Meetings

Teaching requires taking a lot of work home, especially marking and planning. There is no time to do while in school. School consists of lessons and meetings. Lots of meetings.

Under the work-life balance agreements with the unions, we are supposed to have no more than one after-school meeting per week. This week I've had two. This doesn't include supervising detentions. So I have officially stayed after school three out of four days this week. Because there was a mix up about which day a particular meeting was being held, I made plans to stay late, so I used that time to clean up my desk and do a little preparation.

Those are just the meetings that happen after school. Other meetings expose the myth that is the "free" period. Theoretically, I get an average of one free period each day. This is only because as an NQT, I am entitled to 10% more frees than other teachers. This is theoretically because I need more time to plan and prepare lessons - which I do. Nonetheless, I have never had a chance to plan a lesson during one of these free periods.

I've only had to cover a lesson once. Considering NQTs are supposed to the last resort when covering, I suppose that's not too bad. One of my frees each week is taken up with a mentor meeting. I am suppose to spend other frees observing experienced teachers. I often meet with the head of one of the departments in which I teach, if they also have a free that period. Sometimes I am racing around to get all the resources ready for a lesson. It is never truly free, in the sense of having a chance to catch one's breath.

Almost Half-Term

My hope of recording my thoughts on a daily (or even regular) basis went by the wayside as soon as I took up my teaching post. Where's the time? Instead, I am in the middle of my sixth week.

The question most on my mind these days is simply, "Why?" Why did I get myself into this? It is very hard work and I don't even like kids.

I was out of work and my wife suggested that perhaps it was something I could do. And after all, the Government was and is running ads saying, "Those who can, teach." I've taught within other contexts. Never successfully with young people, but I've taught. At the end of the day, it seemed easy enough. After all, I know more than they do about almost everything.

So it was just a matter of getting on a PGCE course for a year and then taking my pick of all the jobs out there. This was before there was doubletalk from the Government of reducing the number of teachers and increasing the size of classes. This hasn't happened yet, but even so, there were few jobs, especially in my region of the country.

As it was, I got my job by default. I was the only applicant to show up for interview. I would have had to have done a pretty bad job on the interview lesson to have not gotten it. Even at the inteview, I got the feeling of, "Is this the best we could do?" My interview lesson wasn't brilliant, but it was at least competent. But honestly, who couldn't do a decent lesson in an artificial environment?

Neither a SCITT PGCE course nor an interview lesson offer any preparation for true nature of teaching in a state secondary school. In the last six weeks, I have discovered why teachers moan about paperwork. I would like to apologise to all of the trees that have been killed just to fill the top of my desk with endless reams of paper. All of this paper is photocopied with an endless variety of information, all of which is somehow critical to my performance as a teacher.

Unfortunately, I don't do admin. Never have. In every job I have held or business I have owned, my weakness has been any adminstrative responsibilities. I need a PA. NQTs don't get a PA. I have been told that thanks to work-life balance agreements with the teaching unions, the paperwork has been reduced. I'm sure there are a lot of happy trees out there, but I can't imagine what it could have been like before.

The biggest misconception I had going into teaching was that it involved teaching. I can teach. I've done it for years. No, what I do is attempt to manage the behaviour of immature individuals confined to a closed space by the force of law. I am a glorified prison guard. I attempt to convince these people to use the time of their confinement to learn something they don't want to know. They are not there to sip from the font of knowledge which I possess and offer to them for the small sum of less than £19,000 per year.

It is much more like tricking a finicky toddler into eating vegetables. This trickery is called lesson planning. Every lesson has to start with a "settler" to try to get them quiet. Then there is the "starter" to introduce them to the lesson. Then the main part of the lesson should contain a variety of pupil-centred (as opposed to teacher-led) activities. Any information they get will be somewhere in a textbook or photocopied worksheet. After short enough activities to keep their gnat-like attention span, it is all summed up with a "plenary" to reinforce what they have learned. All this takes place in less than 60 minutes.

I've run out of time to rant tonight. Got to be up bright and early for another day on the cell block.

Meeting My Form

Yesterday I met the pupils who will comprise the form we will call 7XYZ. It was Year 6 day at my school and my first experience as a form tutor. As a trainee, I assisted form tutors, but never really had responsibility for the form.

With 7XYZ, my first experience was their first experience. I've never had a form and they've never had a form tutor. At least they won't know if I don't get things just right.

When I met with the parents, and explained that I was new to the school (I didn't tell them I was an NQT), some of the faces didn't beam with excitement. I wonder how much faith they have in me. Hopefully I will gain their confidence throughout the year.

Being a form tutor is a substantial responsibility. I'm the first and primary means of pastoral care and support. I have to watch that they are doing their homework and getting along with others and not being bullied and making good effort in all their classes.

I also have to teach their Citizenship lesson each week. I'm not so worried about that, because I am trained in teaching Citizenship and have a lot of personal experience in that area as well. It will actually be a good opportunity to put my training into practice. I'm more worried for those teachers who have minimal INSET training and are thrown into Citizenship. They wouldn't do that if it were Maths or Science, but they assume anyone can deliver the Citizenship curriculum.

Yesterday was a good opportunity to get to know them. I can already see some of the ones who may be troublemakers and others who are going to behave. It is going to be an interesting year.

PGCE Complete

As of Friday, my PGCE course ended. I am just waiting to not be called at random by the Final Exam Board on the 15th and be awarded the Certificate and QTS.

This has been a rough year. It has not been particularly demanding in an academic way. This is not my only post-graduate work or qualification. Combining family, teaching, professional preparation sessions, subject sessions, and the coursework has been a lot.

Some people have said that the NQT year isn't as bad for SCITT-trained teachers as it is for those taking other pathways. Of course this was said before the latest load of Government hoops through which we must jump.

Tuesday I visit my new school. It is Year 6 day and I will be meeting my new form. I may not be a great form tutor, but at least as Year 7s they won't have anyone with whom to compare me. Of course my induction tutor will.

Early Start

I'm not actually an NQT yet, but I have a job for the next year. I will be visiting my new school in the next couple of weeks for various reasons, so I thought I would begin this blog with the end of the PGCE/QTS experience as it transitions into my first post.

The Government have now decided that Transition Point One for the induction year is the end of the training year. Over the next several days I will be completing extensive paperwork with my training manager. This will theoretically play a significant role in how my induction is managed and the goals I have to meet over the coming year.

In some ways the NQT year is harsher than the initial teacher training (ITT) year. If there are questions at the end of the IIT year, the placement can be extended until the training school and the awarding institution are satisfied that QTS standards have been met. If an NQT does not make expected progress during the induction year and they are "failed", they can never teach again. Full stop.

I am sure that this blog will be concerned, probably in no small part, with that pressure.