The Primitive and the Exact

7/27/2019 The Primitive and the Exact

1/90

God as Divine Geometer (13th cent.)

The Primitive and the Exact

For it is only through images that the inner world communicates at all.Images of the past, shapes of the future.

Images of vigour for a decadent period, images of calmfor one too violent. Images of reconciliation for a world torn by division.

And in an age of mediocrity and shattereddreams, images of abounding, generous, exuberant beauty.MICHAEL TIPPETT (1905-1997)

The idea of on demand online units of teacher training,

carried out by means of easily assimilated webinars in

which the option to participate remotely is ensuredis of


2/90

great benefit to the English navigator in foreign seas

during a period of dead calm.

I followed with profit ideas about the imparting of

accuracy and consistent learning routines in overseas

students, and discovered new information about the

alveolar and velar . It seems English is derived from

our word for angle, as the part of Germany from which

my ancestors came was shaped like a fish-hook and

called Angeln...

Georgian children in a rural setting, however, have scant

regard for accuracy and exactitude. They delight in

marinading in the excitementthe plash of newsounds

and the energy of fresh imageswhich a new tongue,

subterreneanly imparted by an astute teacher, canon a


3/90

good day ensure. In this essay we look at some of the

results which such linguistic energy and acts of

imagination can achieve.

*

Here we see pupil grappling with a new word pugknown

from a phonetic type exercise from Enchanted Learning.

Its important to migrate back from thephotocopy to the

security of the blackboard and the home realm of the

drawing encapsulating image and word.


4/90

Quasi-ideographic language building: Chinese must have

started like this! Under a table which resembles a

mushroom we see a cet. The important point here is the

pictorial definition ofunder.


5/90

The pug, however, is on the rug. If anything, he appears

to be hovering over it. The rug is reticulated into a

surface of forty squares, which makes me wonder

whether the student is anticipating a sound world of

approxiamtely forty sounds.

An attempt at a glossary. Where there are misspellings,

the sounds are firmly entrenched in the students ear.

There are one or two other confusions, but the main thing

is the desire to make a list spontaneously and

energetically.


6/90

The vitality of the children in winter. They live near the

surface of things, full of bubble and fun, and if suitably

stimulated, will dig down into the psyche to unearth

treasures of apprehension. But on a day like this,

everything is likely to be boisterous, short-lived and

superficial.


7/90

The importance of mental spacing: Khatia is putting the

rhyming words into boldly separated columns. Here we

see great learning going on, and a cloze exercise being

set up for the instruction of Akaki (foreground right).


8/90

Some tremendously harmonious colouring at the expense

of filling in the right colours. Its a visceral exploration

of the objects depicted, a reliving of them in the

imagination via the act of colouring them in. The

linguistic and analytical will come in very soon. For now

the emphasis is on establishing a study world, a domain

of repose and order.


9/90


10/90

Richinner worlds conjoured up for the children by Enchanted

Learnings Greek amphorae. A secret path of the

imagination back to a past when Georgia and Greece

shared a common ancient world.


11/90

A Chinese sage, acutely tinted to reflect a lambent

sense of nature and the Silk Road.


12/90


13/90

Jumpingonto the subject of the sentence, realized physically,

orthographically and spatially


14/90

Multiple and colourful underlinings: no analysis or

reflection here, but drumming in the music and sound of

the mastered words in a single grammatical take.


15/90

This sketch shows Snow White and the Seven Dwarves,

but Snow White is a dancing, maternal Goddess of

Spring, and the dwarves (four large and three small) are

clothed in some splendidly complementary colours,

almost resembling a rainbow; above, a secure, shady

wood and an airy cloud- and sun-filled sky. Most of the

same rainbow hues appear in a sprawling spangle of stars

in a different picture by a classmate seen just below: the

predictable laws of the lucent, natural world representing

a wonderful inner imaginative refuge for both girl

students (aged maybe about 8 or 9).


16/90

More magical nature worlds from the same class:

dragon; magic tree; knobbly, local-style mountains,studded with fertile and shade-giving trees, as in a vision

of Eden.


