Miss, can you tell me what a hyena looks like?

How do they measure long jumps at the olymipcs?

2010-07-19T21:43:00.001+01:00

We'd been measuring jumps with cubes. We talked about whether they'd use cubes at the olmpics. One girl looked at me - "That's silly. They'd use a ladder!"

The things they say

2010-04-21T20:14:00.002+01:00

Tim's struggling to understand what he's supposed to do. John's trying to explain. After a few attempts, he comes to me and says 'Miss, Tim's not undergetting it'.

Miss Miss Miiiss

2010-03-18T21:44:00.003Z

Miss. I know why the tudor people from that olden times house aren't alive any more.
(We've just been on a school trip to look at old houses, like a medieval farm and a victorian cottage).
Why?
Because the dinosaurs ate them.

Miss Miss Miss! I know what those plates are made out of! They're made out of horn!

Brilliant! (Yesterday they kept thinking the tudor stuff was made out of plastic).

That's really well remembered! Can anyone tell me which animal it comes from?

Yes miss. It's dog.

The tooth fairy don't nick

2009-09-17T15:43:00.001+01:00

There's been a thief in our classroom. They took a bite of my sandwich and left muddy footprints and finger prints and crumbs everywhere.

The children are compiling a list of likely suspects. The potential criminals included:

The reception teacher
The whole of year four
The tooth fairy
The caretaker

But, as one of my children pointed out, it obviously couldn't be the tooth fairy. "The toothfairy don't nick."

Bats in the bathroom

2009-09-07T20:37:00.003+01:00

Today I went back to the land of infants.

My class helped 'Sage' (puppet) with her biggest worry . . . where to find the toilets.

We went on a tour, starting with the girls, and, just for fun, showed Sage where the boys toilets were too.

At this point, the youngest member of my class whispered to me 'Miss, can I tell you something?'

I bent down to listen.

'There's a bat that lives in the year 1 toilet. He's invisible until there's only one person in there and then you can see him and he flaps round your face . . . I don't want to use those ones with the bat'.

After teaching older children for a couple of years, I had to pause for a moment as I digested this.

'I know about the bat. Mr Caretaker knows about the bat as well. In the summer holidays, he went in and caught the bat, and took it to a new home. He lives somewhere else now'.

A wide-eyed and beaming child followed us back to the classroom.

From PDP to PGCE with QTS to NQT with CEPD

2006-06-26T10:34:00.000+01:00

Ace of Base.
Hot Pot of Coffee.
Schwwwwwwwwweeeet Grandmother's Spatula.

We've finished!!

Summer's here, BRING it on!!

Grooooovers in the heart, get dahn, woop-di-woop, rahr-di-rahr,

SHAMONE!!!

Everything you do is useful, however useless

2006-05-26T21:42:00.000+01:00

This afternoon I taught art. I had been preparing for English and Maths til 2am last night so art never got planned. I managed to borrow a lesson plan from another student at lunch time and winged it like a migratory bird.

The art lesson was on Henri Rousseau.

We talked about the tiger patterns and how the stripes are replicated through the painting, and the camoflage colours.

Then I showed them pictures of wild animals, starting with a lion. "How would you camoflage a lion in it's natural environment, children?".
Slight panic as I realise I don't really know details about where lions live or the difference between an African and Indian elephant or the natural habitat of a hippopotamus. The children have to pick an animal and draw it camoflaged in it's natural environment.
The children start arguing about whether lions live in the desert. Somebody starts telling them about long savannah grass and rocks umbrella thorn acacia trees and huge baobabs and perhaps a small pool to drink and bathe from . . .

A panda? They're endangered, by the way children (how does this person know this? they must be a blue-peter fan) and they'll like elevated terrain, with lots of bamboo, a mixture of grasses, grey stone, and deciduous environments.

A Black bear? They love the trembling aspen tree, and would appreciate a mixture of coniferous and deciduous terrain, with lots of rocks and a cave to shelter in - you will probably want to put water near by as well.

Miss, what can you can you camoflage a penguin with?

What can I put with my aligators, Miss?

This person doing the explaining, much to my suprise, was me. Where did all this knowledge of animal habitats come from?
My computer came with a free version of Zoo Tycoon - you get to build zoos and have to keep the animals and visitors happy. I have spent many hours "wasting" my life away building exhibits for animals to live in. This afternoon I learnt that time wasting might one day help you to wing it like a particularly confident migratory bird winging its way accross the African savannah, Amazon rainforest or Antartic desert.

Mountains and corners

2006-05-22T17:46:00.001+01:00

My blog has been very quiet recently.
There are two reasons for this.

One is that I have been too busy to wash my pants, let alone write interesting entries into this.

Second, is that this blog was designed to be a place to store up all the lovely memories I have of my first tentative steps into teaching; a deliberate, one-sided treasure chest of the fantastic things I have been fortunate enough to experience this year. Some of the bad days have been included; you can't truly appreciate the highs if you've forgotten the lows; (and, with a nod towards my "scienceisnotareligion" friend(s) it helped construct a more balanced version of reality).

Over the course of the last four weeks (which have felt more like four months) I have experienced precious little worthy of writing about in this blog.

