Fun post-work activities: A Teacher's Guide

Me: Did you have a good evening? What did you get up to?
Colleague: Googled teacher's suicide rates.

Oh dear.

The Jury - ITV

I am sick and feeling sorry for myself. More so than usual, I mean. Spent the day making some attempt at work, with varying degrees of success. Have made inroads on reading for my essay What is English? but now have finally given in to the nausea and sneezing. Decided to instead watch The Jury from ITV this week, a drama following the twelve jurors on a murder case retrial. I am watching it as I type, ready for updates. Five minutes in I'm really enjoying it (despite ITV player's slight connectivity issues). The opening, with no dialogue, was strong and atmospheric. I always enjoy an ensemble piece where you gradually see how the characters entwine and see their actions from opposing points of view, utilised in films such as Crash and Magnolia to such great effect. That's why I am also currently enjoying The Slap on BBC4, but will save that for a different blog entry.

Twenty-one minutes in - so far the strongest aspect of the show is the writer's ability to character profile. The profiles of the three murder victums are delivered against the backdrop of the prosector's narration in court. This is a very effective device, though does have the effect of convincing the audience that the defendent is guilty because, although we are not seeing the murder happen, the incidents are being told by the prosecutor as though it is fact and we audiences are very susceptible to suggestions like that! This would also be a useful narrative device for radio plays as it is a straightforward but not too obvious way to develop plot and propel the story.

Thirty-eight minutes in - Ah, bit of a revelation during the break: just googled the writer. It's only bloody Peter Morgan. Now, I usually only list a few writing credits for these entries but he deserves a few more:Frost/ Nixon, The Special Relationship, The Queen, The Last King of Scotland I re-watched The Last King of Scotland a couple of weekends ago as it's one of my favourite films (and, I admit, because they were selling it on dvd for £3 in Tesco) and even though I knew what was going to happen I was just as shocked, saddened and intruiged as I was the first time I watched it. Amazing stuff. Though in The Jury I feel like maybe there's a few glaring lines which need a bit of editing down for the sake of subtlety and feel a little expositional. I hope Morgan isn't overexplaining for the benefit of the ITV audience. That would be a sad state of affairs indeed. Or perhaps I'm just concentrating on the script I'm becoming a little pernickety. Am really enjoying it though, and finding this 'review as I watch' idea a bit distracting, which can only be a plus point for the show.

Forty-four minutes in (and the end) - This is definitely a slow burn. I'm still getting to grips with the characters and looking forward to the next episode. I'm particularly interested in the character of Theresa, a high-flying businesswoman with an inflated opinion of her own importance, who sends her assistant Lucy to take her place and try to get out of jury service. Of course Lucy's plea to not take part is declined and she lies under oath. Well set up and perfectly believable. Though I hated myself a little there fore writing the phrase "high-flying businesswoman" as it sounds corny and a bit stereotyped - and indeed she did have leather-look trousers, spiky heels and a blunt fringe. I always enjoy watching Sarah Alexander (who plays Theresa) but there is a reason that her most successful roles are in comedy, and that's because I'm not sure she adds much depth. Will have to see how it develops as I think it's an interesting storyline.

I saw that Zoe Williams, one of my favourite journalists, reviewed The Jury in this morning's Guardian but I wanted to wait until post-viewing to read her opinion. When I did there's some things I agree with and some I'd have to take issue with.

It's a dramaturg's delight, the sight of a bunch of professionals storming down a corridor, preferably dressed as doctors, but barristers are fun too, because of their wigs. I always worry when I see it; if you need to convey that something is dramatic by having people walking really fast, when in reality I bet barristers maintain rather a stately pace, it's the equivalent of having to use exclamation marks to alert people to the fact that you're joking. In an ideal world, it would be dramatic on account of all the exciting things that happen; just as, ideally, people would know you were joking because it was funny.

Hmm...maybe it's a little cliched but professionals storming down a corridor IS exciting. They can't all be characters from This Life, staggering in late wearing yesterday's clothes and still coked off their face.
However I do agree with the below:

Morgan has a wonderful ear for formal intercourse and political devilment, but the dialogue he accords to ordinary families, trying their best in an imperfect world, sounds like an Oxo advert. Eighteen-year-old Rashid is called for jury service – "He can't! Not with his condition!" A businesswoman makes the radically improbable decision to pass her assistant off as herself because: "I'm in what is probably the most important business meeting of my life." It's like career-woman-by-computer-program, in which someone has omitted to tell the software developer that you can end up in prison for that kind of thing. There's a teacher who's in love with her 17-year-old pupil, who has made a decision I feel sure no human being has ever made in a real-life scenario. (She informs her superior of this unnatural passion – granted, the head is played by Meera Syal, and you'd tell her anything, wouldn't you? But still … ) The odd line of interesting dialogue (a lonely housewife says to her friend on the phone: "I'm like a cactus; all alone." I sort of like it because it doesn't mean anything) doesn't alter the overwhelming impression that this was phoned in, by writer and director alike. One big conference call of half-arsed prime time.

