I Should Be Marking

Well, I can’t very well let the blog sit for a fortnight and I’ll be honest and say I haven’t done much school work in the past week.

I did spend a couple of days sorting out next term’s KS3 resources (a new spreadsheet unit employing much searching through Argos catalogues, a host of new websites for 8.3 [website reliability] which I may/may not get round to posting, a new database unit based on a hamster rental company aimed at primary schools) but by the weekend I was into last minute Christmas bits and bobs and by Monday there was no way I was doing any work.

The good news is that the missus bought me a CBT course. She knows I’ve been desperate to get onto two wheels for ages but has thus far been far too concerned that I might not be able to keep it rubber side down. We’ve agreed that we’ll try this, see how I like it and take it from there.

The kids were more than happy with their offerings (which were plentiful to say the least) and so a happy, if manic, Christmas was had by all.

Today was my day to get back into work - I’ve put the tree down (Bah! Humbug!) and all the complicated presents up. I dug out my pile of GCSE marking (only 45 pieces[!]), stared at them for a while and then watched The Hogfather for 3 hours. (It was very good BTW). Sent a few emails. Read a few more months of unnoficial Dilbert archives.

I’ll have to get started by tomorrow as I have 150 KS3 pupils to level, those 45 coursework submissions ot go through, a class-full of A-level coursework to mark, 45 Y11 reports top write and next term’s GCSE projects to prepare (1 class x database, 1 class x graphics, 1 class x PPT and half a dozen doing video editing).

And all needs to be done by Wednesday night, ready to hit the ground running on Thursday. Oh, and did that was just on the ‘essentials’ to-do list? There’s 3 more pages of stuff I’d *like* to get done.

Ho-hum. Aside from the coursework marking I’m looking reasonably forward to it - I just need to get the marking done first or it’ll never get there.

As promised I’ve finally managed to get all of the relevant permission slips sorted and have proudly posted offerings from both the Stop Motion Animation Club and my Y8’s British Sign Language videos for widespread enjoyment.

You can have a look at the Showcase blog, or better still you can subscribe to Blog All feed to see what 7C2 are up to (I need to get caught up with this as the pesky ICT work has been getting in the way of blogging of late) as well keeping up with the Thunks.

Please leave positive feedback for the kids, I’m sure they’ll appreciate it.

I really can’t tell if I love Christmas or hate it.

In registration this morning I was given a really nicle bottle of red wine by one of the pupils, but then my Y11s are still so busy dragging their heels over coursework I think I’ll need the whole bottle just to get myself back to a state of equilibrium in terms of stress.

My tutor group received the most merits of any Y8 class in the school according to yesterday’s assembly, and yet they can’t get through an hour’s tutorial without 4 breaktime detentions and one chucking out.

I won a bottle of Scotch in the staff raffle and then get a snotty letter from a parent whose daughter has lost her PE kit and so she expects me to sort it out or she’ll have “no choice but to come into school” herself to “sort the matter out once and for all”*.

So am I enjoying Christmas, am I enjoying teaching at the minute? No and yes. On the one hand I have my wife forcing me to climb up ladders that look worryingly hampered by metal fatigue in a force 9 gale being pelted with hail stones knowing full well I’ll be back up there in a fortnight to get the decorations back down again, and on the other I have my animation club posting their car chases and zombie weddings online, Y8s signing at me across the playground and the new Jamie Oliver style school Christmas lunch to look forward to in about 10 minutes.

Yes I moan, yes I’m stressed and yes I’m fed up. Still, it wouldn’t be fun if it was easy

* Of course the PE kit was in lost property, where I told the girl to check 3 weeks ago. In fact it would have been passed to me by default had she bothered to put her name in it. Oh, I did enjoy writing the letter in reply.

I came home on Friday ready to post a rant on here, but decided to do the sensible thing and wait a couple of days to calm down. I have 2 Year 11 classes who should have completed 3 of their 4 coursework projects beofre their mock exams.
Instead I have 2 Year 11 classes who have completed 2 pieces of coursework, are between 50 and 90% through the third*. Having spent 4 months working on a spreadsheet project I had three girls last week ask me what a VLOOKUP was, and another one has gone the SUM() route - every test in her test plan included the word VLOOKUP (=VLOOKUP(B12+B13), =VLOOKUP(B13 * 1.175), etc.).

What worries me most is that if they can’t manage the third project in 14 weeks in the first term, how on Earth are they going to manage the fourth in an 11 week term? Especially when i want to use the last 3 weeks of that on theory?

The HoD says lots of short, tight deadlines that are strictly enforced with daily after-schoolies. It sounds like my stress free second term is going to be slightly more fraught than I had hoped.

I’m just trying to not to let myself get so stressed. I’ve done so much forehead-rubbing in the past week I’ve actually made a small hole. Still, only 3 teaching days left until I get two weeks off!
*Actually, I have one lad who is about 5% through (strangely, that’s also the mark he got on his mock exam)

I’m very proud of myself today

Not only did I get through a whole class load of GCSE coursework marking, not only did my Y9’s run through Yacapaca reveal them to be dolts barely worthy of a level 3 but my Y8s put their BSL work to good use.

Last week we had a look at 3 or 4 British Sign Language websites with a view to some online tuition. Today we discussed a scenario (new, deaf pupil joining the school), thought up some appropriate and helpful phrases and then recorded them. I’ve spent an hour editing, adding titles, a soundtrack etc. and have a 2 minute video all ready to go. I’m just waiting on parental permission to allow one pupil’s image to be shown online and it’ll be up on the Showcase blog. Expect another one next week as well as I have a fortnightly Y8 class in just before the end of term.