Excpetions include:

A maths lesson last week. The look on the children's faces when I wrote in pen in one of their maths books (one child struggles to write, and as writing the date and title were not part of my learning objectives, I saved him 5 minutes of pain in 15 seconds flat. This led to gasps of horror from the other 3 children I was working with:
Child: Miss - you've written in PEN!
Miss : ?!?
Children in unison: You must write in pencil in maths!
Miss: Oh. Right. Ben, can I use your pencil then?
Ben: Yeah.
Miss: And your ruler?
Ben: Yeah.
I then quickly drew the child some margins and tried to hand his book back . . . met with more gasps
Children: MISS! You've not counted THREE SQUARES THEN TEN SQUARES THEN THREE SQUARES TO DRAW YOUR LINES!!
At this point, I was the one sat with my mouth agape. The children I was working with are particularly needy - it is a challenge to teach them anything and for it to stick for 24 hours. However, they have learnt by heart and were able to repeat it to me, without skipping a beat, that they must set out their books by counting little squares, underline their date and title, always use pencil, use a ruler to draw margins, which much be three squares width, - this process takes them ages. They have a heightended sense of anxiety about the whole process. Can one of them explain multiplication? No.

ICT lesson last week - child who had played up all lesson came up to me at the end and apologised. A heart warming moment, which for a second, made it all worth it.

Unfortunately, it was a very short moment amidst a sea of hours of desperation. This last four weeks have been some of the most difficult I have ever lived through. Despite being only 3 weeks away from finishing, last Thursday I was on the verge of quitting.

On Friday, I heard news from other people on the course. Most felt the same. They are exhausted. They are on the verge of quitting.

Other students at my school came to me that afternoon.
Hazel! I can't take it! I'm exhausted! Nothing I ever do is right!
You're learning, I tell them. That's the point of teaching training, I say. Don't expect yourself to get it right first time.

I'm considering setting up a teacher-training counselling service.
The problem is, no-one would have time to use it.

magic eyes

2006-05-18T21:56:00.000+01:00

Kids seem to think teachers have magic eyes. When we see something wrong in an exercise book, our vision turns red. If it is right, our vision turns green. No need for actual thinking or knowing what the question was or having the foggiest clue about what the lesson is, our bodies sense right or wrong like traffic lights.

Par example (I've been teaching French, my God that was fun - I have never actually had a French lesson in my life and the children have been learning it since September). A few weeks ago, I had non-contact time to go and mark some books. I had to nip back into class to get something, and one of the kids hisses at me "Misssssssss, Is this right?" Of course, despite not even knowing what subject was being taught, or topic, or even what the question was, my auto-teacher-vision kicked in. Naturally.

Teacher for sale, good condition, free(-ish) to a good home

2006-04-19T14:14:00.000+01:00

Our essays are all handed in, the course is drawing to a close, and the only (hem) hurdle we have left before they hand out those shiny "QTS" stickers is our final placement. (oh, and a beautiful thing called a PDP. Everyone loves their PDP. It brings such joy into our lives).

Now comes the sticky business of finding a job.

Applications: 2

Jobs: 0

I am determined not to be put off, however many job adverts say "we will only send out application packs to the first 100 requests", or stories I hear about headteachers, inundated with applications, employing a highly sophisticated method of selction; i.e. throwing their stack of applications down the stairs and only reading forms which land on every other stair.

SATs

2006-03-27T17:16:00.000+01:00

I've now been at my new school for 4 days. Today was the first time I've had to tell someone off.

The best word I can think of, when comparing my current class to the other children I've met over the past six months or so, is . . . subdued.
Do I have a class made up of much quieter children than the rest of the country? Unlikely.
Do they get quieter and exceedingly well behaved as they get older? - Ask my housemates who teach secondary pupils; NO.
Has somebody come round and injected them all with a "quietness" virus?

Well, maybe . . .

In three and a half teaching weeks, these children will be sitting their Key Stage 2 Tests, or SATs. They are currently working their way through a frantic revision programme, cramming facts, exam techniques, drilling rules, wading their way through endless homework and sitting countless tests in class to monitor their progress. Not only will their future "streams" be determined by the results of these tests, but so will the "rank" of the school and the staff. I suspect that the pressure they find themselves under explains the unnatural, ghostly quietness of the ten and eleven year olds I see each day.

Last week I witnessed the grief of a parent who had to be told her child would not be entered for the tests. Her child would not pass, even with a 'scribe' and a 'reader', and it was deemed, quite rightly, that the school would not set the child up to fail.

Today, I looked through the child's school reports, tracing her development from when she began school. Her earliest reports delight in her sunny nature, her sociableness, her pleasantness. She sang through every task her teacher set, and in music lessons her beautiful voice set her apart from her peers. Her art was colourful and confident, and her self-portrait on her reception report depicts a huge grin. She happily dived into practical tasks and was curious about how the world works and people around her. She then took up violin lessons, and her teacher consistently rated her effort and achievement as outstanding, recommending her for the Junior Orchestra. As she got older, negative comments started to creep into her reports. Weaknesses in spelling, Mathematics, problems in Science, difficulties in History, her Geography was labelled "poor". She was still seen as sociable, but her social skills turn to paranoia; she worried about what her classmates were thinking. On her most current notes this is seen as her single most hampering factor; she is constantly distracted by what others are or potentially could be saying about her.

For her, not being entered for the tests must seem catastrophic. Equally, going through the stress and heartache of the exams only to receive three "n" results would be just as catastrophic. Either way, the presence of These Tests are in no way having a positive impact on the quality of her life.

In fact, I suspect, The Tests force teachers to increasingly focus on spelling, calculations, Science, Grammar; areas in which this child will never excel. Her strengths are continually marginalised, not valued by The System. She in turn, no longer values her strengths. Instead, she focuses all her energy on researching and combating rumours which she believes the others are spreading about her. The violin has long since been abandoned.

The staff at the school have tried everything they could to help this child. They have decided not to enter her for the tests so she would not be set up to fail. I think it is far too late; she has already "failed". She was set up to fail as soon as she entered Key Stage One. For a child who displayed so much sunshine at the start of her life, I think the true failure lies within the system. She has not failed. The System has failed her.

