M&M: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

I like and respect Roald Dahl as a writer and enjoy watching the movie “Mathilda” several times and I did enjoy reading “The BFG” even as an adult. Maybe I should some day read his book “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory”, on which this movie from the year 2005 is based on.

To be honest, I don't like the movie much. It's predictable from the start and the whole conception of it is just purely annoying. A typical Tim Burton movie with the “usual suspects”: with Danny Elfman scoring the music, like he did with almost every Tim Burton movie, we also have Johnny Depp as Willy Wonka in the lead role and Helena Bonham Carter (then still fiancé of Tim Burton) as mother of Charlie Bucket (Freddie Highmore). Charlie's family is so poor, they barely have enough just to eat. Still it's Charlie of all people, who gets one of the rare golden tickets. The golden ticket enables Charlie and other children to visit Willy Wonka in his famous chocolate factory and get a tour there, one which none of them will ever forget. In the end even Willy Wonka, living estrangd from his father, learned something. Yawn. In fact at the end I had the feeling that the movie should have been called “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”, because it was somehow most of the time about Willy Wonka, his life style and his factory and not about Charlie Bucket.

While nobody would wish for anybody to grow up in such poor circumstances that Charlie has to be in. However the other kids that get the remaining golden tickets are rotten and spoiled. Each of the spoiled kids will get into a nasty situation according to their character. Charlie is the only one getting away from that tour in a positive way, since he's already punished enough by living in the poor family situation he grew up in.

The movie respectively the factory has jarring colourings in a typical Tim Burton way. As a fan of Danny Elfman's music I listened to it several times before I saw it was on tv one day. I don't know if my parents knew what the movie was about or that it was a Tim Burton movie respectively some parts would be musical songs. I don't know what bothered my parents the most. In any case they turned it off soon. I watched it alone some time later. As I watched it, I had the feeling Danny Elfman's music held everything together and especially in the factory it seemed that they were moving from one song to the next. I liked the music. Especially the first tracks of the album (1-5) are funny and diverse like the characters they're about (“Wonka's Welcome Song”, “Augustus Gloop”, “Violet Beauregarde”, “Veruca Salt”, “Mike “Teavee”). Danny Elfman sang the lyrics to the songs himself and as he reported himself, as he composed the songs, he had laughing fits so hard that his wife checked in on him a couple of times,to see if everything was ok. I can very much imagine that. The tracks are “quirky”, upbeat and dynamic. With “Augustus Gloop” there is however already a revelation that nothing really bad will happen to the kids. Of course not! It's a children's movie and as rotten as the kids may be, nobody wishes them anything terrible („But don't, dear children be alarmed, Augustus Gloop will not be harmed, Augustus Gloop will not be harmed“). The tracks 13-15 (“ Loompa Land”, “The Boat Arrives”, “The River Cruise”) and 18 (“The River Cruise – Part 2”) are pretty dark tracks, by the way. So it's by all means not all just cheery music. I'm listening to the soundtrack again after a long time as I'm writing this blog post.

I would almost suggest to not watch the movie and just listen to the soundtrack. Of course you won't see the kids that way or in what kind of situations they get into and the lessons they'll learn. By only listening to the soundtrack you will also not know the ending and what happened to Willy Wonka and Charlie Bucket after the tour. I like Helena Bonham Carter, who can only be seen shortly as the mother and I also like Freddie Highmore. Still, I personally would prefer listening to the soundtrack happily and repeatedly, which I find much more entertaining by itself with the sounds and the lyrics, than watching this quirky, predictable movie. Probably most people will want to watch the movie after listening to the soundtrack anyway. To that I can only say this: Watch it at your own risk!

On the way to the Christmas party...

The jaw of a co-worker dropped and she was literally speechless when I showed her this picture I took on my way to the Christmas party:

Banana oat cookies

 Ingredients:

2 bananas

100 g oats (2 cups)

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C (350 degrees F).

Peel the bananas and mash them up in a bowl with a fork.

Add the oats and mix it all together.

Make small balls and put them on a baking sheet (press down on the balls to flatten them, if you like) and bake for 15-20 minutes.

Enjoy!

Puff pastry rolls

Ingredients:

1 roll of puff pastry

1 pot of sour cream (or cream cheese with spices)

100 g (2 cups) grated cheese

1 package of diced bacon

Alternatives/variations:

As an alternative to the bacon salmon works great, too. There's a ramson cream cheese here in Germany that I think is a nice combination with that. I haven't tried other variations personally. Write in the comments, what combinations you tried.

