Welcome to the School Days, Reminiscences series in which my champion bloggers and authors share reminiscences of their school days. It’s my small way of thanking them for their support and of letting you know about their services and publications.
This week, I am pleased to introduce Miriam Hurdle, poet, blogger, flash fiction writer, photographer, ex-teacher and educator. She blogs at the Showers of Blessings and recently published a book of poems entitled Songs of Heartstrings: Poems of Gratitude and Beatitude.
I first met Miriam at the Carrot Ranch when she rode up and joined in the flash fiction challenges. Since then, we’ve met up in many different places around the blogosphere. Considering she’s been blogging even longer than I; I’m surprised we hadn’t met earlier. We share our thoughts on education and grandchildren, and in fact on anything to do with making our journeys through life the best we can. It is always a pleasure to converse with Miriam.
Before we begin the interview, I invite Miriam to tell you a little of herself:
Miriam Hurdle is a multi-genre writer. She writes poetry, flash fiction, short stories and memoir.
Music has rooted in her life. Being a soloist as a teenager led her to taking voice lessons and to have ongoing singing engagements. She continues to sing soprano in choral groups. Lyrics have a major influence in the natural flow of her melodic writing. She writes memoir in the form of poetry.
She took photos when the films were black and white. Photography is still her enjoyable hobby. Drawing and painting were fun activities as a child. She resumed drawing and watercolor painting several years ago. In her poetry collection, she includes photos and paintings to illustrate the poems.
She earned a Doctor of Education from the University of La Verne in California. After two years of rehabilitation counseling, fifteen years of public-school teaching and ten years in school district administration, she retired and enjoys life with her husband in southern California. She makes frequent visits to her daughter, son-in-law and granddaughter in Oregon.
Welcome, Miriam.
Let’s talk school. First, could you tell us where you attended school?
I went to school from elementary to college in Hong Kong.
Did you attend a government, private or independent school?
In Hong Kong, there are public schools, government subsidized schools, and private schools. I attended two elementary schools sponsored by organizations and they were tuition free schools. One was a Buddhist organization sponsored school, and we had to take a Buddhism class. I remember the nun chanting in class.
What is the highest level of education you achieved?
After I graduated from the college in Hong Kong, I worked for five years, then came to the United States for my graduate studies. I got three master’s degrees – in Religious Education, Counseling, and Educational Administration and a Doctor in Education.
What work or profession did you choose after school and was there anything in school that influenced this choice?
I love music since I was a kid. I sang solos in churches as a teenager. As a result, I took voice lessons and had more singing engagement. It would be my first choice to become a professional musician or teach music, but I could only afford to do music as an enjoyment, not a profession.
When I was in college, I volunteered in Far East Broadcasting Company in several programs. I did singing and recorded children’s stories. When I finished college, FEBC wanted to hire me full time, but the job didn’t pay too much.
Many girls chose to be teachers or nurses back in those days. I accepted a teaching job. I taught Chinese as a Second Language for three years in the Baptist University of Hong Kong. I was also a Director of Children’s Department for two years at Asian Outreach where I wrote four children’s books.
In the U.S. I worked as a Rehabilitation Counselor for two years, taught preschool for two years, taught elementary school for fifteen years, and worked as a school district administration for ten years.
What is your earliest memory of school?
My earliest memory was when I won the Abacus Competition in first grade. The second-grade teacher taught abacus. He came to our classroom to present me the award. Another wonderful memory was that my first-grade teacher Mrs. Leung said I was bright. The thought of being bright influenced my whole life.
When I studied counseling and child development, I learned that positive reinforcement encourages desirable behavior. In fact, it is also true with adults. Instead of pointing fingers or saying, “don’t do this, don’t do that,” we can praise and encourage desirable behavior or responses.
What memories do you have of learning to read?
We did a lot of memorization in reading. We had to recite the reading lessons in early elementary school. My dad helped with my homework and had me memorized the lessons every week. I learned everything in the current lesson before the teacher taught a new lesson. At the fourth grade, I read my dad’s newspapers. My dad and I traded sections to read. I read the horrible news describing the details of crime scenes, read adult fantasy, comic strips and the Sunday children’s section.
