TACTics Journal

A Publication for and by TOC for Education Practitioners

September 15, 2000

 

CONTENTS

CONNECTIONS

   (1) TOCFE, The Netherlands, Eleanor May-Brenneker, United Kingdom

NETWORKING

   (2)        TOC: The Malaysian Experience, C. Ean Khaw, Malaysia

   (3)        A Journey Begins, Jana Borisavljevic, Yugoslavia

EDITORS’ NOTE

   (4)        Kay Buckner-Seal, Cheryl A. Edwards

 

CONNECTIONS

(1)     TOCFE, The Netherlands

From Eleanor May-Benneker

 

Dear TOC Friends,

It's a shame I could not attend the Mexican conference.  I was busy with the final translations of the TACT manuals from English into Dutch with my colleague, Nel Hofmeester; I truly missed you all!

 

However, one Dutchman, Phillip Bakker, attended and he is going to brief the Dutch TOCFE group on Sunday, September 10th when I'll travel from UK to Holland to organize our 2nd “POOGI Day” this year.  All qualified TOCFE-ers want to be present.  The Dutch TOCFE movement is very alive and kicking! We are moving closer to achieving our Ambitious Target within the time limit we set 9 months ago at the end of the first Dutch TOCFE/TACT course. Some IOs were:

     Translate the 5 TACT manuals into Dutch by beginning of Sept. '00.

(A team of 5 TOCFE/NL translators volunteered to carry out this enormous task brilliantly!)

By end of Sept. '00:

           Have 25 copies printed

           Set date and venue for a new TACT course in January 2001

           Work out the logistics for this course

           Target prospective candidates

           Target cucumbers for this course

 

At our September meeting we'll work on these IOs and we're confident we'll be able to run the new course in January 2001, thanks to the TOC tools we're using to achieve all this.  The tools work and as some of my colleagues repeatedly say: "TOC has changed my way of thinking, privately and professionally.  We always automatically think now: What is hes need?  TOC provides clarity and focus."  Thank you Eli!  We'll report back on this POOGI. 

 

Also, due to the sudden illness of an appointed specialist, on the spur of the moment, I was asked to run a 2-day study skill course for 13-year-old dyslexics.  I took on the challenge, working out a programme using TOC tools and I set time aside in the programme to teach the pupils a simple “motivation tree,” a positive branch.  They loved it and the parents commented later on, when the students shared their work with them.  How brilliant that tree was!  One parent wrote to me: “My child is now much more confident and highly motivated!”

 

Warm greetings and love to you all from a cold, wet and windy England,

 

Eleanor May-Benneker

eleanor.may@emayl.freeserve.co.uk

 

NETWORKING

(2)      TOC: The Malaysian Experience

By C. Ean Khaw, Malaysia

 

C. Ean Khaw is head of the Special Projects Unit in the Curriculum Development Center of the Ministry of Education, Malaysia.  She will share the Malaysian Experience in TOC in a series of contributions to TACTics in the future.  This week she begins with the first:

 

A Journey Begins With The First Step” —A Chinese Proverb

 

When the year began in January 2000, we had never heard of TOC in Malaysia.  By July 2000, TOC was on its way in a program designed to reach 1.4 million children entering school for the first time in January 2001 and a potential 750,000 preschool children.  How is this possible?  Is it magic?  Are we just plain lucky?

 

Luck, as we know it in TOC, is what happens when opportunity meets preparation.  What we basically did was to grasp the opportunities… the opportunity of getting an exposure from a TOC demonstration by Kathy Suerken in February 2000 and a 5-day TACT course in early July… the opportunity of taking it into two bona fide programs that were already tailor-made for implementation on a nation-wide scale.  We are in the process of preparing a transition programme for children entering year one of formal school at 6 or 7 years of age and preparing the guidelines to the National Preschool Curriculum for children aged 4-5 years old.  These two will be launched in 2001 and it was timely to include TOC as part and parcel of the programs.  In this way, TOC will impact over 30,000 teachers and almost 2 million children in 2001!

 

We seem to have moved at an incredible speed but basically it is a matter of taking stock of the problem and situation at hand and turning it into a win-win solution, what we would call, “If this is it, lets get down to business.”  The wonderful part of this is that in arriving at achieving our goals, the TOC tools themselves had been used.  We were in a position where time was an important factor and using TOC’s Ambitious Target tool enabled us to reach our goal in a phenomenal saving of time.

 

Right now in August, September, and October we are all fired up preparing the program with a teacher-preparation package for TOC, on which we will be also running a pilot.  Even as we are working on it, new and wonderful ideas for more things start surfacing and these we will keep for future development.

