MY STUDENT FROM A MUSLIM COLLEGE

When I think about my experience teaching for a year in a Muslim College in Perth, one particular student comes to my mind. Not long time ago I opened the West Australian Newspaper and there she was,standing...

Separation, challenge and return

WHAT DOESN'T BEND - BREAKSMy son kept me regularly informed about his travels. He longed to reach the ancient Inca city and his dream came true. To reach the upper stony structures the visitor travels...

An adolescent's journey into manhood

I want to tell you a story about my son's experiences with a passage to manhood. From birth to 7 years of age was his first passage when he started school in a new country, dealt with his first bullies...

HOW HEAVY IS YOUR HEART?

This poem I dedicated to my first born son. He was the most happy baby you could wish for, always smiling in spite of wet nappy or a late feed. As a boy he sailed with his good friend around the Rottnest...

WHAT MAKES US HUMAN?

This poem I had dedicated to my son born in Australia when he started to question: himself, people around him, place where he lives and his family. Before he was born he survived a car crash and battled...

MY Perception of people

Our children do not need psychological labels and medication, our children need love and trustI was a child once, a confused and insecured one, diagnosed as depressed and traumatised. People felt sorry for me and i felt worthless. I was naughty child as well, people felt angry with me and I felt unloved.I was a teenager once, giving my teachers a hard time and arguing with my aging Grandmother, my sole carer and was diagnosed as suffering from something likeappositional defiant disorder. They persuaded...

Special human beings

I regret all those times when I worried about my look, my weaknesses and flaws when I was child. I learnt to accept all my flaws. Flaws and weaknesses, strengths and abilities that is me. That what makes me special. When my children come to me wanting to correct their flaws, I remind them: ' Don't change, be who you are. There is only one you.'We need to teach children to embrace themselves as they are and to embrace other people as well.Bitter and sweet, they are unique traits that make me, you,...

Bittersweet Beata

there is nothing to compare with a deep bond with another, even if it means we feel the pain as well as the joy. Connection is about empathy, which is the ability to imaginatively feel the emotional state of another. This is the most remarkable skill.It is also a matter of understanding through bodily imitation. Children learn to speak, and nearly everything else, by imitation. Babies will imitate the facial expressions of adults within the first hour of birth. Later they learnt to distinguish difference...