Dry Clean Only

2006-03-25T22:38:00.000Z

All our work is handed in. The 100 or so adults comprising our course, could be found last week on the concourse of the education block frantically cutting and sticking their way to a post-graduate qualification.

Everything is now handed in. All that remains between us and our very own class (i.e. in my case my very own small army to begin the revolution) is The Final Placement. I'm at Big School. A Very Big School. With medium-sized ten and eleven year olds.

On the first day, there were no questions about Scotland and hyenas or my marital status and reading abilty. Instead, on the way in, me and my placement partner walked down the (long, long, long corridor) and two medium-sized boys held open the doors for us. In a jolly teacher fashion, my partner said
"Ho ho ho, there, do you want a tip?".
Unimpressed, the boy replied "No. Got any fags?".

Later. A lesson about nouns. Proper nouns, common nouns and collective nouns. Teacher explains that "people" is a collective noun.
"If I say . . .'the people voted no', then "people" would be singular. Can you give me an example of plural people?"
"Yes, Sir. 'I see dead people'".

Spatulas abound. The next few weeks are going to be very different from my last School Experience!

In memory

2006-03-08T14:16:00.000Z

. . . of someone who was IMPOSSIBLE to keep up with in the pub. Good-bye Polly-Anne. We'll miss you, you sexy beast.

Miss, this is the best maths lesson ever!

2006-02-12T17:56:00.000Z

I have to agree. It was the best maths lesson ever.

Maths is tons better than it used to be.

The kids got a letter from a bloke who needed a load of dough for his new pizza restaurant; thus maths meant: kids, teachers and carpet covered in flour and 78 very sticky hands (there were some sneaky maths objectives in there, honest. If you really want to know, the kids had a recipe and a craftily placed selection of items, but - this is the clever bit - no scales. So they had to invent a new way of measuring - mwahahah). Evil Teachers emerge the next day - "So children, how much flour would you need if you wanted to make TEN pizzas? MWHAHAHA" we cackled, evil glints in our eyes, maths objectives less sneaky and more neon-flashing-brain-achingly-head-scratchingly-mathsly-obvious.

Karma has bitten back. The flour is gone, (a stupid number of asda smart price 64p mixing bowls rest precariously on our kitchen cupboards), we've cleared away the cups and the stickers and the chocolate and the squirrel and the brussel sprout, the kids have broken up, and are just beginning a 9 day CBBC marathon, student teachers long forgotten. Student teachers (sweet karma spatulas) are cursing our EVIL "teacher-educators" who are sat going "MWHAHAHA" behind their dingy desks at University where they live. (Like the way teachers live in the stock cupboard). They've given us 4 neon-flashing-brain-achingly-head-scratchingly-national-curriculum-numeracy-strategy-evil "learning objectives" which we have to justify in an assignment; ARGH.

It's at times like this it's nice to have a blog where you can write about the flour.

A cooker, a squirrel and a brussel sprout

2006-02-07T20:15:00.000Z

I'm back in a new school; things are hectic as per usual. And as per usual, the kids are totally nuts.

Highlights so far this week have included an extended debate on whether a brussel sprout or a squirrel has the greater mass. And a very small child trying to convince me that last night he weighed his cooker for his homework.

p.s. I am a non-smoker.

Hands up all the non-smokers!!!

2006-01-25T00:16:00.000Z

I know it's only January, and not wishing to count chickens and all that, but I've decided that picture I had up before is out-of-date, due to my shiny new status as a non-smoker.
So have one of me exhaling washing-up liquid instead.

Hit the ground cart-wheeling

2006-01-19T19:53:00.000Z

Monday - new school, new class. Deep breath, and we're off . . .

Teaching is still amazing, even when the kids are 5 years older. In fact, teaching is even more amazing when the kids are 5 years older.

In what other job would you find yourself up to your armpits in lemonade, fishing raisins out of a sink?

The kids still say top quality stuff; except it's older, like "MISS! MISS!! I know why you can't breathe in space!!" (Miss gets quite excited cos we're doing about gases, and child is about to break new ground into unchartered territory)
"Yes, Ryan, why can't people breathe in space?"
"Cos there's no GRAVITY, Miss!"

This week has had it's share of ups and downs; the new class has been given lots of P.C. adjectives like "lively" and "challenging".
Meaning: they have the minds of a collective organised criminal genius. Within seconds of our second lesson, they had created a complex trading web and not one child was wearing their own name badge. Phil was now Steve, Steve was Greg, Greg was Dan, Dan was Tom, and Tom was . . . THEY'RE 9!!! What are they going to be like when they're 14!!?? By the hammer of Thor; Lord have mercy on their future supply teachers.

We have wrestled with each other, established boundaries (and done a lot of waiting. "I will stand here and WAIT until TWENTY PAST THREE if I have to!" - and I meant it as well) and it was the most amazing feeling this afternoon when our home-time announcement was met with groans, the "liveliest" of the class begging us to be able to stay on after school to carry on working. Ahh. Bless. The beast has been tamed. (For now).

If only I could do the same to my hair.

Farewell

2005-12-16T17:08:00.000Z

I'm not sure I have ever felt so Christmassy in my life.

(Well, it probably ties with the time we sang Rudolf-the-red-nosed Reindeer in Chapel Methodist with Lee doing the "like a lolipop" bit when I was 12).

But this Christmassy feeling has got a lot less to do with it being the final Christmas concert of a run of 16 and knowing that Miss Ellis will put away the carols until next August, and more to do with all the other non-singing related parts of Christmas.

"Teaching" has gradually disintegrated into "careful colouring" and watching Disney. One lesson I was supervising worksheets - teachers are off sick all over the place and school has become chaos, last minute activity planning means giving the photocopier a good workout.