17/90

This painting in felt pens has all the verve of a Matisse

(cf R). The choice of colours and boldness of conception

are remarkably dramatic and pleasing.


18/90


19/90


20/90


21/90


22/90

Remarkable essays on the deep inner theme of inhabiting,

which Bachelard has analysed. Learning the names of the

rooms in a house involves a meaningful psychologicaljourney for the young artists. Everywhere there is a

tremendous eye for detail and an acute sense of

observation. The pure lines of the table might have come

from Ozenfant (below far R) but its a touch ironic that

a huge calligraphic and artistic effort has missed a slip in

the spelling! (top R)


23/90


24/90


25/90

A careful and measured fixing and naming of salient

images in which texture, context, consciousness and

attention are all in perfect balance. The figures look

really come to life and speak vivdly to the onlooker. Th

spilling red water adds as surreal, dramatic touch.


26/90

Even where the learning curve is straightforward,

synesthesia can make for great clarity


27/90


28/90

Studying a textby Miss Read about a ruralchurch

school in England, Anuka imagines its appearance, and

types across some new words from my scanned text


29/90

Whats impressive about these three drawings

from the same student is the strongly ingrained

and vivid presence which the entities represent.

The sun is sizzling hot, but he has yet a

personality: rosy cheeks and a tongue; and hes

doing his job, with some enjoyment. The passive

mushroom on the ground has not got a lot to

recommend it except its unusual shape;

meanwhile theflowers from the meadow

(although only one, exemplary, flower is given!)

represented in mid-air, above the mushroom

have all the grace and buoyancy of a childs view

of springtime.


30/90

We have a star at random a beautifully

delineated five-pointed star floating loose

underneath the mushroom. And the little girl has

given no real thought to the use of the definite orindefinite article, but shes decided to call them

the mushroom, the sun, the flowers [sic] , the

star: thus, to her, what shes represented are the

essential elements of things in her grasp; and

shes baptized them in English; and in that act of

denotation, shes not only brought, really, into

her heart the names of these things in English:

shes also meditated upon them, lived with them

for a little while; thought about them; reflected

on them; and reacted to them; and ended up

with a series of lovely and really quite generous

open-ended images, which express her

happiness to be alive; and her readiness to take

part in the dance of the cosmos.

Her blackboard, again, has the gravitas of the

schoolroomin both senses of the word: its

propped up very nicely; there are shadows, under

each of the legs; theres some mysterious writing

across the middle of the boardits done in a

more attractive colour than a normal blackboard,because its blue; and the sun this time a rather

more schematic sun! with seven beautifully-

spaced points is illuminating the scene. This

time, she has not called her items the sun or the


31/90

board, but she shes just looked at isolated

senses having a board, or a sun, in everyday

circumstances. This time, shes not being

definitional: shes not trying to create a kind ofBook of Genesis or Garden of Eden scenario, as

some of the children do in some of their

drawings: this is more an ad hoc, vocabulary-

building, image-building or word-building

exercise, which shes doing for her own pleasure;

and the words are a little bit subsidiary to the

images; but the two work together in a very

symbiotic and complementary way: the balance

between them is perfect.

Its a wonderful exemplification of the medieval

principle ofdilectio: doing something

meditatively out of ones sheer love of the

delight and texture of it.


32/90

Here we see (from the same student) a Pooh

Bear and a bottle of cola. Shes decided to list

their attributes in groups: the bottle is black (I

suppose a bottle is black when its got some Coke

in it) very observant of her!although shes

drawn its contents in red: but shes clearly

thinking of itin black. The red recalls maybe the

fruity taste of the Coke. The Pooh is a classical

Pooh in the style of the drawings by E.H.

Shepherd: but hes done in yellow. One might

claim that a Pooh Bear is properly brown: but

yellows a more optimistic colour; shes balancing

her bottle of Coke here. And shes obviously got a

great interest in the sun: which shes describing


33/90

as yellow, warm, hot; and it reminds her of the

sky and the clouds which she has spelt with a

w; which is logical. I wouldnt dream of changing

such a beautiful piece of writing.