My favorite literature was Aesop’s Fables. I also remember learning English grammar such as the regular tenses as walk, walking, walked, walked; and the irregular tenses as go, going, went, gone.
What memories do you have of learning to write?
There was not a lot of creative writing in the lower grades in elementary school. We did a lot of copying the reading lessons. I guess by copying; we remember writing in a proper sentence structure. In upper grade, I learned how to write a story with an opening, the middle, the climax and the conclusion. I remember how I paced my writing and made sure the climax was at the three fourth of the paper. We had a subject in Letter Writing and learned to write different letters.
I learned to write both Chinese and English calligraphy. For Chinese, we wrote in vertical and right to left progression. For English, we wrote alphabet and spellings. I like calligraphy and I still write in calligraphy style in my handwriting. I bought a calligraphic set to address my daughter’s wedding invitations.
What do you remember about math classes?
We learned math the traditional way and learned the mental math. I did addition and subtraction well with an abacus. Doing multiplication and subtraction on the abacus is harder so I don’t remember how to do them. I won the Abacus Competition in the first grade.
What was your favorite subject?
My favorite subject was reading. I didn’t have books other than textbooks at home. There were bookstands on the streets where I could rent books to read. I remember using my allowance to buy tickets to rent books to read. I love to read comic books also.
What did you like best about school?
I like to be with my friends. My best friend Shirley at the fourth grade was my teacher Mrs. Cheung’s daughter. Mrs. Cheung was also a music teacher for the upper grades. We had a singing contest. I entered the competition and got fourth place. Shirley got second place. Shirley played the piano. I went to her house on the weekends and listened to her play for hours.
I keep in touch with Shirley. When we traveled to London, she and her husband took us sightseeing for five days.
What did you like least about school?
I can’t think of anything I didn’t like. There were forty students in each class. We received two report cards a year; they showed our ranking among the class. I got second to ninth places from first to sixth grade. It broke my heart when I got the ninth place. I can’t remember what happened, but it wasn’t because of any subject.
How do you think schools have changed since your school days?
I think the elementary schools in Hong Kong still do a lot of memorization rather than creative learning. My sister and her husband sent their two children to Canadian system International School, and they eventually migrated to Canada. After they got the Canadian citizenship, because of my brother-in-law’s health issue, they went back to Hong Kong and keep the dual citizenship.
What do you think schools (in general) do well?
Since I left Hong Kong forty years ago, I can’t comment about the schools there anymore. But I taught in California thirty years ago, I can comment on the schools in California.
Class size–Kindergarten is 20 students, first to third grades is 25 or fewer students, and fourth to sixth grades is up to 35 students average.
Schools get special funding for English learners to get extra help to learn at their current English levels to catch up with the levels of their classes.
There is special funding to help students from the low-income family because statistic shows that these students have low academic levels.
Many families can afford to send their children to go to preschool. For low-income families, they can send their children to the Headstart program to prepare for the kindergarten.
There are breakfast and lunch served at schools. Low-income families receive free meals for their children. Other children have meals for reduced or full fees. Students can bring their lunches to school also.
How do you think schools could be improved?
At elementary school, there is not enough time of the day to teach all the subject to prepare the students for Junior High or High school. Schools end at 2:30 p.m. for lower grade and 2:45 p.m. for upper grade. For lower grades, teachers teach reading and math in the morning. After lunch, they may teach social studies and physical education. There is no time to teach science. Since the State test at the end of the year doesn’t test science, the teachers give up on teaching that subject.
For upper grade, teachers teach reading and math in their homeroom. Some of them team teach social studies and science so the teacher could do the preparation and teach for more than one class. Students can benefit more learning if the school days are longer.
Thank you for sharing your reminiscences of school and thoughts about education in general, Miriam. It’s been wonderful to have you here. I learned so much about you. I am impressed by your doctorate degree, curious about whether you learned English at school, fascinated by the thought of renting books and envious of your singing ability.
Find out more about Miriam Hurdle
Visit her website: https://theshowersofblessings.com
Or her Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/Miriam-Hurdle/e/B07K2MCSVW?ref=dbs_p_ebk_r00_abau_000000
Connect with her on social media
Twitter: https://twitter.com/mhurdle112
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/miriam.hurdle.1
Purchase Songs of Heartstrings from
Amazon Universal Link: http://smarturl.it/SongsofHeartstrings
Amazon UK Link: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07K1S47W9
Amazon.com Link: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B07K1S47W9
If you missed previous reminiscences, check them out here:
Look for future interviews in this series to be posted on Sunday evenings AEST.