One sheet asked them to find musical instruments in a word search and had pictures of the instruments at the bottom to give them clues. One child presented me with his sheet "Finished, Miss!". I had a quick scan, and pointed to the picture of the guitar.
"What's that, Derek?"
"A guitar, Miss."
"Well, do you think you should perhaps find that word as well?" I said, eyeing the letters GUITAR in the middle of the page with no pencil line around them.
"I have miss," said Derek,"there". He switfly points to the letters above where I am looking: GTAAA. How can you argue with such logic?

School is now out. It is time to look back at all my blogs and reflect on how far I've come. But not tonight. Tonight it is time to reflect on red or white. Or beer.

Spatulas, Bows and Ribbons

2005-12-04T20:33:00.000Z

This weekend was the school Christmas Fayre.

I was allocated to the "Present-Wrapping-Room" with a big sign on the door which said "NO PARENTS". There was an impressive array of bottles of bubble bath, lip gloss, make-up bags, leather credit card holders, air fresheners, and other gifty items spread out around the room. In the centre were 4 tables piled high with ribbons and wrapping paper and sellotape and bows and labels, and pens and pencils for writing labels.

The idea was for children to come in (leaving mum or dad outside with their mulled wine), choose a present, hand over a sweaty pound coin to teacher (mwhahaha - that's me now! I'm teacher!), and then wrap up aforementioned present (probably with help from teacher).

I was quite looking forward to it (I spoke to Mum before hand and it sent her spinning off into delighted reminiscences; I heard all about how my cousin Mark had bought her a sachet of shampoo and wrapped it up all by himself and it was just the cutest thing when little ponters give you something they've chosen all by themselves! This forced me to point out to her that however delightful it might be for Mum, for a student teacher who has one day off a week and has to spend it up to the eyeballs in sellotape with children the idea has considerably less charm).

Anyway, Present-Wrapping-Room. The first child enters clutching her sweaty pound, and announces she's looking for a present for Dad. We look at all the nice presents on the first table. She ponders the shampoo, the air fresheners . . . nope. Not right for Dad. So we move onto the next table, toiletry bag? C.D. holder? . . . nope, not for Daddy. . . Moving on to the last table . . . leather credit card holder? cuddly toy? No. None of them are right. I'm a bit puzzled, but before I have time to stop her, she has moved onto the wrapping up table.
"This is perfect! Dad'll love this!"
She is holding one of Year 6's chewed yellow and black pencils, and thrusting her pound at me.

I stand there a bit stunned.
Help.
I've just sold a small child one of the school's pencils - I'm not sure that's even allowed, and she's definitely been ripped off.
But she's so happy with the pencil!

I had to think quick, so I grabbed the first present I see. This happens to be (*****) = I'm still not sure what it was. It was square and green and had a loose top bit and hideous leaf shaped patterns on it.
"How about you give this to Daddy, AS WELL as the pencil?"

So on Christmas day, someone, somewhere, will be presented with a present which rattles ominously when moved, and open it to find a hideous square green leaf thing, housing a chewed Year 6 pencil. "Thank you SO much, Isobel, it's just what I've always wanted".

P.S. Who is Brian Blessed?

The Beagle III

2005-12-04T17:22:00.000Z

This week I taught a lesson of ICT (Information Communication Technology), i.e. computers.
The national curriculum expects children to learn how to give machines instructions in order to "make things happen".

The school has two little robots which you can programme to move around the floor, so I took them home and taught them how to crash into the pepper pot on our kitchen lino. (And I taught them how to sing Frere Jacque. My Nanna would be proud).

The next day, whilst the children were in assembly, I re-created the surface of Mars (a row of garish aliens with an unusual number of legs; "space rocks" (shiny paper) and blue Martian bricks) and laboriously programmed one of the little robots to travel in and out of the various obstacles. This is trickier than it needs to be, because the programme is cumulative, so each time you plug in a new instruction you have to carry the wretched thing back to the beginning so it can grate through the whole programme again. (The point of this was to demonstrate to the children firstly, how the robot can move. Secondly, I could then re-run the programme after having moved an obstacle into the path of the robot, so we could discuss whether the robot was alive, and whether it could see. After that, the children could have a go at programming some very simple instructions themselves, like forward 2 or backwards 6, to win jelly babies.)

Eventually, after moving the space mountains a bit to the left, and changing the robot's launch pad a bit to the right, and entering the wrong instructions, wiping the memory and starting all over again at least twice, then shunting the space bricks backwards, and twisting the garish aliens closer to the door, and squashing the space mountains closer together, the robot finally glided effortlessly around my space rocks and aliens and Martian bricks, to the robot food (jelly babies). I was ready for children.

The children returned, all merrily humming "this little light of mine" (and I didn't even think about laughing). I sat them down and explained that we were setting off on a dangerous mission to mars to explore the surface of the red planet. I explained that it was SO dangerous that we had to get a robot to explore for us, and we were all going to be captains of mission control.

Mission control then lined up at the door, ready for take-off, blasted into outer space and sat in a circle around the surface of mars. I went to retrieve the robot from it's hiding place, but it slipped in my hands; CRASHing to the floor (sweet spatulas above, by the hammer of Thor; I didn't kill a child. Or even injure one.)

The robot was also still in one piece, (they're pretty tough) and I set it down onto it's launch pad. The class is hanging onto my every word (jelly babies are an extraordinarily powerful teaching tool); and to be honest, I'm pretty excited to be on the surface of mars myself. I reach down to turn on the little exploring robot, and, holding my breath, I punch "GO".