And the board has reminded her ofchalk,eraser,

words and, very interestingly, formula: shes

probably got that from her maths lesson. Again, it

just shows a superb, complete, open-eyed take

on reality; from a student whos very eager to

learn, whos very settled in her view of the world;

and open, really, to any learning experience. Its

the kind of work which gives the teacher great

delight.


34/90


35/90

Another, older, student has written almost a

small poem: Parrot is a birdit flies, Parrot has

beautiful colours. Here, of course, the article is

not thereGeorgian wouldnt have an article

but it gives us the essentials of the parrot, and I

photographed this for the text rather than for the

picture of the parrot which is drawn to one side.


36/90

Another student has seen some emotional

context in her river: shes drawn in arrows

indicating the ideas and feelings which a river

evokes for her. Shes given us a nice broad river,which gets broader as it goes along; perhaps

shes thinking of our local Matsavera River which

twists and turns, and has an eccentric path; and

shes thinking of the riverhurrying; so shes put

hurry Shes thinking that the river is perhaps

Quixotic, and does strange things, so shes put

naughty: maybe shes thinking of it flooding, or

not being direct; and so shes also written long

because it does go on for an awfully long

distance!and shes written fast, because,

indeed, a river like this river of ours is a gurgling

and rushing and rather attractively vital kind

ofriver; with almost a personality of its own.

*


37/90


38/90


39/90

A group of images that show lists. When we

began our early learning classes we sometimes

showed a photograph on one side of the screen;

and on the other the words for the image we had

projected. Here we see chicken, elephant,

fisherman; and on this occasion, we got the

computer to write them in a kind of script.sothat the children would write down the words

more nearly in handwriting than is the case with

small-case print writing which is sometimes the

promulgated norm in textbooks; and you can see


40/90

the children here will write maybe the sound of

the words or maybe they will group them: make

elaborate wavy lines down the lists down the

columns to suggest how they are orderingthem in their minds; or maybe they will just leave

elegant white space between the columns, so

that everything is crystal clear.

This is the work of two students; and theyve

tried to echo each other, to list the various

compass-points, really, in their minds, in course

of copying down many words from our days

study. And this time we were expanding concepts


41/90

numbers of things; and small expressions like I

do not knowwhich has been written six times,

for some strange reason! The words are always

written eloquently, and with small variations: astrong sense ofmastering the expressions;

sometimes running the words into one another;

with no real thought for conventional

orthographyIts rather the sense ofconquering

and internalizing an expression which they

already know inside-out. And I come along, and

put in a few annotations in red, just to support

them, help them along Theres nothing

profound here; but its a channeling of daily

learning in a very lucid and lucent way: from

wonderfully attentive, wonderfully articulate,

and always happy students.


42/90

This shows the response of a student who clearly

suffers from dyslexia. But even though this is full

of disturbing erroryou wouldnt really know

where to start correcting itits nonetheless very

clear that hes making an effort: hes trying to

write words down on a board, hes trying to

space them out, hes copying them as best he

can: theyre coming out very strangely; but

nonetheless, this is really my non-invasive

teaching philosophy in action. It would be very

hard to know how to guide this boy, except to

encourage him; and let him try things; and little

by little, the mind will heal itself and come into

focus. Thats the best I can hope for with a


43/90

student like that. But thats, by and large, a

philosophy which applies in every situation.

This whiteboard shows how I chipped in with a

few teaching words of my own. Students always

enjoy this particular type of word because such

words have what I call the unfriendly or un-

cooperative neighbour syndrome going on. So


44/90

weve got cake which (I tell them) has initially got

an a sound as in cat and an e as in get; but

when a k decides to push in, to jump between

these two letters, why then a and e (who arefriends) have to start talking in a different way;