Coming soon:
with more to follow.
Thank you for reading. I appreciate your comments. Please share your thoughts.
![School Days, Reminiscences of Charli Mills Welcome to the School Days, Reminiscences series in which my champion bloggers and authors share reminiscences of their school days. It’s my small way of thanking them for their support and of letting you know about their services and publications. This week, I am pleased to introduce Debby Gies (D.G. Kaye), author and blogger extraordinaire. I can’t remember when or how I met Debby, but I do know that very early on I read and thoroughly enjoyed her travel memoir Have Bags, Will Travel. While Debby has done far more travel than I, there was much in her book with which I could identify. I remember laughing out loud in places, surprised to find there was someone else who shared similar obsessive behaviour. Debby is a prolific writer, mainly of memoir. I have read others of her books and never been disappointed. Her style is open, from the heart, and conversational. You could be having a chat with a best friend over coffee, sharing love, life and laughter. In fact, those are things we both have in our blog taglines. How could we not be friends? Since our first encounter, Debby has been a constant supporter of both my blogs, always dropping by to share some words of wisdom or encouragement — a true champion. But perhaps I should allow Debby to tell you a little of herself: Debby Gies is a Canadian non-fiction/memoir author who writes under the pen name of D.G. Kaye. D.G. is born, raised, and resides in Toronto, Canada. Kaye writes about her life experiences, matters of the heart, and women’s issues hoping to empower others. Why I write: I love to tell stories that have lessons in them and hope to empower others by sharing my own experiences. I write raw and honest, hoping that others can relate and find that we always have a choice to move from a negative space to a positive. We need only the courage to take the leap. Describe yourself in three words: Optimistic, funny, worry-wart. (Is that four words?) Best advice: If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all. Never do something to someone you wouldn’t want done unto yourself. Welcome Debby. Now let’s talk school. First of all, could you tell us where you attended school? I’m born and raised in Toronto, Canada. I originally began grade 1 going to a parochial school. Before the school year ended, I was stamping my feet demanding I wanted to go to ‘real school’, lol, meaning public school. I got my wish and grade 2 was Kenton Drive Public School where I was thrilled to have Miss Jacobs for my teacher as she was very compassionate toward me. In middle of grade 4, we moved (again) and changed schools to Rockford Road Public School till grade 7 where I spent my 3 years at Fisherville Junior High. In grade 10 I went to high school at William Lyon Mackenzie Collegiate – far out of my living district, but considered higher academically than the one near my home. It was a half mile walk to the bus and 3 busses there and back a day throughout high school. After high school I moved away from home and began working and taking night school classes for business and accounting where I received diplomas, which proved useful for many of the secretarial and admin jobs I had through the years. I also became a certified travel agent and then proceeded back to University of Toronto to study voice and theory in music. Did you attend a government, private or independent school? They were all government schools. What is the highest level of education you achieved? High school diploma and the school of hard knocks. What work or profession did you choose after school and was there anything in school that influenced this choice? While in school I couldn’t make up my mind what I wanted to do. My initial goals were to become a journalist or a lawyer. I had the grades to do so but not the inspiration nor the encouragement to follow through. I worked in the clothing industry for a few years in my early twenties, started as a salesgirl, working my way up to managerial positions and buyer. The fashion bug hit me early. I then became an executive secretary for a general manager of the Carlton Inn Hotel – best job ever! And then I moved on to run an office for a construction company for a friend and later did the same work for an architectural firm. After ‘those days’ I went to ‘dealer’ school where I became a licensed blackjack and poker dealer and worked in the casino business until I met my husband. I also spent the better part of my twenties trying to catch a break in the music industry as a singer. Fun times in bands doing gigs. I recorded a demo tape, but eventually I gave up the dream. What is you earliest memory of school? My earliest memory of school was a kind teacher I had in kindergarten – Mrs. Wagner. She knew my emotional struggles and paid me extra attention. I came from a severely, ongoing, broken home situation and a few of these