Shopping tip:

Unless you're grating your own cheese, they will sell 200 g packages of cheese in Germany only. So might want to think of doubling the amounts and make one with bacon and another with salmon.

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C (392 degrees F)

Roll out the puff pastry and first spread the sour cream on it. Make sure to cover the edges, too, otherwise the rolls on either end of the roll will be "slim".

Next spread the bacon/salmon on it.

Lastly put on the grated cheese.

Now you're going to roll it. There are 2 variations: Rolling it from the short end will give you fewer rolls, but they'll be bigger. About 10. Or 2: Roll up the long side. It's a bit more tricky, because it's longer, but it'll give smaller and more rolls. About 16.

I personally prefer smaller rolls and cut mine about the size of the tip of my thumb to my first knuckle. Which usually is about 16-18 rolls. Place the rolls on a baking pan with some space between them. They will rise.

Put the rolls in the oven for about 15 minutes, depending on how brown you want them to be.

The rolls can be eaten hot or cold.

Enjoy!

Rolls with diced bacon:

 

Salmon rolls:

Internet sales part 2

Previous reports about internet sales can be read here: At long last... the pleasure of shopping online and Selling thing online. The following is a translation.

Carolin 20 August 2019
Still available

SA 20 August 2019

Yes, still available :-)

Carolin 20 August 2019
Could you bring it?

SA 20 August 2019

Why can't you get it?

(If I had gotten a reasonable reply that it was a disabled person or an old person within my area, I may even have brought it, but I didn't get any reply whatsoever.)

Selling things online

And here's another (translated) sale/message history from that online selling platform. If you haven't read my first post about this, you can find it here: At long last... the pleasure of shopping online. "SA" is me, as you can probably tell.

Bubé 12 August 2019

Hello, that's looking good, can I have it tomorrow?

Best regards

SA 12 August 2019

Hello, yes that would be ok. Greetings

Bubé 12 August 2019

Can I get it tomorrow at around 7 pm?

SA 12 August 2019

Yes, that's ok.

Bubé 14 August 2019

Hello, sorry for the late reply, I wasn't able to get there yesterday.

Can I get it today, in 1 hr?

Best wishes

SA 14 August 2019

Hello, I didn't read that on that short notice, because I was busy outside of the internet. How about tomorrow? Greetings

Bubé 14 August 2019

Ok, how about tomorrow about 6 pm?

SA 14 August 2019

Yes okay

Bubé 15 August 2019

Hello, I'm just coming from work,can I come there now?

I would like to have the address.

Best regards

SA 15 August 2019

Hello, I was away myself up until now, because I didn't get a message before 6 pm. If it's not too late, we could meet today. (I gave my address and which name to ring the bell). When would you roughly be here?

Bubé 15 August 2019

It  is ok if I'm there at 08:50 pm?

(Not even waiting for a reply from me, he followed this with two other messages pretty much all back to back)

Bubé 15 August 2019

Then I'll start going now, I'll take the bike

Bubé 15 August 2019

I'm already on the way

SA 15 August 2019

You're on your way now already ;-)

(Shortly after the doorbell rang. When I opened the door, I could hear someone talk in a language I didn't understand or recognise. When I was able to see the person, I saw just one man, no companion, but in conversation with someone over his headset. I lifted the water-boiler in my hand and he searched for the money to give to me. We exchanged the water-boiler and money. When I went back to my laptop I read the following message.)

Bubé 15 August 2019

Right:)

I couldn't go there, so a friend of mine got it. Thank you.

Best regards

(I thought of the advice on the internet to never ever agree to "my friend will get it", because "my friend" could be someone, who hacked the messages and just for fun gets the thing as a supposed friend. So I couldn't resist writing one last message. I didn't get further messages.)

SA 15 August 201

What? You wrote to me you're on your way to get it and then it was a friend? Ok, as long as I've got my money... Have fun with the water-boiler, if you get it...

Two signs

Saw this today in the city, no idea who made the signs or who put them there:

"Geil, endlich 4 neue College-Blöcke" - Wicked, finally 4 new spiral-bound notepads

"Kein BAUM ist EGAL" - No TREE is INDIFFERENT

Comparing pays

Christmas is long over now, but the next Christmas will surely come. For this Christmas I checked my sister's amazon wish list and found a liqueur that I knew a certain store close to my place sells, too. Amazon had it for about 16 Euros (about 18 US Dollars). I went to the store close to me and found the last 2 bottles of the liqueur my sister wanted... for only 11 Euros (about 12.42 US Dollars). It was only a bit strange for me to pay for it, because I don't drink alcohol and now was standing with a liqueur bottle at the cashout.