and what we generally do is get the students who

are playing the vowels to reach round another

student who has jumped in (who represents the

k) i.e. who has jumped in the middle and they

modulate their voices into one single identical

sound, which is the ei sound of cake, a

diphthong. And then its very simple to get the

students to understand that as well as cake you

have take, rake, make, bake for single initial

consonants; and then of course, you can have

these more Georgian-looking complex

consonants starting other similar words such as

snake or tram or pram; more Georgian , that is,

in the sense of being complex, not that those

consonant clusters are actually salient in

Georgian; and then, of course, you can change

the consonant that jumps in so that you might

get date, rate; and lake and lane; and name,

changing it once again; same, tame, wane

changing it a further time or two: but never

confronting the student with too much change at

once. Getting them to copy ones pronunciation

of these, and see the logic of the spelling; which


45/90

is not a difficult logic to grasp, but it needs a little

eking out. And then of course, you can show how

without the e at the end of these words

modifying the a which comes second, you canjust have normal vowel operation in words or

at least have words which are not thus modified

in this way, examples being January and land.

And I think they do get a clear polarity from the

teacher that there are words with this curious

unhelpful neighbor syndrome going on; and that

there are other, standardwords, which dont

have it. And thats about as complex a higher

level explanation as I think its safe to take with

students of this kind of background and age.


46/90

This photo shows Dolch words. Dolch words are

the building blocks of childrens fairy stories,

which Enchanted Learning very helpfully lists...

And here I wanted the students to see what

words they recognized. It was a non-invasive

test: I wasnt saying, Here you have to have

known all these words!; I was saying, Here are

some words we may have had; do you recognize

any of them? And the children would colour in

the ones they recognized. And, interestingly, they

used different and vibrant colours to show their

varying responses to different words. So again, I

had this strong sense of there being an inner

world of language in the children, which my

print-out here managed to magnetize, and to

draw the similar words in their minds into aparticular focus, words which they would then

colour, say, in yellow; and then they might be

into another, different, focus; and theyd colour

thosewords in red. One stray word here is

coloured in lime greenthats the word good;

and others are coloured in purple. Its a very

personal and individual response: all the studentswho did this exercise came up with quite

different colours; they didnt actually go for

trying to claim that they knew all the words: they

simply went for words which they liked and


47/90

remembered. There was no sense of their having

to achieve anything. They were simply required

to react to what they knew, or might have come

across.

I adopted a similar colouristic and graphical

approach myselfin explaining the very simple

first grammar point, the most essential

grammar point in English: what is the Present of a

verb and how you have an s on the third person.


48/90

With the tiny sketch of a sheep and a girl to make

things clear, I began with he sheandit. Ive

separated the third person from what you might

call the immediate world of the children,I andyou; and the distant world of the children, we

and they; which is more abstract and remote. I

coloured in blue the area for he sheandit; and I

linkedplaywith those other words, Iand you;

andweandtheywhich Ive differentiated, and

Ive coloured them in yellow; but the word which

varies with the s on the endIve notcoloured

in: but Ive made the s blue; so the whole thing is,

I think, as lucid from me, the teacher, as they are

habitually serving up for me in their own musings

and meditations on the way language seems to

fall out, in practice, for them...


49/90


50/90

A much younger student simply managing to

copy MacMillan flashcards successfully; and I

have helped him to write the word rocket over

the top of the drawing on the first two pictures;

and Ive given him ten out of ten; because at that

age, its a great achievement if he sits still and

can actually do something without getting

distracted; without going off-message.

Another student in the same class has got veryinvolved in copying a snake. Hes more or less

spelt snake correctly and Ive done one of my

very rare corrections, very gently overlining the k

which he had done, which was more like an h,


51/90

and putting in a standard k in a slightly different

colour. So theres no sense of, no, this is wrong!

its just a gentle movement to get the ship back

on course. No more than steering it in a morerelevant direction. This is my idea of student

correction. It must be very gentle and non-

invasive; and in no way challenging to the

students sense of pride in his or her progress.

And there must be no sense that every minute

isnt progress, either if thats possible!