The robot starts to move. Instead of gliding smoothly along my carefully prepared obstacle course, it starts spinning around on the spot, heads off at an angle towards the children (who rapidly scoot back on their bottoms to get away), then starts spinning again, darting about unfathomably, then stops, and bleeps out "Frere Jacques".

I should've known something would go wrong. Us Brits don't seem to have much luck at exploring Mars.

There's always someone worse off . . .

2005-11-28T19:51:00.000Z

This course is teaching me so much; I have become so much more organised; I am tidier, my hair is now all one colour and most of the time lies flat; I even organise my computer files into folders (sort of) and (for the first time ever) my car has no dents; but in one particular direction I am definitely regressing.

There once was a time (not that many months ago) when I knew how to cook. More importantly, I remembered to eat, and remembered to shop for things to eat. I would even cook for lots of people, like 3, or 10, sometimes (but not very often).

For most of this weekend, I have been curled up in a ball feeling very ill, and eating has been even lower on the priority list than usual. But I was beginning to feel better yesterday, and offered to make some food for one of my housemates (who was in a bit of a rush).

I opened up the fridge and investigated my shelf. It is a very tidy shelf. On it was small cube of apricot stilton, 5 eggs and a tub of spreadable butter. Frozen to the back was a large tin of beetroot with 3 baby beets floating around in oceans of red stuff. Not a lot to work with, especially if the person you are making tea for has a phobia of eggs.

I've still got one or two tins though, so combined with someone else's bread = beans on toast.

After this fiasco, I was DETERMINED to go to the supermarket this evening and buy something - ANYTHING to eat. As soon as I've done my lesson plan.

Lesson plan is taking a while. I decided it's not a good idea to go to the supermarket when hungry. So back to the tin cupboard . . .

This evening, it dispensed a packet of supernoodles, a tin of beans and a tin of tuna into the same saucepan. Magic slop. Back to the lesson plan.

Whilst eating slop I hear from my sister. I tell her about magic slop, and as people always seem to do when you tell them what you're eating, she lobs back at me "I had leeks for lunch".

I'm thinking; "You jammy get." The last time I had anything fresh like leeks in my cupboard was over 19 days ago. I picture a nice cauliflower cheese type dish (made out of leeks, of course), maybe with some smoked ham chopped into the sauce, or maybe some quiche made out of leeks or served with leeks, and some cherry tomatoes, and mashed potato, with a sprig of parsley, or some pasta and mushrooms and goats cheese with leeks, or some artichokes and leeks in a flan, or an asparagus, leek, shiitake and potato ragut. Or at the very least, leek and potato soup.

It turns out, when she says she had leeks for lunch, she had just that. JUST leeks. In fact, not even a whole leek. Half a boiled leek. On a plate.

Hospitals and fabrications

2005-11-24T17:38:00.000Z

School = germ incubator.

And not just any old germs, either, really scaring sounding ones like scarlet fever and impetigo.

The class looks ill.

(And so do the teachers. And student teachers).

The bursar's job = Doctor. At lunch time, she matter-of-factly rattles off a rapid progress report to teachers, detailing colour of the sickest children, (green or white), temperatures and dosages of calpol administered.

I have a lot to learn about dealing with sick children.
I taught them dance in P.E. this morning. (It had been a noisy morning, and my voice was little more than an ineffective croak by this time, but we were nearly at the end of the lesson, and the morning had been mega fun). It was time to stretch, and we put Will Young on, with the kids singing their hearts out whilst we plucked imaginary apples from high branches and other stretchy-things (n.b. giving instructions over Will Young and a class of singing infants didn't help make the voice any less croaky). A child started tugging at my joggers,
"Miss, Miss, I feel sick."
Miss stops, mid-apple pick, and sees a luminous green face staring up at her. (Class look confused; they are left with one hand stretched up in the air, looking at each other)
"Right, Stephanie, go to the office and tell Mrs Bursar."
Instantly a t-shirt pulling and shoving fight ensues among the three girls closest to me about who is going to take Stephanie to the office, while Stephanie informs me she is actually going to be sick, so I send her straight to the toilet, alone.
Before I get chance to go back to the apples, a second girl presents herself in front of me.
"Miss, I feel sick too!" She also looks a bit pale (but not glowing green).
I am stumped - my sense of fairness insists that I trust this child, so I start to tell her to go to the office, but before I finish my sentence, 7 more girls have presented themselves in front of me:
"Miss, I feel sick!" they chorus.

ARGH!!

The class are outraged;
"Miss, they're not really sick, they just want to go home!"
"Miss, they're pretending!"

I'm putting a sneak-o-scope on my Christmas list; and in the meantime, "learning how to smell liar-liar-pants-on-fire" is my next target for my personal development thingy.

Happy Day

2005-11-16T16:08:00.000Z

Today I experienced my first official "observation" and I passed everything! Happiness!
:-)
:-)
:-)
. . . one step closer to them letting me be a trulio-realio-life teacher!

Next week, our outside "moderator" will come to observe a lesson and my teaching will be scrutinised again. She is not the smiliest of people. I anticipate that the experience of having her observe my lesson will be as comfortable as sitting in a wicker chair made from thistles.

The main part of tomorrow's lesson, I have decided, will be learning the difference between MISS and MRS. I don't care if we spend 45 minutes practicing how to say my name, because the children WILL (gritted teeth) get this right before wicker-thistles lady arrives.

But before that, let's celebrate! Time for tea and choccy biscuits methinks.

He's got the whole world in his hands.

2005-11-15T21:46:00.000Z

When my sister was 6, her ambition in life was to become a teacher.

Reason?
Because education is concerned with the battle against tyranny, oppression, inequality and exploitation? . . Given that she was 6, somewhat unsuprisingly; No.