Some days I really love my job.

Seeing as I’m up, I’m having a look through some of my RSS feeds and finding new blogs. One in particular has had me in stitches for the best part of an hour, topped off by the following post which had me shoving my fist into my mouth in an attempt to not wake the rest of the house.

I think I’m going to have to add a new category for this blog, ‘Inspired by the TES forums, or something similar. I think fully half of these posts must have started out there and here we go with another…

There was a post late last night from a teacher who was finding it difficult to teach ICT. Pupils assuming they can come into a lesson and play Flash games, check email, etc. I’m sure all ICT teachers have seen that, but I think that for most it isn’t a huge problem (or it hasn’t been allowed to be a huge problem, I should say). Problems holding their attention was another difficulty cited and the first couple of posts (apparently not everyone is up as early as me this morning) talked about the boring nature of the National Strategy. Me, I’ve been up half the night (kids, blech!) and so my response turned into a bit of a rant.

I talked about a lot of the simple ideas I’ve used to make ICT more interesting. Instead of competing with Miniclip and MSN, why not use what the kids are interested in to hold their attention? I don’t mean bribe them with games, not by a long way. I know far too many ICT teachers that do this and it drives up the wall. What I mean is do things that are interesting.

Kids really don’t care about how much it costs to put on a school disco (7.4). I’m hoping they’ll have more fun next term when I have them pricing up sofas, pool tables and PS2s (should that be PS3s?) for a youth club. Still a bit dull on the face of it, but show me a kid who can resist flicking through the Argos catalogue and I’ll show you a kid in need of a big hug.

Instead of making a website about the school (8.2) or a PowerPoint about themselves (7.1), why not get them to make a PowerPoint about wild animals for their Y5 bretheren back at the Primary Schools? Why not get them to make a website for one of their clubs, groups, bands, etc? Why not get them to make a showcase for their Art work - take some still and video cameras up there and get some multimedia content.

Instead of filling in worksheets about communication methods (GNVQ), why not get them to make an advert for a mobile phone company, an office training video or a stop-motion animation?

The list goes on and on, A colleague of mine was desperate to get her Y9 pupils to really understand how attachments work on email in preparation for the QCA tests so they spent an hour drawing silly pictures and emailing them to each other. They had a great time and actually got the idea for how to attach and access files sent along with emails. Something obvious to us but actually quite difficult for a lot of kids.

My point is (and I’m aware I’m preaching to the converted) that we have so many tools at our disposal that it is criminal to allow them to learn Office for 5-7 years and call it ICT. No wonder pupils get bored and fed up with that. Using the Internet to teach yourself sign language is much more fun and probably more educational than making yet another poster in Publisher [spit].

OK, so we’re near the end of term, my Y8s have finished and uploaded their websites, so now what? Well, after chatting with them about kids’ TV (in particular Justin on CBeebies) we got on to simple sign language.

So today, with 20 minutes left at the end of the lesson, we had a look at some BSL (British Sign Language) websites and started learning some very basic signs. I can now say “Hello, my name is Mr. C” as well as “My cow is ill”. I’m not sure which will come in more useful, but the plan is to write and then video some simple sentences. A quick bit of editing in iMovie, add some subtitles and we’re done. Cracking good fun and they’ve been signing “Afternoon, Mr. C.” across the playground at me all day.

As I’ve mentioned before, I run a stop-motion animation club (or SMAC as one quick witted pupil pointed out). By next Monday we’re hoping to have the finished video more-or-less completed. Expect a high concentration of car chases and zombies (you’ve gotta love the Y7 mentality). Watch this space…

It seems like an age since I’ve posted anything, but I have a perfectly good excuse (I always do) - I’ve been ill. Nothing serious, but enough to knock me out of contention for the best part of a week.

During my convalescence I got to thinking about how much it must be costing the school in terms of cover. A supply teacher costs around £150, or so I imagine, which meant that my 3 days would have cost the school close on £500 - about as much as an iMac at the prices we got over summer. Imagine how much better the classroom would be with one more shiny new Intel iMac and one less antiquated G3 iMac (think low-end PIII)!

On the other hand it would have meant me dragging myself into school when I was clearly in no fit state to manage my learning environment and doubtless ending up dragging out the illness to a fortnight or more. I could still set reasonable cover work and I even managed to use Moodle to IM my two Y11 GCSE classes (although this may have been more of a distraction than a help).

I forgot (albeit temporarily) that the whole point is to help the pupils to learn things. If we don’t have a suite full of the very latest kit, but we do have a teacher who is capable of standing out with breaking into a cold sweat then that must be better than a state-of-the-art classroom with a teacher who is unable to manage the behaviour and guide the learning, even if it means the odd cover.

My conclusion? If I’m ill, I’m staying at home. Hardly world changing but it’s one more area where teachers often don’t get the balance right. I know a couple of people with long term illnesses who are too afraid of letting the kids down by taking time off to recover. Trying to convince them they’ll be hurting both themselves and their charges more in the long run is as futile as trying to convince a Y9 pupil that Gantt Charts are not just important, but cool.

And anyway, I managed to get caught up on my Dilbert backlog so the 3 days weren’t entirely wasted.