52/90


53/90

Great feats of the imagination here! largely

because its done entirely in two or three colours

on a whiteboard so that, technically, the

resources were very limited. Its a response to a

Cow Who Fell Into The Canalpicture which was

full of much interesting detail and here we see

some of the words, cat, house, barge and canal,for example; other students on this exercise put

in a lot more words. But even where elements

have not been annotated, they have generally

been drawn, with subtle and fitting re-

interpretations. The screaming baby is

magnificent, and seems to be levitating out of his

play-pen; the man on the bridge has been moved

back so that we get a better view of the bridge;

the elaborate Dutch bird-house has been omitted

so that we get a better view of the house; the

mother and child have been given a more


54/90

emotional and caring modulation. On the far R,

we see the original.


55/90

This group of images relates to our Apple and

Georgian Poetry week in October 2012. The


56/90

churches depicted are always the traditional

Georgian cruciform type, with its central cupola.

A great deal of detail here, and the church in blue

(and one in an image below) are situated on thetop of a hill, as is often the case in Georgia; the

cross is the particular Georgian type of pectoral

cross which is often found in Georgian art; worn,

I believe, by Georgian priests


57/90

Stages in the evolution of a picture representing

a poem about the cypress tree swaying and the

wind blowing (After the Mongol Invasion by

Tariel Chanturia) which we translated (or

looked at!) in both languages. In this graveyard

scene, an apple tree has replaced the cypress

which is actually a very optimistic replacement.

Again, this is done on a whiteboard. Technically

its extremely adept, considering the whiteboard

is a slightly unforgiving and inflexible medium on

which to work. Below: further responses; and the

text of the poem in Donald Rayfields version.


58/90


59/90


60/90

*


61/90


62/90


63/90

Cathach of Saint

Columba: Irish, 7th

cent.


64/90

These images show how the children almost

make the orthography of English their own.

Georgian has only one letter case: there are no

big or small letters in Georgian; and this seems

to have influenced way Georgian children want

to write English, just as seventh century Irish

scribes were somewhat bemused by the

hierarchical requirements of copying a Psalter in

Latin (R). Its quite obvious in the list in black;

and again, in the red ones (below) the writers

arent so expert; but theres this strong sense of

wanting to equalize the heights of letters, even

against the grain of actual usage. Ive not insisted

on correct English mis-en-page at this stageIve

not corrected itbecause Im happy to see that

intense engagement with creating harmoniousstructures in the students mind. In this arena,

theres no real difference between the wide-eyed

Georgian schoolchild and the medieval writer of

the Cathach. Below L, to amuse the student and

to try and speak his graphical language, Ive made

an attempt to draw in fish apple cat and dog

myself; but the clumsy and unnatural posing ofan adults imagination immediately jars: it has

nothing of the freshness and vitality of a childs

imagination; and thats even when Im trying my

very best, attempting to get onto the childs


65/90

wave-length. I like the way that the provider of

the lists in black (above top R) has almost like

the medieval scribe put in little icons of the

words: an apple, a little fish, and what I take tobe a nut; filled in as an extra just casually and

beautifully.


66/90


67/90

*


68/90


69/90


70/90

Three very calligraphic and sketchy but perfect

responses, full of personality, written on rough

paper and with just a few inadequate colours.

The student has nonetheless achieved a very

harmonious result.

Above, some of my attempts to differentiate

between the sounds of the English letters and

their names, which is a point of confusion inGeorgia very often. Ive not used any formal

phonetics, Ive tried to make it as vivid and clear

and simple as possible. And I also provided a little

rhyme, which they were required to read out and


71/90

have an informal test onaiming to establish

whether they could indeed distinguish the names

of the letters from their sounds, and get both

right. In most cases the children then could;although later, they again started to forget some

of these points. As children will. Here is my

rhyme:

*


72/90

The above image shows what happens when

with a student whos not likely to approach an

English language textbook dialogue in the

conventional way you say, All right, well just

look at whats going on in the dialogue, who the

people are, and so on!; and so then you take

the Preview, just the picture part; and the

student gets involved in colouring it in and

identifying with the people, making a very

beautiful improvement really on the original

picture; embellishing it with all sorts of new

colours and details. And shes readying herself,

subliminally, for a study of the dialogue

proprement dita bit later on, or even (with my


73/90

encouragement) gently for a few moments

maybe, at the end of the lesson; initially just

checking out some of the words and expressions.

