Update from the front line

For the first time in a couple of weeks I feel like I've had a GOOD DAY at school. Finally I have witnessed students engaged in debate, expressing opinions, and thinking about issues outside of their direct experience. I am going on a year ten trip tomorrow and some of my year ten girls whooped when they found out I was supervising - must mean I'm doing something right!

On the down side I feel overwhelmed by assessment objectives and foci, schemes of work and a mulitude of pointless acronyms (EAL, SEN, G&T, IEP, AOs, WWWs, EBIs, VAK, AFL...and the list goes on...) but am getting there, slowly but surely.

I had a meeting with another teacher today who seemed to talk entirely in metaphors - the children were plants, their education roots, and results their fruit. This became quite tedious quite quickly. By time he got to 'the classroom is like a game of Jenga; you move one building block and the whole lot comes tumbling down.' I felt like I was in a meeting with a fortune cookie maker.

Today I also had a year 7 student who, after hitting a fellow pupil, was writing an account of what happened (this seems to me to be an excellent punishment - getting them to write, whilst also avoiding fraught 'he said, she said'). He wrote the sad words "He came to the window of the classroom and stuck his middle finger up at me. Then came in and said "F your dead mum" so I got angry and beated him." Kids can be pretty mean.