Teacher Tag
Interviewed by Ruwan, Shan and Mily
I: Did you have plans for this year that were cancelled due to corona?
Mr Attard: My brother lives in Tasmania, so I was hoping to go see him this year because I don’t see him much, but no major plans. This year I haven’t made any big plans but I think people are being cautious with their plans, so no, not this year but last year I wanted to see my brother
Mily: I heard your brother surfs
Mr Attard: Yeah, both of my brothers are very keen surfers. I’m very bad at surfing, They both love it and they chase waves all the time.
Ruwan: Do you surf much in Tasmania?
Mr Attard: Yeah, the surf’s great in Tasmania.
Ruwan: Is it really cold?
Mr Attard: Yeah it’s freezing, because it’s closer to the Arctic or the Antarctic? I always get confused
Shan: Yeah Antarctic is down,
I: What do you look forward to at Uni High?
Mr Attard: Probably seeing all the students, I think we’re really lucky to have lots of different types of students at Unihigh. Being in the city I feel like there are a lot of different people, they move to the city for many different reasons, being close to the CBD. So it’s really great to talk to lots of different types of kids, find out about where they’re from, what they do, you know, their lives. So that’s what I look forward to at Uni High.
I: Is Uni High the first school you’ve taught at?
Mr Attard: Sort of, I did CRT (casual relief teaching) for 6 months before starting at Uni High. And so I worked at a lot of different schools, around the northern suburbs during that time.
I: What are some differences between those schools and Uni High?
Mr Attard: Yeah, interesting. Well I didn’t spend that much time at any particular school. So I would do like a few days a week at those schools, so it was kind of hard to know, to get a real sense of the schools in such a short period of time if I was there for a week. But for differences, I suppose some of the most obvious differences is Uni High not having a uniform. If you turn up here for a day, that’s one of the first things you notice. What else is different… I’m not sure. I guess the size as well, Uni High has a lot of students in a small space, where most schools have like a thousand or less students in a space bigger than Uni High. So I suppose the density here is pretty intense.
I: So when you were still in school, what was your favorite subject?
Mr Attard: My favorite subject…
Mily: Methods
Mr Attard: Do I have to say maths? Well in case Mr Patsch sees this I have to say maths. But I actually did really enjoy maths at school though. I also really enjoyed music as a subject, as you might’ve guessed. What else did I enjoy? We had like a drama subject called improvisation that I really enjoyed as well. Because you could just like say whatever you want and it didn’t matter, as opposed to maths when there’s like one correct answer and no negotiations.
I: When you were in high school, did you have a dream job?
Mr Attard: A dream job? Not really, I was never really sure what I wanted to do. I could never really imagine myself in a particular job, like you imagine the future and you think it’s so far away. I kind of thought that I would become a teacher eventually, but I thought I would do another job first. I always liked the idea of becoming a musician, I used to see bands, touring bands, going all over Australia and touring overseas. I always thought ‘that sounds really fun,’ being able to travel and doing something constructive or like having a reason to be at each place.
I: Do you have a favourite musical?
Mr Attard: Probably, I think it’s equal between Parade, do you guys know Parade? I did it in year 12 for musicals, and I didn't know it before my school did it as a musical. I listen to quite a lot of musicals before that as well, and I enjoyed doing the musical. It’s quite a heavy story, but it’s really well written and the music is really great. But I also really like Jesus Christ Superstar, it’s more like a rock musical, kind of like The Wedding Singer.
Mily: Did you do musical a lot in high school?
Mr Attard: Actually no, I didn’t do musical until year 12. People would always try to rope me into musical when I was in school but I always said no because I lived quite a distance away from school. I went to a school in Geelong and lived in Geelong, but I lived around Ocean Grove, which is like a half an hour drive, around 30kms away. So I was like oh if I have to rehearse a few nights a week, mum and dad have to drive me and pick me up because public transport isn’t very good down there, that kind of thing. But then in year 12 I was like ‘I should probably just do it, it’ll be fun,’ and it was, and I wished I had done it earlier.
I: Do you have a favourite movie?
Mr Attard: Hmm hard question. I’m not really a movie person but I really like music so a lot of movie musicals or docos on bands are things I enjoy watching. I watch a lot of music YouTube stuff. I saw a really good movie the other day which is about Bangarra dance. They’re like an Indigenous dance company from Brisbane and a movie just came out that documents their history. They’re a pretty amazing company. They were sort of like the first successful commercial Aboriginal dance company and so it talks about the three brothers who founded the company and how they were all dancers. Also about how they built it up to what it is now, which is an internationally acclaimed company. But then two of the brothers killed themselves in the last ten years so it’s kind of a sad story but also an amazing one too.
I: What’s your favourite book?
Mr Attard: That's also hard. I don't really re read books, I don’t really have a favourite book.
I: A maths textbook??
Mr Attard: Yes of course heheeh, However, When I was younger, I used to be obsessed with the Harry Potter series, so probably that.
I: Do you have any Role models?