I also liked the cactus line, primarily because it was said by a foreign character in subtitles (I don't know what nationality yet; I'm not just making a rather offensive sweeping statement) and for me this makes it more interesting; as though perhaps that is a rather poetic proverb from another country.

I may disagree with some of Wiliams' points, but the way she formulates them is lovely to read.

BBC Radio 4: Opening Lines

A new opportunity below, as per the BBC Writersroom site, on their opportunites page:

The BBC Radio Drama Readings Unit welcomes unsolicited submissions from writers new to radio for their annual series, Opening Lines which is broadcast on BBC Radio 4.

As well as broadcasting the three strongest stories in the summer of 2012 they will be publishing transcripts of the shortlisted stories on a new Opening Lines webpage.

The next window for sending in material is October 17th – December 2nd, 2011. Stories submitted outside this time-frame will be returned unread. Your story will be read and responded to within three months of the submission deadline.

Content and format:

They are looking for original short stories which work being read out loud i.e. with a strong emphasis on narrative and avoiding too much dialogue, character description and digression. Pay particular attention to how the story opens and closes. They’ll be looking to see whether the beginning of a story successfully links to how it ends.

The Readings Unit are interested in seeing stories which cover a broad range of subject-matter but material which explores particularly dark, harrowing themes is not best suited to Opening Lines.

The BBC has a rigorous taste and decency policy and cannot accept stories of a sexist or racist nature, or those which use the stronger swear words. The time allotted for each story is around 14 minutes, which means stories must be between 1,900 and 2,000 words in length.

Submissions must be typed and double-spaced on A4 paper and it is important to put your name and address on the script itself. Please do not send a recording of the text.


Submission details:

When submitting your work, please include a SAE and a brief covering letter giving your name, e-mail address (if applicable), the story’s title, word count and details of writing track record. We regret that we can only accept one submission per writer and if we intend to broadcast your story we shall contact you.

Stories that fall outside these guidelines will be returned unread.

Please send us a copy of your story, not your original work.

If you would like to submit work to the London office please send it to:

BBC Radio Drama Readings Unit
Room 807, South East Wing
Bush House
Aldwych
London
WC2B 4PH

Deadline: December 2nd 2011

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.

Books, glorious books

I've read some great books lately. Am currently trying to eke out the end of Caitlin Moran's How To Be A Woman. Awesome.

So here is the quick way of working out if you're a feminist. Put your hand in your pants. a) Do you have a vagina? and b) Do you want to be in charge of it? If you said 'yes' to both, then congratulations! You're a feminist.

Now, I already knew I was, but this is such a funny, astute book and Moran is able to word her aruguments on feminism much more succinctly than I ever could. And she made me smother a loud chortle pre-7am on a freezing cold train to Croydon. Anyone who can do that is alright by me. She had me at "vagina"...

Also went through my obsessive We Need to Talk About Kevin phase. My god I can't wait until the film comes out. I have also been reading a lot of teen and pre-teen fiction. There are some brilliant books for kids out at the moment, and since the Harry Potter/ Twighlight years it's really having a renaissance with publishers. I'm very excited that we're providing interesting and ultimately responsible novels for them to read. More feedback on these to come, or check out my Shelfari page to the right.

Morning

I am now leaving the house at 6.15am to catch a train to get to school for 7.50am (I know, horrible commute). This means I leave the house while it is still dark and all the lights in people's houses are off. I obviously venture out of the house when it is dark at night, but the morning seems so different - there is a quietness to the morning, a feeling of intruding. I slink down the road, careful not to crunch the gravel too loudly, creeping along walls and away from streetlights. In the evening you try and make yourself heard and seen, but the deserted morning is a different matter.

This morning on my way to the train I saw a lone man dressed in a reflective yellow vest over his clothes and wearing a hockey mask over his face. It was too out of place for me to feel alarmed, but only after he passed me by did I fully realise he was clearly up to no good. I also, in a presumably unrelated occurance, saw an enormous dead fox splayed out on the pavement in front of me. Its neck bent back at an awkward angle, exposing a white scruff around his neck. His glassy eyes gazed sightlessly into the night.