The moral of the story: Even if online shopping is comfortable, it may pay to compare.

Taking and giving

Last month I wanted to go shopping and found an envelop wet from the rain on the pavement. I picked it up and found that it wasn't an open one, but a closed letter. I walked the path a bit further, because there would be a mailbox. Until now anyway. When I reached that corner, I looked around. Where was the mailbox? Had I not paid attention? I hadn't used it that often so far, but it should have been here somewhere. Then I saw it: the shadow and the holes from the attachment where the mailbox had been the past years. It had been taken away! I used the entrance to the tram station and went to the inner city to throw the envelop in the mailbox there.

By the way I had to go to the inner city, because the post office at the townhall closed last year, as well as the one at the central station. I found out the one at the townhall doesn't exist anymore when I went there to send a letter and found the building closed. I was surprised about the closing of the office at the central station at the same time, which I found out, when I wanted to get some money from the cash machine there and didn't find it. Only after walking the many hallways in the building and was standing in front of the door where the counters had been, did I see a note about the closing of the office. Really great. Hadn't it been possible to pin a note on all the entrances of the building, instead of letting me walk through all the long hallways to almost the counter room first? If I understood it correctly, the thought was to have all the possibilities of service in one single office. A research on the internet revealed that I wasn't the only person angry about the closing of the office at the central station. The parking options for car owners were seemingly better at the central station than at the inner city.

Around the same time I wanted to dispose of my recycling paper and walked to the container nearby. (The same container where I had found the religious figure.) But when I arrived after about 5 minutes of walking with the full cardboard box, I found no container. Just like with the mailbox, I looked around in surprise. The containers had been here for sure. Two paper banks and one for white, green and brown glass. But there was not one container! Angry I walked the way back and further to the other containers, which are inconveniently placed so you have to stand right on the street to dispose of your trash. At least those were still there, but the paper banks were pretty full and I had trouble getting my recycling paper I there to dispose it. On my way back I toyed with the idea of writing my landlady to give us back our paper bin. It doesn't cost extra money anyway. Our “housekeeper” had argued that it had been taken away for “fire safety reasons”, because nobody would take care to empty it, but it got stuffed overflowing. I discarded that thought to write to my landlady soon however. Surely she'd disagree or take her time to get our bin back, like she had been with other things in the past.

Today I walked a slightly different way back home from shopping than usual. I wondered what kind of containers there were just at the corner of our street. Were those new containers in fact? Indeed! We have new paper banks just very near by at the corner at our street! I walked home to get rid of the shopping and picked up my cardboard box which was overflowing with paper and dedicated the new paper banks.

I'm curious though that suddenly 2 paper bands are able to stand at the corner of the street. I had written to the city a while ago, because on the map online that street corner had been marked for paper banks, but didn't have any and I asked if it was possible to add some there. They negated that arguing that the vehicles to collect the paper were too big to drive there. Suddenly it seems possible after all. Suits me.

A letter from my aunt

Here's the (translated) beginning of a letter from my aunt from Hamburg, Germany, which I had in my mailbox today:

"Dear Sarah, 14 days ago I received your lovely Christmas greetings." (Liebe Sarah, vor 14 Tagen erhielt ich Deine lieben Weihnachtsgrüße.")

Granted, I had been late at the post office, only 2 days before Christmas(?) to send away my Christmas greetings. Still it's a very long time now for a simple post card in an envelope within Germany, isn't it?

Jeffrey

This story is fiction and at the same time true for so many people (especially teenagers). Not exactly the same way as in this story here, but in different ways. The end is tragic, but true as well for so many people in our culture. I wish I could say "have fun" or something. But this story just isn't fun at all. First I thought of summarizing the following story. But then I thought that I can't do it. I (or in fact Daniel Quinn, thanks, Daniel for sending it so fast!) cut it a bit, but this is what Ishmael tells (the story can be found on page 196-198 softcover edition of "My Ishmael"):

         "Among her friends in college," Ishmael began, "my benefactor Rachel Sokolow counted a young man named Jeffrey, whose father was an affluent surgeon. Jeffrey became an important person in many lives at this time and later, because he presented people with a problem. He couldn't figure out what to do with himself. He was physically attractive, intelligent, personable, and talented at almost anything he turned his hand to. He could play the guitar well, though he had no interest in a musical career. He could take a good photograph, produce a good sketch, play the lead in a school play, and write an entertaining story or a provocative essay, but he didn't want to be a photographer, an artist, an actor, or a writer. He did well in all his classes but didn't want to be a teacher or a scholar and wasn't interested in following his father's footsteps or in pursuing a career in law, the sciences, mathematics, business, or politics. . . . In spite of all this, he seemed 'well-adjusted,' as it's called. . . .