Mr Attard: When I was a teenager, I used to look up to Tim Mitchen, who is an Australian’ comedian. I used to go to his shows, he’s like qute political with his shows, and likes to talk about the way things are. It’s funny, but it’s also like social commentary. And he was also a musician, and would play funny songs at his shows as well. I used to be really obsessed with him when I was younger.
At school, I really respect all of the teachers at our school, especially all the senior maths teachers who have all been so helpful, especially when I was starting out.
I: What's a current song or artist you are obsessed with?
Mr Attard: I really like funk and jazz music a lot, so I like this band called Vulfpeck, who are an american funk band. i also really like folk music. There the Punch brothers, and an Australian band called the maze as well.
I: Where are some places you have travelled to before?
Mr Attard: I used to be in an Acapella group, which was a singing group and we got to travel to all sorts of places which was lots of fun. We went to a competition in Singapore, but it was only for a few days so I didn’t feel like I was able to really explore Singapore, cause we sort of only went there for this competition. We also went to Hong Kong for 2 week.s We did like school workshops where we would do a performance for a school and then do a workshop about singing. So we got to go to all of these different schools, and since it’s such a small city, we got to see a lot of it.
My partner's brother lives in Estonia, but yeah, he lives there. He’s a ballet dancer in a ballet company in Estonia hahaa. We got to visit him a couple of years ago It was winter, so it was like 20 degrees. There was also amazing architecture there. And I suppose that Europe has a lot of those old buildings, but Estonia was able to dodge a lot of those bombings, so there’s like a town that literally looks like a fairytail cause it was preserved from the bombings.
I: Do you have any favorite dishes from the countries which you’ve visited?
Mr Attard: Mmm good question. Melbourne has a lot of good food. To be honest, the food in Estonia was rubbish - it was so bad. They just had no fresh fruit and vegetables there just because it was so cold. If you’re importing fresh fruit and vegetables it’s not going to be good by the time it gets there. I think in Europe we didn’t really have that much good food really. Hong Kong was great though - some of the street food that we ate was really good too. But yeah, I feel like Melbourne just has such a good variety of food. I really like ramen so there’s lots of good ramen places here.
I: What is the best advice you could give a student?
Mr Attard: Oh no...Listen to your teachers! Haha I’m just kidding. That’s a good question. This is going to sound weird but do a lot of stuff. Take up different opportunities when they come and even if you feel like you’re unsure, just do it. Obviously only if it’s safe and legal. Even if you feel like you’re over committed and you feel like you’ve got too much stuff going on just try to do it anyway. If you feel like ‘nah that’s not for me’ just try stuff and do stuff.
I: What’s the name of your band?
Mr Attard: Stress walters. It’s a bit of a pun - the leader of the band is our vocalist Jess Walters and all the songs are about them being stressed. Haha I’m kidding not all of them are. It’s a bit of a play on words. There are four of us in the band. People like to describe our music like ‘alternative’ music, however, it’s more like ‘indie-rock’.
I: How often are you confused with Mr Arnott?
Mr Attard: Probably at least 3 times a week. Sometimes I wonder if people actually think that only one of us exists. Because they never see us in the same place at the same time, maybe they think that we’re actually just the same person. At the moment Mr Arnott and myself are teaching renaissance together - which we tried to avoid but because of the incidence with the whole fire and timetable rearranging, the only way to make the renaissance classes work was to put us two together. I find it hilarious as well as all the year 8s. In renaissance we go by our first names which makes it easier because we’re both ‘Mr A’ so at least in renaissance we can be called Tom and Dan.
I: Why did you not decide to cut your hair since year 11?
Mr Attard: This is pretty funny. I think on the day that I was supposed to get a haircut, I’m I was having an argument with my mum about something stupid and I was in a ‘disagreeing mood’. Later on she was like ‘you got an appointment with the hairdresser’ and I was just like ‘no.’ - I was just very stubborn. Then, it just stuck after that. Sometimes I wonder how I got here in the first place.
I: What's your hair care routine?
Mr Attard: I used to use very large velocities of Tresemme shampoo. But recently I was given some advice that if you push through the early stages of your hair being greasy and gross by not washing your hair, it actually turns out okay. I detangle my hair when it’s wet, but I don’t actually use shampoo and conditioner anymore. Yes, there’s an awkward transition period, but after that hot tip you don’t have to wash your hair.
I: Why are u so cool?
Mr Attard: Interesting. I don’t know, maybe it has something to do with the last question haha.
I: What’s your favourite maths topic?
Mr Attard: Hmm. Probably calculus or applications and differentiations and stuff - which you guys haven’t done yet. When I studied maths at uni I did Applied Maths which is essentially all calculus. I also really enjoy maths problems that are hard but aren’t hard to understand. For example a maths problem that I could give to a Year 7 and they’d find it challenging, but then I could also give it you guys (Year 11s) and you’d still find it really hard to answer. Mr Evans asks a lot of these kinds of problems that are like maths riddles.
I: Finally, Who do u tag?!
Mr Attard: Ms Goodger
Thank you so much Mr Attard for taking the time for this interview!!