{"id":922,"date":"2012-06-05T14:30:57","date_gmt":"2012-06-05T12:30:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.teachenglishtoday.org\/?p=922"},"modified":"2012-06-11T08:38:10","modified_gmt":"2012-06-11T06:38:10","slug":"marking-my-territory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/teachenglishtoday.org\/index.php\/2012\/06\/marking-my-territory\/","title":{"rendered":"Marking my territory"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"image_pdf\"<\/a>\"image_print\"<\/a><\/div>

\"\"<\/a>Marking my territory<\/strong><\/span><\/h1>\n

Roger Graham<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Westerford High School, Cape Town<\/strong><\/h3>\n

 <\/p>\n

Some decades ago, an ethologist, Robert Ardrey, gained much exposure with the idea of the \u2018territorial imperative\u2019.\u00a0\u00a0 His study of animal behaviour led him to the conclusion that the strongest drive in the beast was setting up his territory and marking the boundaries over which others of its kind must not cross unless prepared to bare tooth and claw.\u00a0\u00a0 The thing which Ardrey said that had his name hanging in the air for a little while was that humans, too, mark their territory.<\/p>\n

I teach English; I mark it.\u00a0 My territory is marking.\u00a0 Ardrey had it all wrong: there are no boundaries to marking.<\/p>\n

It should be done in the confines of four walls, but many times it is not.\u00a0\u00a0 Take any car park, for instance: it may not seem a desirable place in which to mark, but, on a Friday night, when you have been asked to drive a youth group to a mall in which they have disappeared\u00a0 for upwards of two hours to lurk, run around or play assorted evil games, there is a choice: does one stay inside the vehicle, positioned under as bright a light as possible, with all the interior lights also sucking away at the battery, or does one roam around the fabricated cement maze, doing nothing in particular?\u00a0 \u2018Oh, but why not take your marking into a coffee shop?\u00a0 People do that all the time.\u2019<\/p>\n

No, the distractions are too many: give me a car park where the only distraction will be the security guard who might walk by a few times, looking suspicious at first, then sympathetic.\u00a0\u00a0 A car park is quiet, uncomplicated and boring: it is not trying to be anything else but a car park, unlike coffee shops trying to infiltrate book stores, florists and food troughs.\u00a0\u00a0 With a car park comes focus:\u00a0 it is so unpleasant that marking\u2019s a pleasure.\u00a0 And you remember where you marked \u2013 now isn\u2019t that something?<\/p>\n

I remember: Grand West Casino (it comes with skating-rink attached \u2013 for the kiddies); N1 City (so depressing that the pen set the pages alight); a ten-pin bowling alley in Bellville, Kenilworth Centre (laser-hunting inside, dodgy characters outside) and Tyger Valley.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 These were always night experiences; daylight might have made them seem better, but I doubt it.<\/p>\n

I never worried about being hijacked as I sat there.\u00a0 In fact the only time I have ever been worried about airing my scripts has been on the train.\u00a0 As no mugger would ever have obliged and lightened my load, it was not this I feared, but that some interested commuter would look over my shoulder and remark: \u2018Oh, I see you are marking Senior Certificate First Language English (Higher Grade) Paper Two \u2013 how interesting.\u2019\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0Yes, one was once \u2018allowed\u2019 to take home the hallowed scripts, provided it was not too obvious.\u00a0 I suppose that marking on a train can be called obvious, but I was once or twice tempted to klap<\/em> a few en route to the centre, having the memo so in the brain that it could be done on the train.\u00a0\u00a0 Planes, too, have been territory: once the turbulence is over and the passenger next door is either uninterested, uninteresting or absent, how about a script or two for entertainment?<\/p>\n

Marking is very useful.\u00a0 As mentioned already, it can save one from malls.\u00a0 It can also gild the pill of chores.\u00a0 Years ago, when my children were very young, we belonged to a baby-sitting club which allowed us the luxury of phoning up members to book them to mind our kids for a particular night.\u00a0 It was a simple barter system: we were then in the red and when another couple needed someone to babysit theirs, we would be given the call.\u00a0 This worked out very well for me: not only did it save money, but it also advanced the cause of marking, provided that the children were not tetchy or hyper.\u00a0 Once they had been put to bed (usually by the parents who probably thought that it was best, seeing it was a dad not a mom who was doing the beat), I could mooch around, skim a few of their books, enjoy some of the delicious dainties which had been left as an offering and then settle into some serious marking.\u00a0 And it only got better:\u00a0 there\u2019s nothing like getting ahead when there\u2019s no choice but not to.\u00a0 Quite often the couple, enjoying the gorgeous freedom of being alone, would stay out far later than they had intended.\u00a0 When they put their heads very sheepishly around the door well after one o\u2019 clock, they were not met by an indignant stare, but a cheery \u2018Hi, enjoy yourselves?\u2019 \u00a0I had scored: there were extra points in the bag (if you came in after midnight, it was double points earned) and had rolled over a whole batch.\u00a0\u00a0 Had I tried to do this on a weekend night at home, not a third would have seen the little red pen.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s where, not what I\u2019ve marked that\u2019s memorable.\u00a0 To illustrate: our school sets an infamous project which requires holiday marking: it is so long that taking them on during the term ends up in frustration as there is seldom time to settle down to them properly and feel any satisfaction in the process.\u00a0 \u00a0But what do I remember about marking these (and, back in the bad old days before computers there were some dreadful 10,000-worders, horribly handwritten) … ?\u00a0 A rondavel overlooking a river at Hartenbos, a bungalow in the mountains above Aurora along the West Coast, a cottage in De Hoop Nature Reserve, others in The Wilderness and Citrusdal \u00a0\u2013 even a girls\u2019 hostel in P.E. and a boys\u2019 in Jo\u2019burg – these I remember well.<\/p>\n

A piece of advice which everyone has heard at some time or another is: \u2018Don\u2019t take you work home with you.\u2019\u00a0 Teaching wouldn\u2019t happen if that were heeded.\u00a0 Marking must be bagged, brought home and returned in one piece: it\u2019s as simple as that.\u00a0 Home is where the marking is and marking is my territory.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Some decades ago, an ethologist, Robert Ardrey, gained much exposure with the idea of the \u2018territorial imperative\u2019. His study of animal behaviour led him to the conclusion that the strongest drive in the beast was setting up his territory and marking the boundaries over which others of its kind must not cross unless prepared to bare tooth and claw. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[14],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/teachenglishtoday.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/teachenglishtoday.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/teachenglishtoday.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teachenglishtoday.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teachenglishtoday.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=922"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/teachenglishtoday.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1059,"href":"https:\/\/teachenglishtoday.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922\/revisions\/1059"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/teachenglishtoday.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=922"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teachenglishtoday.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=922"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teachenglishtoday.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=922"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}