         "Jeffrey's friends never tired of finding new ideas to present to him in hopes of awakening his interest. Wouldn't he enjoy reviewing films for the local newspaper? Had he ever thought of taking up scrimshaw or jewelry making? Cabinetry was put forward as a soul-satisfying occupation. How about fossil hunting? . . . Jeffrey's father was completely sympathetic with his inability to discover an enthusiasm and ready to support him in whatever exploration he might find worthwhile. If a world tour had any appeal, a travel agent would be put to work on it. If he wanted to try the life of an outdoorsman, equipment would be supplied, gladly. If he wanted to take to the sea, a boat would be made ready. . . . He shrugged it all off, politely, embarrassed to be putting everyone to so much trouble.

         "I don't want to give you the impression he was lazy or spoiled. He was always at the top of his class, always held a part-time job, lived in ordinary student housing, didn't own a car. He just looked at the world that was on offer to him and couldn't see a single thing in it worth having. His friends kept saying to him, 'Look, you can't go on this way. You've got too much going for you. You've just got to get some ambition, got to find something you want to do with your life!'

         "Jeffrey graduated with honors but without a direction. After hanging around his father's house for the summer, he went to visit some college friends who had just gotten married. He took along his knapsack, his guitar, his journal. After a few weeks he set out to visit some other friends, hitch-hiking. He was in no hurry. He stopped along the way, helped some people who were building a barn, earned enough money to keep going, and eventually reached his next destination. Soon it was getting on for winter and he headed home. He and his father had long conversations, played gin rummy, played pool, played tennis, watched football, drank beer, read books, went to movies.

         "When spring came, Jeffrey bought a second-hand car and set out to visit friends in the other direction. People took him in wherever he went. They liked him and felt sorry for him, he was so rootless, so ineffectual, so unfocused. . . .

         "The years drifted by in this way. Jeffrey watched old friends get married, raise children, build careers, build businesses, win a little fame here, a little fortune there  . . . while he went on playing his guitar, writing a poem now and then, and filling one journal after another. Just last spring he celebrated his thirty-first birthday with friends at a vacation cottage on a lake in Wisconsin. In the morning he walked down to the water, wrote a few lines in his journal, then waded into the lake and drowned himself."

Sad story, one would probably say and indeed many people I've told the story to did say it. It seems that something is wrong with Jeffrey. That's what everybody told him. Something was wrong with him. But I'd like to ask the reader of this story a question: Is it true? Is there really something wrong with Jeffrey?
Jeffrey's story is fiction and reality at the same time. There are so many young people committing suicide. Not because they are crazy, but because of their helplessness. Mother Culture tells us that there's something wrong about these peoples.
Jeffrey's story is loosely based on the life of Paul Eppinger. His father Charles published Paul's journal under the title "Restless Mind, Quiet Thoughts". There are also letter exchanges from father and son and Charles also added some explaining lines here and there.

In memory of Daniel Quinn (October 11, 1935 – February 17, 2018)

M&M: Stand and Deliver

This movie from the year 1988 was based on the true life of mathematics teacher Jaime Escalante. Don't moan just yet without watching it first. This movie came before some of the others, sadly better known “real-life teacher stories”. By the way, the real Jaime Escalante is quoted on imdb for saying that the movie is “90% truth and 10% drama”, which seems pretty good to me.

Jaime Escalante was a really tough teacher. He had to be, teaching a class of Hispanic immigrant teenagers. He's played by Edward James Olmos. Some of you may know him from Battlestar Galactica where he was William “Bill“ Adama. Olmos got an Oscar nomination for his role as Escalante. The movie mostly focuses on the mathematics classes. But we do get to see glimpses into Escalante's private life. He's got a son, who is played by Olmos' real-life son, Bodie Olmos.