"I wouldn't say I enjoyed it..." Reflections on first weeks in the classroom

God only knows if I've made a decent career move. I keep thinking about that email from a literary agent. Should I have at least sent them my CV? But the deed is done now and I have started my classroom experience. I am placed in what is referred to as a 'challenging school.' It's actually a well organised academy with lofty ambitions for its pupils, who come from diverse and often difficult backgrounds. I can see how teachers get ground down by the constant abuse and behaviour management, but I keep reminding myself that a badly behaved kid almost always comes in tow with pretty inadequate parents. It's funny, interesting and sad in equal parts. And it's certainly a fertile enironment for fuelling the imagination. Here are just a few things with have stood out so far:

On day one a year 10 threw a paper aeroplane at me. Obviously it undermined my authority, but I do admire the vintage charm in his weapon of choice.

The students aren't the only ones with issues; the number of teachers giving out inappropriate or just plain wrong information is baffling. One teacher in particular regularly provides incorrect meanings of words but I don't feel well placed to correct her (yet).

There is also a regular perpetuation of gender stereotypes such as "Stop talking. You're supposed to be reading and as you're a boy you can't multi-task and do both at once." Had I been a student in that class I would have pounced on that statement and insisted on multi-tasking with my mates for the rest of the lesson. I am a girl, after all.

A teacher also described The Sun as "not a newspaper. It just has sport and photos of women who have no self respect." This was not followed up with any explanation or class discussion. No wonder I hear boys in corridors regularly referring to women as slags, or assuming that IQ level and skirt length are inversely proportional.

School children stink. And I don't mean their attitudes (though, in some cases that is also the case). I mean they reek of adolescence. The heady mix of Lynx and body odour infiltrates every corner of the building.

There is a tiny year eight pupil, a little boy, who can't weigh more than a few stone. He is constantly exhausted and spends most of the lesson with his head on the desk. I mentioned this to his form tutor, who said not only do his parents not put him to bed at a reasonable time but they often forget to feed him dinner. No wonder he can't concentrate when he hasn't eaten for days and is in need of a nap. Made me feel very sad.

If you read a lot growing up your ability to communicate, both written and verbally, increases massively. A textbook asked students to select a newspaper article from home about refugees and one girl wrote just the words "We don't have No Newspapers" in big letters in her exercise book. Says it all, really.

Kids are very adaptable. There is a large number of students at the school with English as a second language. One recent Eritrean refugee is really struggling with his lessons and he knows very little English. However another little boy, with perfect English and a reading age well above his peers told me that when he moved to England from West Africa at the age of seven it took him a whole three months before he could speak English fluently. I was learning French for two years before I could string a sentence together! Sometimes the only giveaways that a pupil has only been speaking English for a few years is that they absentmindedly turn the pages of a book in the wrong direction or write their titles on the right hand side of the page instead of the left.

Kids also like to Do the Right Thing. They have a very strong moral compass when tested, and fights in the corridor often highlight this. They are also proud when they achieve, no matter how uncool they think it is. It is often easier to pretend you don't care and to fail than to admit you do and still fail.

After observing the behavioural problems in the lower school I was entertaining fantasies about how great it would be to teach A-level groups. I imagined we would all sit in a circle, their faces glowing with pleasure at being able to spend two hours discussing books and theories and sharing their ideas. After all, sixth formers are there voluntarily because they want to learn and because they love the subject. I could not have been more wrong. The group consisted of fourteen students who acted more like they were being asked to do hard labour than read an Arthur Miller play. "Sir, it's so boooring" "this is a well shit book" "what's even the point of reading?" and so on. I spent the whole lesson with them pretending I didn't hear their silly chatter that was designed to shock me. However I feel they might be about to get their comeuppance. Today their teacher confiscated a letter that went something like this:

"I like to snort cornflakes in my nose so they come out of my bum. I like to rub jam into my japs eye. I have got a lego brick shoved up my bum. I put my dick in my sister's mouth and shag my mum."

And so on and so forth. I am sorry to say that the grammar has been added in by me (as if these students would know how to use a possessive apostraphe). However I am pleased to say that the punishment will be a photocopy of this letter sent home to the parents of every student involved. It's about time they knew what their little darlings are up to whilst they were supposed to be learning about Freudian readings of Arthur Miller. Well, maybe they can try a Freudian reading of their own work...

I'm not really sure how to follow that little gem. More updates from the frontline next week!