Because she wanted to help children learn to read and write and do numbers?
No.

Because she wanted to help children know where countries are and what happened in history and how to draw well and remember to recycle? No.

It was because she wanted to be able to keep her eyes open in prayers.

Well, sis,
NER. NER. NER. NER. NER!!! I get to keep my eyes open in prayers!

N.b. She currently finds herself inescapably ensnared in a terrifying-time-space-warp- pre-determined-parallel-zone- horror-dimension where despite choosing different A-levels, different schools, a different University and completely different degree in a completely different subject, she handed in her proposal this morning and it stared back at her with the same dissertation project that I handed in this summer.
("How?" she jibbers down the phone at me, disolving into unintelligable random words, which sounded like "ice cream" and "international law" and "pears")

Well, sis, you're handing in my dissertation, and I'm living out your dreams. It's a small world, and he's got the whole of it in his hands, apparantly. It's no wonder he gets it a bit muddled sometimes.

Social Life Memorial Service

2005-11-11T18:44:00.000Z

Long time, no post.

Simple reason: Lesson planning.

On Monday we began our placement full-time.
On Sunday, my social life had it's official funeral. (I would have gone but I was too busy organising story-board boot camp in our flat; DRAW people, DRAW! think of the children sweet squirrels, spatulas, and small boys, just DRAW!)

It has been a busy week. Each day I get more immersed in children-world and the funny things they do are becoming so normal I hardly notice.

A couple of things did stand out though.

Scene: Maths lesson - learning to tell the time. My partner opens her lesson with a big interactive clock on a screen. She sets the big hand to twelve, and the little hand to twelve. She turns to the class and says;
"Right class, hands up - can anyone tell me what time the clock says?"
Lots of eager hands shoot up; "Yes, Angela?"
"Lunch-time, Miss!"

And proof I haven't yet become completely severed from real-world - I nearly failed to hold it together in assembly this morning when the opening bars of Kum-by-Yah filled the hall. "Someone's crying Lord" - sweet chickens; realio? trulio? little pet dragon? I thought it was mythological buffoonery; yet there I was, second assembly, Kum-by-Yah-ing away and trying to think of all the saddest things I could to stop myself from belly laughing in front of entire school and entourage of parents.

Miss, my ears are bleeding

2005-11-04T12:52:00.000Z

Sweet spatulas; what a week.

Here follows a concise(ish) summary:

The Lows
Wednesday. Woke up wishing that I'd turned off the heating before I'd tumbled into bed. Result: perma-headache. Then was totally baffled by some milk which paraded to still be in date yet had curdled itself into solid lumps onto my musli. mmm nice.

The rain was POURING down in sheets. My pale-faced soggy partner climbed into my car, and gave me the unfortunate news that we had failed our maths preparation statement. Bit complicated to explain, but basically failing = bad.

After *help* and *but we worked so hard* and *it's just not fair* on route to school, we consulted our mentor at school *what can we dooooo?*, and she advised us to leave school for the afternoon to repair our punctured plan. (This would mean avoiding our course leader at all costs, as she was unlikely to find us missing an afternoon of school "groovy").

The morning with the kids included *miss, my ears are bleeding* *miss I'm about to be sick* (another baffling moment - I accompanied a green looking child to the minature hobbit-sized bathroom, where aforementioned child spat in the sink and announced "done it!", then skipped back to the classroom, followed by me with a metaphorical question mark hovering above my head.) And a very unsucessful explanation from miss about the moon being round but not like a mouse on a football. And practising walking down the corridor to the ICT suite quietly a lot. And very quickly it was time to go back to college and try and uncover where we'd gone wrong with our maths preparation statement.

A flat tyre and a missing maths tutor later, we both were ready to throw ourselves off something high up. Not a good day.

n.b. we bumped into our course leader. not groovy.

The Highs
Thursday. FANTASTIC day. (despite a very wobbly start relating to me cursing at my alarm clock). I've remembered why we're doing this.

My partner delivered a fantastic lesson - I was so proud of her. Well done, Mrs G. And although my lesson wasn't quite so smooth, (in fact descending into complete and utter chaos at one point, and all my resources being trashed), it meant that I found myself doing my first bit of major telling off ("class 2, I am very, very cross" served with a side-salad of *stern teacher look*) and I give myself an A* for that (especially as it was my first time).

And one of the kids even called me Miss instead of Mrs (that was the child with blood dripping from his ear).

And we got an email to say our re-submitted maths has passed. Life is sweet.

Maybe it's just the weather . . .

2005-10-31T14:05:00.000Z

but I'm having a major "Is. It. Worth. It.?" day.

Veteran PGCE-ers earnestly warned me in August - "It's really, really hard." I thought at the time I knew what they meant.

I didn't.

I'm starting to get it now.

And you really do have to wonder - is it worth it?

This afternoon we had a tutorial. "Aha" I thought, Alan-Partridge-Stylee. "A real life teacher - she'll remind us all why it's worth it."
Hmm.
She said "Being a teacher is really really hard work" (We nod dismally - it's not the first time we've heard this now, and not one of us has seen even a glimmer of absolutely ANY evidence to the contrary).
"You're in school at ten past six, thumbing through your blah blah blah blah"
We've heard this before too. Our class teacher has said to me and my partner that we can phone her any time after 5am if we need anything. *the first time I heard this I blinked rapidly as I processed what she had just said*

"The first week of the holiday is a medical necessity."

"If you stay in teaching long enough, eventually your parole comes round and you get to work at this place." (Our tutor gestures at her surroundings; meaning the University.) "Teaching teachers is much easier. When I was still in school, I headed up the tunelling section for the last 3 years" (She makes wild furrowing movements with her hands, indicating digging).