Escalante has to teach those teenagers mathematics and he's really passionate about it, which certainly also helps the teenagers to get interested and pay attention during those classes. He's honest with the students and tells them that they have two strikes against them: their name and their complexion. That will make the world assume they know less than they do. Their bosses at work won't care about their problems, so neither does he. He still ends up helping out one of the girls in class when he finds out her parents took her off school and talks to the father. Of course the class also has a trouble maker. Escalante calls him “Finger Man” for obvious reasons. I like the way Escalante deals with him by teaching him some cool mathematics with his fingers. Judging from Youtube comments, I'm not the only one wishing that my teacher taught me that trick. You'll know what I mean when you watch the movie and get to that scene.

The students get well enough to do the AP Calculus in their senior year. Escalante has his students take summer classes in advanced mathematics in preparation for this. The other teachers start being cynic towards Escalante. They don't think the students are capable of it. But Escalante and the students prove them all wrong. They take the test and pass it, too. However the Educational Testing Service doubt the results. They accuse the students of cheating, since several students have the same mistakes. Escalante believes there is a racism problem behind this. In a short scene where they try to question the some of the students, one of them seemingly cracks and has just the right answers. Among the people questioning them is a fairly young Andy Garcia as Dr. Ramirez, by the way. You can clearly see him fight not to laugh along with the students, but at least he shows a short smile, before he and his colleagues go away. Escalante suggests the students take the test again. They're granted that wish with only one day to prepare for it.

How did they do the second time with the exam? See for yourself. Really, go watch the movie. I know it's an old one, but it's got some great scenes in it. Well worth it in my opinion.

The Neuro-Logical Levels and the significance of our word choices

When I was studying inclusive education, they told us that body language and an “open body posture” was important when working with clients. But they didn't elaborate on that. So I had to do my own learning (mostly reading) about that. I came across Neuro-linguistic programming (NLP). I won't go into the details about what that is. Part of what they did and still do is either checking out those that are good at something and find out how they do it that well, so they can teach others that aren't that good or know nothing about this activity. One of the people especially interested in researching how people do things is Robert Dilts. That quote I opened my previous post with was from the book “Dynamic Learning” by Robert Dilts and Todd Epstein and is a transcription of a seminar on learning and teaching.

One of the things Robert Dilts developed (this is also mentioned in “Dynamic Learnings” and other of his books) are the “Neuro-Logical Levels”, sometimes also just referred to as “Logical Levels” or “Levels of Learning”.

a) Identity – Who?

b) Believes and Values – Why?

c) Capabilies – How?

d) Behaviour – What?

e) Environment – Where and when?

Sometimes those levels even have another one before “Identity” which would be “Spirituality/Mission” asking “Who else?”. For the purpose of this post however, the 5 levels mentioned above are suffice. All the levels influence learning and influence each other. Though changes in the bottom levels won't have so much of an influence on the upper levels than changes on the top levels do on the levels below.

For example it is indeed more difficult to study at around noon right after you've eaten and your body is more focused on digestion and your belly than headspace and learning. I remember one of my teacher at university was really unfortunate to teach us fairly theory packed things in a seminar at noon. One time he noticed we were all just too tired to pay proper attention, he was kind enough to end the class early. I really appreciate that. Or when it's really hot in the summer and you already have all the windows open to get some air in, but there just is no wind outside, it may be difficult to stay focused.

Speaking of focus: What schools usually focus on is how the children are doing in performance. So that would be the behaviour level and how well they do it, rating their capabilities.

Things can get mixed up badly though with terrible consequences, when for example some child is not doing well in writing. We are quick to say that “the child is dyslexic”. Dyslexia is the term for when someone has problems with reading and/or writing. But check the levels above again. If you say someone”is dyslexic”, that's the identity level. It's on top of the levels. It influences all the other levels. And it's wrong. If what makes them bad is being poor at spelling, that's a capability level, not identity level. Sadly people identify with their symptoms fast and what once was a fairly low level of “bad spelling” may soon become “a dyslexic child” or “a child with learning disability”. Make a guess about which of those problems is easier to change?

