Cherisse Moe

Through­out her life­time, Lynette Noel has al­ways cho­sen to view the glass half full. Her pos­i­tive out­look tran­scends in­to her every­day du­ties, es­pe­cial­ly her role as an In­struc­tor in Read­ing at the Uni­ver­si­ty of T&T (UTT). So when she de­cid­ed to put pen to pa­per to com­pose her first book of fic­tion, those clos­est to her knew it would be one worth read­ing. They were right. The 13 page pub­li­ca­tion ti­tled The Night Nopat Was Left Out, launched last month at the Na­tion­al Li­brary of T&T, high­lights the strug­gles many ado­les­cents face in find­ing their iden­ti­ty, and brings to the fore per­ti­nent is­sues such as par­ent­ing and teacher/stu­dent re­la­tion­ships. "The book was pub­lished by Au­thor­House and it al­so speaks to the whole idea of friend­ship and trust and who re­al­ly is your 'horse' when it comes down to the crunch," she said.

Favourable re­views

The 58-year-old doc­tor­al stu­dent, who be­gan her teach­ing ca­reer in 1973 at the Cal­vary Ro­man Catholic School, Port-of-Spain, hopes the book will soon be on sale in book­stores through­out the coun­try. It is cur­rent­ly avail­able at Ama­zon.com. Cater­ing to read­ers eight and old­er, Noel said the book, which con­tin­ued to re­ceive favourable re­views, was per­fect for par­ents, coun­cil­lors and teach­ers, as it high­light­ed the im­por­tant roles they played in the lives of ado­les­cents. Stat­ing that there was a com­plete break­down of moral val­ues in to­day's so­ci­ety, Noel be­lieves that a cul­ture of trust should be es­tab­lished be­tween adults and ado­les­cents to en­cour­age a "na­tion-wide change." She added, "It's im­por­tant to share good news with them and see the good in them. Too of­ten teach­ers fo­cus on the neg­a­tive when it comes to stu­dents. Par­ents must re­alise that they are the first ed­u­ca­tors. We need to see all learn­ers as peo­ple of pos­si­bil­i­ty, not prob­lems."

Mes­sage of hope

And just as in every as­pect of life, when it comes to learn­ing, Noel said the male and fe­male brain ab­sorbed in­for­ma­tion dif­fer­ent­ly, adding that it was es­sen­tial for ed­u­ca­tors to com­mu­ni­cate with each stu­dent on an in­di­vid­ual lev­el. "Many male ado­les­cents don't see them­selves rep­re­sent­ed suf­fi­cient­ly. They feel mar­gin­alised in the class­room and are fight­ing to find them­selves. The prob­lem is the lack of un­der­stand­ing of how the male and fe­male brain learns," she re­vealed. "We need to be aware of this so that we can help them de­vel­op in a more holis­tic way." Ac­cord­ing to Noel, The Night Nopat Was Left Out is more than just a sto­ry... It's a mes­sage of hope, which she is con­fi­dent still ex­ists, even to­day.

Book sum­ma­ry

Nopat is an ar­dent bas­ket­baller who feels that the world re­volves around him and that "he con­trols things." To some, he is a re­al trea­sure, while oth­ers are un­hap­py with the way he op­er­ates. When his friends want to have a "sweat" af­ter school, he is the one they come to be­cause he knows how to or­gan­ise the games. He is the man with the ideas. His friends have no prob­lem with that, un­til his ar­ro­gance caus­es them to lose an im­por­tant match. That's when the sit­u­a­tion starts go­ing down­hill and even some of his fam­i­ly turn against him. What is he to do now? Can he trust any­body at all? How can he turn this sit­u­a­tion around?

• To get a copy of the book, which comes with a mu­sic CD ti­tled, Left Out No More,

call: 678-1566/770-0707.