For some reason, I'm not feeling very re-assured.

Spare a thought

2005-10-27T17:17:00.000+01:00

I know strictly speaking it's half-term and therefore I've got no children to write about this Wednesday and Thursday; but after only 2 weeks of writing blogs I think I'm getting withdrawal symptoms.

Just as the weather-people promised, it's been a BARMY day today; halloween beckons and yet the skies have been almost glowing with blue-ness; several times today they've stopped me in my tracks and I've stood gormlessly, head-back-mouth-open, thinking (oh-so-eloquently) "sky - wow".

This evening, I made my way down from campus-library-computer-books-land to college-train-catching-land. The platform is a mosiac of scholarly-looking academics, weighed down with books bearing serious titles, such as
"Old English houses of Alms: A pictorial record with architectural and historical notes" and
"ECE compendium of model provisions for building regulations - revised edition" and
"Algebraic systems of equations and computational complexity theory by Zeke Wang".
Spare a thought for the fledgling primary student teacher, clutching picture books like
"Man on the Moon - a day in the life of Bob" and
"Gentle Giant"
"How to catch a star" and
"A sailing boat in the sky" and
"Good night Mister Tom" and
"Twinkle Twinkle Chocolate Bar"

. . . I shift my books uncomfortably under my arm. How is one to feel, amongst such a studious, academic fellowship of commuters? Out of place? Inadequate? Unintelligent? Like I'm Twenty-Three goin on Five?

As I climb on the train and bury myself in "A day in the Life of Bob", I learn about his daily commute to the moon (not dissimilar to mine - only takes 15 minutes and he can do the crossword on the way) and I spot the aliens lurking on the tranquil surface of the moon. I can almost already hear class 2 enthusiastically giggling and shouting out to Bob that the aliens are THERE!! BEHIND YOU!! and I realise how a fledgling student teacher should feel next to all these serious scholarly academics - smug.

aeroplanes and ambulances

2005-10-20T18:20:00.000+01:00

This morning the children arrived to find their first challenge of the day was to find as many words as they could in "aeroplane". As I have not long left the undergraduate world of countdown, and spent my summer coffee breaks in hospital staff rooms doing the quizzes on back pages of newspapers (find as many words as you can from the grid, 22 = good), I was ready to get my teeth into some serious word crunching.

The first question : "Miss, can you do aerodynamic?" stumped me. Firstly, you are five; how do you know the word aerodynamic? Secondly, and fundamentally; No. You can't have aerodynamic.

Next question: "Miss, can you have Daddy?". Liz, let's think about this. What's the first letter in Daddy? "Er, d" (Read this phonetically, not Dee, but duh) Right, "d". And is there a "d" in aeroplane? "No". Ok, so can you have daddy? "No". Good.

"Miss, can you have Dan?" *Miss steels herself for a long day* Liz, what's the first letter in Dan? "Er, d". Right. Is there a "d" in aeroplane? "No miss.". OK, so can you have Dan? "No."

"Miss, can you have Hannah?" Liz, what's the first letter in Hannah? . . .

Staff Room.
The sound of a distant whistle signals the end of break, and the staff begin to make their way back towards their classrooms. Towards us, come a swarm of children, and looping around the swarm is an ambulance:
"Nee Nor, Nee Nor, Nee Nor, Nee Nor, Miss, Miss Miss! Grace has fallen over! Emergency! Emergency! 999! Nee Nor Nee Nor, Nee Nor, Nee Nor!"
My partner swiftly makes her way to the scene of the emergency, and administers first-aid, Primary School Style (Run it under the cold tap. Then dry with a paper towel.)

This emergency must have left more psychological scars than normal though, because as the children began their "busy-as-bees-in-the-hive-but-not-actually-doing-anything-trick, -under-pretence-of- changing-for-P.E.; some girls came up to me and said "Miss, Miss, Grace can't do P.E.; she's broken her leg". This was definately worthy of investigation.

I went out to see Grace, still mopping her knee with a soggy paper towel. I couldn't actually see anything, not a graze, cut, red mark, or anything. Hmm.
I thought back to my Mum; what would she do in this situation?
Mum being Mum, I instantly advised Grace that the only possible cure was to chop off her leg immediately. If nothing else was available, I would have to use the rusty saw in the stock cupboard. Strangely enough, she was one of the first changed for P.E.
Thanks Mum.

My highlight of today was reading to the children. There is something magical about having 25 five year olds sitting at your feet, eagerly drinking in every word of the story. Thank you class two. See you after half term.

M something something something Y

2005-10-19T20:32:00.000+01:00

08:58
The irrepairable puncturing of the calm (til 15:15) is heralded by: "Miss, Miss, MISS, look, LOOK, I've got a wobbly tooth!!" *accompanied by vigorous tooth-wobbling*

08:59
*Miss thinks: I've got wobbly legs, hands, head, I've even got a wobbly blog.*
But at least I've not got wobbly teeth.

20:51
*Miss also thinks: it's time for a large brandy. Between nocturnal foxes, maths, predictions, flying beds, double-yellow lines, magic words starting with M something something something Y, caravans and broken washing machines, story time is going to be short today, class. This student-teacher is off to hide in the stock-cupboard*

Wobbles and Bubble Wrap

2005-10-18T22:19:00.000+01:00

Tomorrow is our third day in school. At. 9.am. I. Am. Teaching.
The. Whole. Class.
Maths.
On. My. Own.

There's been a dreadful mistake.
I got on the wrong bus;
No, NO, No, you don't understand, I'm here to clean the windows;
I'm here to do a complicated social science experiment, the University sent me;
No, you've got it all wrong, I couldn't possibly teach, I'll be far too busy, I'm doing an audit of how many millilitres of green ink there is in the average UK primary school classroom.