This student has got a very graphical focus: shesmuch more interested in art and drawing and

imagining than in conceptualizing; and I let that

ride

If a slightly different writing style is introduced

and its attractive, the students will make great

efforts to imitate it.

*


74/90

The MacMillan sticking exercise a quite tactile

sense of matching the image with the word; and

having the fun of gluing it on, cobbling it together

quite physically and literally, as well as in ones

mind.


75/90

An economy of line here from Khagani which

really rivals very late Picasso. The student just

dashes off a quick MacMillan fruit image, simply

to show his colour skills; and then gives us the

essentials of a house; and also he signs the sheet

with his nickname, kasanovi; though hes

crossed out both namesI think its because hes

not particularly proud of these wonderful

drawings, whichfor my part, I must say I

treasure.


76/90

A late Picasso line drawing

*


77/90


78/90

Khatia has been inspired by the famous almost

operatic finale at the end of the first MacMillan

book which shes trying I think to teach to

other students in the class (as she often did) andshes done a very beautiful king, whom I also

show in a close-up view with his three-pointed

crown, his slightly vacant look, and his schematic

body Shes managed to people an empty

whiteboard in a single colour with a variety of

figures, the composition of which is not at all

easy to work out; and yet the result is extremely

harmonious and satisfying, as with everything

shes done.


79/90

Above and below: images by Mari: fascinating

because shes trying to represent partly in the

drawing and partly with arrows and words what

she did at the weekend. And shes trying to do so

without verbs without the declensions and

difficulties of verbsshes trying to just

graphically represent what shes trying to put

across. Its very eloquent, its very creative, and


80/90

it shows a real understanding of her sense that

language is going to pose technical difficulties;

and that we might playfully try to find ways

round those technical difficulties. And in thelast picture we see her trying to construct some

sense of a house the one where her

grandparents live where she went at the

weekend, as she has indicated!

*

The next group of pictures is also very interesting

because it shows students creating almost


81/90

hieroglyphic representations of concepts; and

indeed verbs. These artists Azerbaijani

students as already mentioned in Five Days in

May have a wonderful strong sense of the sun,making a visceral attempt to draw its vital rays;

and then write the word sun in the middle of all

this. Its clear that they are having a vivid learning

experience and want to echo it back to the

teacher.


82/90


83/90

The picture of a van, from a much younger

student, is similar in spirit to the drawings of the

sun. The wheels are very prominent and theres

some sense that theres an inside, and that it

carries things, but its a very two-dimensional

image; and the student has not a very profound

view of the world yet; and he sees the outsides of

things Thats worth remembering, in young

children; they see the world in a partial way;

things are bigger to them than they are to adults.

So the whole relationship between things and

their representation in children is quite different

to what it is in adults. I think language teaching

must reflect at least a tolerance of that

difference.


84/90

*


85/90


86/90

The last three pictures shows what happens

when you give Georgian students an art

instruction book which derives shapes of leaves

and petals and so on from geometrical shapes

and gently leaves the students to recreate the

same natural object, starting from these shapes.

And the results are really very impressive, lucid

and accomplished. And not something I thinkthat every student in every country in the world

would be capable of bringing off to such a

standard and especially not at such an early

age! When I see these images, and the images


87/90

with words, I am excited by the tremendous

vitality and sense of being which their creators

possess: a sense of the thisness the haeccitas

of existence, as John Duns Scotus put it.

*

We need to tap into this sense of life, this

plenitude, this unique insight which they have!

if possible, when were teaching them. We

need to draw it out; and indeed be fired by it

Its something than cannot be found in anytheoretical system which we might impose on

them!


88/90


89/90


90/90

Double Rainbow at Bolnisi, Summer 2013

Do you want your breakfast now? Giorgi

Archangel at Kintsvisi, Georgia

Documents

The Primitive and the Exact