 

Right now, we have a focus and a direction and on these we are working hard so that when our plans come to fruition in the near future we will have that warm glow in us that we are one step nearer the vision we all hold to make a significant difference in the lives of the children in Malaysia who will become part of the future citizens of the world.

 

September 2000:  Coming Up Next:  (As 7 Different Articles)

 

The Malaysian Experience : Using TOC in Curriculum Development:

1.    Using the Ambitious Targets Tool in Resistance to Change

2.   Using the Ambitious Targets Tool in Preparing an Improvement Goal

3.   Using the Ambitious Targets Tool to Design A Curricular Program

4.   Modules for Personal Development of Preschool Children

5.   TOC in the Transition Program

6.   The Teacher-Preparation Package:  More Than Good Enough

7.   A Module for Teaching Moral Education and Values to Young Children: Using the Cloud and Negative Branch Tools

 

(3)      A Journey Begins

From Jana Borisavljevic, Yugoslavia

 

After a long flight from London to Houston, several hours delay in Houston, a late night taxi ride to the Sheraton Hotel in Monterrey (during which I struggled to keep awake) and a very short night’s rest, I found myself entering a small meeting room at the hotel at 9 AM the following morning being welcomed by seven friends I had never met before.

 

I have had many experiences of sharing good times and important experiences with people with whom I then grew to be friends with but this was the first time I started off by experiencing “friendship” and then growing to share good times and important experiences.  And of these there were many…

 

I still wonder what made the TACT ETC. class held in Monterrey from 3-7 August so extraordinary.  From the very first moment, I experienced everybody as truly giving and eager to contribute.  I suppose we all so appreciated the opportunity to be there and to share and learn together that we actually started from the place where most groups come to only after they have worked together for some time—a place of trust, respect, support and keen interest in learning from one another.

 

There were eight of us, including our facilitator, all from different backgrounds and experiences, each one a very strong individual and yet there was a great feeling of togetherness and unity in the group.  We had a “gadget lady” who was never short of a technological device to suit the situation, an “organizer” who even on the first day knew where to take us for a meal, a softly spoken, smiley-eyed “academic” who had a soothing presence and carried around her an aura of gentle and unimposing authority, a knowledgeable “enthusiast” or maybe an enthusiastic “knower” who even when he was trying to hold himself back made the air around him “buzz” with ideas.  There was another knowledgeable enthusiast who claimed he didn’t know much about education and yet had the qualities of the best teachers I know: giving of himself, patience and calmness.  Then there was the “warrior” who fought the cold with a vision and taught leadership with grace, the “scribe” —a beautiful person with beautiful handwriting; and the “leaping one” whose mind would every now and then jump a few steps ahead leaving her behind to make sense of it all.

  

When we were introducing ourselves on the first morning a lady next to me spoke about her experience of sharing the cloud with her daughter and I recognized a story from the TACTics.  I shared with the others how I felt about that —an instant “jump” to a different level, the thought of “I know this lady!” and a feeling of meeting an old friend. This started us on a sharing of how important TACTics was for each one of us, how it gave us a sense of community, how it helped with practical ideas, how it inspired us…  It also made us realize how we took it for granted. 

 

I was glad that Cheryl, one of the TACTic’s editors, was there to hear our appreciation, but I made a promise to myself then that I would write and share my appreciation this way as well.  I wanted to do that for several reasons: to thank the editors, to thank the people who send their contributions, to express my gratitude for the fact that there is this way in which we can communicate, to express my gratitude that there is such a thing as TOC, to express my gratitude that there are people who hold a vision of a better world and to express my gratitude for TACTics being one of the many ways in my life in which I experience receiving abundantly.

 

A month has passed since that class and I still experience the warmth, enthusiasm and joy that were generated in it.  Coming back to Yugoslavia with that training experience and the conference in Monterrey is like going on a journey and taking a compass in my hand.

 

EDITORS’ NOTE

(4)      Kay Buckner-Seal, Cheryl A. Edwards

Eleanor, “so much to do and so little time in which to do it…” It’s been great hearing from you. 

 

Jana, good luck on your journey; you’ll do great as long as you don’t loose that compass.  It’s inspiring to hear that our readers value the TACTics Journal.  THANKS!

 

Ean, you have left us breathless.  We look forward to joining you on your journey to make a significant difference in the lives of all our children.

 

To all of our TOCFE family, we welcome your input.  If you would like to share with us, send hyperlink to:

 <bucknek@resa.net>

or

<redwards@sault.com>.

 Or, you may send it by mail to:

            Cheryl A. Edwards

            2253 S. Hill Island Road

            Cedarville, MI 49719 USA