Holy, sweet, chocolate covered spatulas. It sunk in about 2 hours ago - all in all, it's not been a great evening for sinking. After reading "Handbook" number 5 million, and realising the true scale of the impending mountain we have to overcome before Christmas, I totally flipped and found myself jumping up and down on sheets of bubble wrap. That didn't help much so then I sat my housemate down and forced him to endure a picture book. ("Can you see the magic fairy dust, Peter? Good Boy, Well Done.") That helped a bit, (and I also think there's a good chance Peter won't even be psychologically scarred) but I thought maybe pouring out my inner wobble onto the web would work best.

Thus:

wobble WOBBLE wOBBle

WOBBLE wOBble WobbLE

WOBBLE WoBblE

Wobble WOBblE WoBBlE WoBBLe

Wobble WObbLe WoBBLE

I'm a bit worried about my partner, because at least I've had this evening to wobble. It was her wedding anniversary this evening, so she hasn't had chance to look over all the stuff yet (apparantly the Partnership in Education Handbook and Romantic Evening In With Husband don't go well together, I can't imagine why); I'll have to summarize it for her at twenty to nine. I think I'd better take some bubble-wrap to school.

Miss, Jerry ate my hamster!

2005-10-13T17:17:00.000+01:00

Ahh, the tranquility of the village classroom. The carpet pollinated with leaf skeletons, washing lines dangling laminates boasting 'curly c a t', teachers' hands affectionately clasping warm coffee mugs, and amber rays of morning sunlight diffusing through the window. Peace.

We blissfully reflect on the joy of learning, looking forward to imparting our wisdom to the eager, innocent wee pups that make up our class.

Then the whistle goes.
I am instantly besieged. And bewildered.

"Miss, Jerry kicked me!"
"Miss, my shoelace is undone!"
"Miss, Luke's got a conker!"
"Miss, I feel sick!"
"Miss, I dropped my coat in puddle!"
"But MISS, conkers aren't allowed!"
"Miss, Miss, Miss, I'm six today!"
"Miss, my knee hurts!"
"Miss, Neil's taken my conker!"
"Miss, Felicity kicked me!"
"Miss, Neil's got my conker in his mouth!"
"Miss, I can't find my cardigan!"
"Miss, Neil's swallowed my conker!"
"Miss, Sharon's said "who the heck are you!"
*Miss looks particularly puzzled at this one*
"But miss, that's rude, she's singing a rude song, you can't say who the heck are you!"
*Miss remains puzzled despite this enlightening explanation*
"Miss, Neil's choking!"
"Miss, Neil's turning blue"

I'm ready to run to my car and its only 09:03.

This whole telling tales business is baffling. Yet the class teacher manages to unpick 15 of the most tricky of tales, simultaneously, and has them all sitting down working within 3 seconds.

The teacher then had the unenviable task of organising a democratic vote (which she manages seamlessly despite only a few minutes notice); the class needed to elect a boy and a girl to stand as representatives on the school council. After establishing who was prepared to stand (i.e. every hand in the room waved madly at the teacher: "Me! Me! Me! I want to!"); each child was asked to write down the name of one boy and one girl who they would like to stand as class rep. There then followed the most complicated, entangled web of "vote trading" that a person can concieve - you vote for Shirley, then I'll write down Christine, and Christine'll vote for Francis, and Francis then has to vote for Charlotte, and Charlotte needs to vote for . . . I was lost. You reckon Bush's subterfuge of the Bush/Gore election was impressive? His administration has got nothing on 5 year olds.

Talking of politicians . . . five year olds have this remarkable talent for appearing tremendously industrious; take this morning, for example (after the reps were announced and the last tears wiped away: "But I really, really wanted to be on the council!") The whole class room jiggles and swarms, each bee buzzing around its P.E. kit, giving the impression of diligent "changing" taking place. Yet with closer scrutiny, you realise that not one shoelace has been untied, not one button undone, infact, not one bag even opened. What have they been doing for the past ten minutes? I am stumped.

They are amazing. I am convinced, (despite me and my partner beginning a prayer routine begging God to introduce 48 hour days so we can fit in all our work) that we have joined some of the luckiest people in the world, getting to spend time with such inspiring little people.
As for teaching? At the moment, I am learning a HECK (sorry Caroline) of a lot more than I am imparting.

The things some kids say . . .

2005-10-12T19:26:00.000+01:00

Today was my second adventure into the wonderful land of key stage one. The last time I was there, I think the whole country had a different name. They called us infants. It feels like a long time ago.

It is good to be back.

Although it hasn't felt that way all day. From the moment I got an acceptance letter saying that I could train to teach children, I've been thinking; "What, in sweet spatulas name, have I done?" The intensity of my panic's been crescendo-ing, reaching triple forte this morning when a shoal of curious faces peered at me and my placement partner, as the teacher introduced us (and we simultaneously waved goodbye to our first names; hadn't mentally prepared myself for that one! . . .)

But they were adorable. Top three moments of day one:

3. Using pencils to explain how 4 can be split up into 2 and 2 *Oh my God, I'm teaching! It's. actually. happening! Sweet grandmothers, spatulas, pencils and all!*. (also - how do primary teachers stay so thin when they talk about take-away so often? I kept finding my mind at the curry house. . . mmm curry)

2. "Miss, can you read?"
"Of course she can read, she's a mummy"
"Erm, actually I'm not a mummy"
*confusion*
"But you are married?"
"Nope, not married either."
"So you can't read then."
( . . . what do children think happens on wedding nights?)

1. "Miss, can you tell me what a hyena looks like? I've never been to Scotland, you see".

Bring On Day Two.