Side-note: It must have been in eighth grade or somewhere around that time when the teachers taught us about puberty, sex and all that stuff. I remember we got a small book in religion class that I ended up giving to the school library. I'm not even sure if I stopped reading it at a certain point or if I did finish it and then gave it to the school library. In any case there was this paragraph where they explained that teenagers sometimes argue with their parents and are mean and bad towards them. The reader needn't worry though: “You can still change.” (Du kannst dich noch ändern.) That line just made me furious and I told as much to the librarian I handed my copy of the book to. Even back then I thought that a big part of being a teenager is about change and growing up and getting independent. To me at least some of the tantrums of teenagers is based on that growing up process and hormones and not so much about willingly being a bad person. So to tell a teenager then that they “can still change” seemed just a stupid thing to write in my opinion. Was it like if they didn't like who they were then, (e. g. with the tantrums) that it didn't mean they'd stay that way until they died? Well, of course not! I guess the word that offended me most was the word “can”. Granted, there are some bad adult people out there as well. I guess the authors of the book would suggest that they didn't take that chance to change. Generally for me that change was a given in my opinion and to make it a “You can still change” seemed really stupid.

So anyways the point I wanted to make in this post here is that we should be careful, especially with negative feedback to children on which level we make those comments. It will leave an impact. Some deeper than others depending on the level.

My last and best mathematics teacher

“Having a student identify with mathematics is really different than having them study it and try hard to learn it.” Robert Dilts (Robert B. Dilts/Todd A. Epstein: “Dynamic Learning”, Meta Publications, 1995)

I was always average at best in mathematics in school. In exam I'd write 3 or 4 (C or D in American grades). It's okay, but not great. In my final year in college we got a new teacher. I forgot why the other one didn't go on for the final year with us. What did surprise both my new teacher and me though was the fact that suddenly I'd write 1 (A) in exams! That's right. It left me speechless the first time it happened.

I believe that part of it was due to the fact that the new teacher would always start a new subject by talking about how it related to the real world outside. It's good to have some connection to the real world and not just working some abstract numbers and learning for exams only. Mind you, I barely remember anything from the mathematics now. It's 17 years ago. Just too long a time. But I still remember the action of talking real world first.

I wonder how much more students would be engaged in learning and studying beyond just for exams, if all teachers did that. It wasn't that the new mathematics teacher talked the whole first class about the connection. I don't remember how much time he spent. But even if it's just a couple of minutes and listing a couple of examples, at least it makes the subject more relatable, doesn't it? It doesn't have to be a long talk.

In the end I finished school still with an average 3 (C ) in mathematics, because they had to add up some exams before my 1 (A) exams and I pretty much blacked out in one exam that was part subject of the final exam as well. I'm not good at all in some areas of mathematics, because my brain just doesn't seem to get it, despite all the efforts of my teachers.

Beware of the red pen!

During the first couple of years at school, I remember we had moments where the teacher would read us a short text and we'd have to write it down to practise writing and spelling. I did pretty good back then. I barely made mistakes. I still have images in my mind of my writing being free from corrections and only at the end of it there would be a “Prima, Sarah!” (Great, Sarah!) For having no mistakes.

For my first two and a half years of school I lived up in Northern Germany. We had a text that had a sentence where I made a minor mistake about books on a shelf. During the Christmas break of my third year at school, we moved and I changed schools. In my new school we'd still write those texts the teacher was reading to us. Guess what? One time the teacher in my new school read the text about the books and I again I made the same mistake, that bit about the books on the shelf. That was in fact the only mistake I made that second time! My mother pointed out that I had made the same mistake the first time. I have no recollection of writing it the first time and how that went. But that's why I remember that sentence to this day actually: Not for writing it the first time, but for the mistake. The mistake I made twice, according to my mother.

I forgot where I read it. It's been a while. Part of the problem in the current school system and teaching system is that teachers focus on marking out what's wrong. Red pen marking out everything wrong. “Attention! Wrong!” If you're a good student making no or few mistakes, you're only left with a short, nice comment. If anything at all.

There seem to be teachers more recently, that let children write as they like and not correct them. That's what at least one co-worker once told me. Maybe some teachers don't want to discourage the children from writing by pointing out all the mistakes. But where would those end up that are in higher classes and still write the way they want to? There are certain set rules about how to spell and grammar and all that. You can't just ignore that. Sometimes you write different for certain effects and it's purposeful writing. Children need to learn the correct way first though. Or maybe the teachers are lazy? I've seen adults with bad writing, too. Also at a certain age hardly anybody points out mistakes. I don't know about the motivation of those teachers though. I hope there's more to this than... laziness?

How about instead encouraging the good students more and only focus on them? That way they'd feel pleased and confident to keep on doing what they do well. And the bad students might take interest in checking out how the good students do what they do well. Instead of the bad students feeling bad for their mistakes and the good students being only left with short comments? Just an idea.