teachers I pointed out were like angels with radar. What memories do you have of learning to read? Honestly, I don’t have any memories of learning to read other than I loved reading. Nobody ever read to me at home and we didn’t have any books. I must have had some great teachers! What memories do you have of learning to write? I couldn’t wait how to learn to write. I do remember I began writing as soon as I learned how to write as a tool to release my thoughts and feelings. I wrote poems and love notes on scraps of paper and made cards. Some I gave to intended recipients – some I never showed a soul. What do you remember about math classes? I enjoyed math until high school and always had good grades, but I lost interest when we began learning physics and calculus. I much preferred English and French classes. Languages have always fascinated me. What was your favourite subject? It’s a toss up between history and geography. I loved to learn about other countries and cultures, even as a child. But I’ll have to go with geography, which I think stimulated my interest to travel. What did you like best about school? My teachers. I had developed several rapports with teachers in many grades. When I look back on those days, I know it had to do with the compassion and extra attention they gave me that I didn’t receive at home. What did you like least about school? I hated gym class. I was not an active child, more of a thinker than a doer. I didn’t like the ugly uniforms we wore that weren’t the least flattering, especially for girls carrying extra weight, and I didn’t enjoy sports. I was the proverbial girl chosen last when picking teams. Here’s the girl who always kept a high 80s average throughout high school until the year I actually failed gym, which cut into my good grade average. Seriously, who fails gym? How do you think schools have changed since your school days? Oh my, that’s a loaded question. Even though I never had children, I’m quite aware how much the system has changed. There have been many cutbacks in after school programs, classrooms have too many students in them, and I hear complaints from parents that their kids are inundated with homework nowadays. Not to mention, the whole computer era that wasn’t our world then. The saddest thing I think that’s happening is the decision to no longer teach cursive writing. How on earth can they not teach that anymore? It’s sad the art of letter writing is on its way out with time. It also makes me wonder if children will even learn how to sign their name where print doesn’t cut it. What do you think schools (in general) do well? I’m not too familiar with what’s happening nowadays in classrooms, but I do know from having a 7-year-old great niece and having picked her up from school a few times, the system for safety seems to be excellent before picking up children from school. I must sign in, and my niece (her mother) must call the school to alert them someone else will be picking up her child. How do you think schools could be improved? They could definitely use more government funding, more teachers, more after school programs, and more benefits for the children whose families can’t afford supplies and books for their kids, and for field trips. [thank you] Thank you for sharing your reminiscences of school and thoughts about education in general, Debby. It’s pleasing to know that you enjoyed school and that you had compassionate teachers who helped you blossom. It’s been wonderful to have you here. I learned so much I didn’t already know about you. Find out more about Debby Gies (D.G. Kaye) and connect with her on social media or any of her author and blog pages www.dgkayewriter.com www.goodreads.com/dgkaye www.amazon.com/author/dgkaye7 www.twitter.com/@pokercubster (Of course there’s a story to this name!) www.facebook.com/dgkaye www.linkedin.com/in/DGKaye7 www.mewe.com/i/debbygies www.instagram.com/dgkaye www.pinterest.com/dgkaye7 Debby invites you to come join our Literary Diva’s Library Facebook group for writers and authors And our #ABRSC -Authors/bloggers rainbow support club. We are also on Mewe - https://mewe.com/join/theliterarydivashangout BOOKLINKS: [image] Conflicted Hearts [image] MenoWhat? A Memoir [image] Words We Carry [image] Have Bags, Will Travel [image] P.S. I Forgive You [image] Twenty Years: After “I Do” Visit me at my Amazon Author Page [books] If you missed previous reminiscences, check them out here: Charli Mills Sally Cronin Anne Goodwin Geoff Le Pard Hugh W. Roberts Look for future interviews in this series to be posted on Sunday evenings AEST. Coming soon: Pauline King Jules Paige D. Avery With more to follow. Note that, as next Sunday is Easter Sunday, I won’t be posting an interview. Pauline’s interview will be posted on 28 April. See you then. [thank you] Thank you for reading. I appreciate your comments. Please share your thoughts.](https://norahcolvin.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/books-by-d.g.-kaye.jpg?w=1024&h=1024)
Norah Colvin 