING UP THE ARCHITECTURE? Through intimate conversations with journalist Jonathan Sale, some of Britain's leading personalities reminisce about their school and college days, revealing the portents, paths and false starts that led them to where they are today. With poignant and hilarious anecdotes spanning everything from those very first days at school to receiving their dreaded O level, A level and degree results, this book is brimming with recollections that every reader can associate with. Tributes are paid to the teachers who opened doors, whilst others tell tales on those who slammed them in their faces. And all credit to the teachers who were truly prophetic about their pupils. These personalities may be reticent with regard to their adult personal lives, but speak candidly about their childhoods, revealing fascinating insights into the role their formative years played in shaping them to become the people they are today.
Laugh, weep, be moved, challenged, and inspired, as you are taken on a journey of discovery. You might identify with the students – or relate to this teacher! Delve into her world, as she fulfils her childhood dream of becoming a wise and compassionate teacher. She considers teaching as the greatest privilege and responsibility. She taught her school subjects, but she also taught young people life skills: how to learn, laugh, live, love, forgive – and what really matters, in this short life we are gifted. She strongly believes that students need acceptance, and self-belief, in order to learn and to love learning – that they are worth her time, interest, and care. Her methods of engaging the interest of students were rarely traditional. But they worked! If students had difficulty, her calling as a teacher was to “find another way”. Every time. You will be touched not only by her variety of classroom stories, but by her honesty, humour, wit, and insights, but you’ll be hooked with her ‘teaching’ experiences as she travels with seven teenagers for three weeks in a foreign country. What could possibly go wrong? Enjoy.
SHORTLISTED FOR THE TED HUGHES PRIZE 2015 Tabard Inn to Canterb'ry Cathedral, Poet pilgrims competing for free picks, Chaucer Tales, track by track, it's the remix From below-the-belt base to the topnotch; I won't stop all the clocks with a stopwatch when the tales overrun, run offensive, or run clean out of steam, they're authentic and we're keeping it real, reminisce this: Chaucer Tales were an unfinished business. In Telling Tales award-winning poet Patience Agbabi presents an inspired 21st-Century remix of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales retelling all of the stories, from the Miller's Tale to the Wife of Bath's in her own critically acclaimed poetic style. Celebrating Chaucer's Middle-English masterwork for its performance element as well as its poetry and pilgrims, Agbabi's newest collection is utterly unique. Boisterous, funky, foul-mouthed, sublimely lyrical and bursting at the seams, Telling Tales takes one of Britain's most significant works of literature and gives it thrilling new life.
Renowned picture book creator Jeanette Winter tells the story of a young girl in Afghanistan who attends a secret school for girls. Young Nasreen has not spoken a word to anyone since her parents disappeared. In despair, her grandmother risks everything to enroll Nasreen in a secret school for girls. Will a devoted teacher, a new friend, and the worlds she discovers in books be enough to draw Nasreen out of her shell of sadness? Based on a true story from Afghanistan, this inspiring book will touch readers deeply as it affirms both the life-changing power of education and the healing power of love.
From Ann Cleeves—New York Times bestselling and award-winning author of the Vera and Shetland series, both of which are hit TV shows—comes Telling Tales. “Ann Cleeves is one of my favorite mystery writers.”—Louise Penny It has been ten years since Jeanie Long was charged with the murder of fifteen-year-old Abigail Mantel. Now residents of the East Yorkshire village of Elvet are disturbed to hear of new evidence proving Jeanie’s innocence. Abigail’s killer is still at large. For one young woman, Emma Bennett, the revelation brings back haunting memories of her vibrant best friend--and of that fearful winter’s day when she had discovered her body lying cold in a ditch. As Inspector Vera Stanhope makes fresh enquiries on the peninsula and villagers are hauled back to a time they hoped to forget, tensions begin to mount. But are people afraid of the killer or of their own guilty pasts? With each person’s story revisited, the Inspector begins to suspect that some deadly secrets are threatening to unfurl...
p.B. J. Whiting savors proverbial expressions and has devoted much of his lifetime to studying and collecting them; no one knows more about British and American proverbs than he. The present volume, based upon writings in British North America from the earliest settlements to approximately 1820, complements his and Archer Taylor's Dictionary of American Proverbs and Proverbial Phrases, 1820-1880. It differs from that work and from other standard collections, however, in that its sources are primarily not "literary" but instead workaday writings - letters, diaries, histories, travel books, political pamphlets, and the like. The authors represent a wide cross-section of the populace, from scholars and statesmen to farmers, shopkeepers, sailors, and hunters. Mr. Whiting has combed all the obvious sources and hundreds of out-of-the-way publications of local journals and historical societies. This body of material, "because it covers territory that has not been extracted and compiled in a scholarly way before, can justly be said to be the most valuable of all those that Whiting has brought together," according to Albert B. Friedman. "What makes the work important is Whiting's authority: a proverb or proverbial phrase is what BJW thinks is a proverb or proverbial phrase. There is no objective operative definition of any value, no divining rod; his tact, 'feel, ' experience, determine what's the real thing and what is spurious."