Year 10: an update.

In other news, I am so proud of the change in attitude my Year 10 class have had since my last post about them.

With three and a half weeks to go until the end of term, I was suddenly struck by the sheer volume of work we had left to do. We still needed to finish annotating the scenes from Romeo & Juliet, we needed to watch the film and make notes about the relevant scenes (a crucial part of the assessment), we needed to carry out a mock, create sound assessment plans and then actually do the assessment. I also needed to mark the mocks to give some feedback to them before the assessment. I panicked. I explained to them. They panicked. Then we pulled together.

Some of the lessons did end up being a bit of a lecture, which I could be happier about but it just became about getting the job done, rather than flowery approaches. The kids seemed to respond well too and they really got their heads down and tackled the work head on. We had several lessons where I encouraged them to work together, use the computers, and make their own interpretations and the notes from the film were largely their own thinking too. They have done brilliantly and I don't feel anywhere near as nervous about the actual assessment as I did last time.

I feel really proud of them; they've stepped up to the plate and taken on quite a mammoth task. Their essay writing skills are the only issue but we did some major troubleshooting of that this week and I'm hoping that some of it will have gone in. There's only one or two who I'm not 100% confident of but I'm hoping that there will be a much higher percentage of them getting into Band 4/5 this time.

It's a learning process for me too. Last year, my classes were all Key Stage 3 and so I am a bit rusty when it comes to GCSE. However, I feel like I and my Year 10 beauties have hit our stride with this work. So, keep your fingers crossed that the assessments show this to be true!!

An American Horror Story

The terrible events at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, yesterday, will have sent a shiver down the spines of parents and teachers alike, everywhere. It is another in a long line of school massacres which have plagued the United States in the last decade or so and raises immediate questions about American gun laws. In the UK, it leaves many of us grateful for the stringent laws we have in place. From my own experience, arriving in America and seeing airport security guards and police officers carrying guns, is something which scared me. You just don't see it over here and it struck me how these sights must have the exact opposite effect on young people who have grown up in a nation where guns are commonplace.

The events of yesterday left 20 children and 7 others dead. The time has come for Obama to step in and put a stop to these flagrantly relaxed gun laws. Not only that, but it raises questions in British schools as to how long it will be before there are similar problems here.

As a teacher, it is part of my job to keep an eye on the children in my care. Some of them are quiet, some of them are loud, but all of them are fragile. Growing up is hard and it's easy to become resentful in an environment where looks, clothes and generally 'fitting in' are deemed more important than anything else. One girl (who reminds me a bit of me when I was her age) is bullied badly simply because she isn't interested in sex, drugs and alcohol like other girls in her year group are. She's made to feel as though she's not normal when actually, she's one of the most normal kids I know. What happens if she felt unsupported at home too, or had less teachers looking out for her? What if she felt so miserable that she became resentful and bitter? What if she lived in a country where she could gain easy access to a gun and decided to silence her bullies once and for all? Kids pick on the weak and then, eventually, the weak get angry, once all the confidence and self-esteem has been drained from them.

We can only speculate why the gunman yesterday, who's being cautiously named as 20 year-old, Adam Lanza, chose to do what he did yesterday. He walked into an elementary school of children aged anywhere between three and eleven, and killed twenty of them. His actions and his choices can never be excused, even if they can be explained but it will never make up for the tragedy they caused. However, we must do more to ensure that disturbed children do not grow up to be disturbed adults and in doing so, we will water down the chances of people feeling so angry that they feel like they need to take such drastic action. Kids like the girl I describe above need support and love to ensure that she knows how normal she is.

No amount of analysis can dismiss just how horrific the events of yesterday were, and still are. However, there is time to make changes to prevent these monstrosities from happening again. Until such time, my thoughts go out to the victims and their families - no words can ever remove the pain they must be feeling.

Ban guns, ban bullets; love our children.

The Man should try teaching Year 9.

The government have launched yet another negative attack on the teaching profession. In short, if you're not deemed to be a strong teacher, you will be paid less than your peers. There are pros and cons to this move, but from where I'm standing, one greatly outweighs the other.

Teaching is already a profession laden with anxiety, stress and paranoia. It's like being at school again but with the added pressure that you actually care about how you're doing and, instead of a detention when you mess up, you get complaints from parents and meetings with your line manager. It is a profession of criticism and you have to be quite thick-skinned. I'm not and one of the hardest things I had to learn was the ability to turn a critical comment into a positive boost to my performance. In every other area of life, if you were faced with constant comments and criticisms, you'd probably either kick off or crumble but, in teaching, you have to cheerfully take it on the chin and then prove yourself to be implementing that advice at the nearest available possibility. Whether we like it or not, if someone is struggling, it does seep out and whilst teachers are generally supportive folk, it does mean you can end up feeling very self-conscious.

So now, the government, in their infinite wisdom, have elected to provide teaching with yet another competitive, performance-based hierarchy to conform to. As if the pressure of line management meetings, observations, data collections, report writing and parent's evening isn't enough (not to mention the pressure we put on ourselves as intrinsic, natural-born perfectionists anyway). All of this is just parts of the job that we grumble about but accept. However, I'd be lying if I said that I didn't feel nervous every time one of these things crops up. I KNOW I'm a good teacher - I'm passionate, enthusiastic, giving and devoted to my job and students but even then, I worry. So now, I have to worry about whether I'm going to receive my pay rise every year and, if I don't, I get to spend a whole year feeling like the loser teacher who messed up so much that they didn't want to pay her properly; an entire year worrying about getting it all wrong again; an entire year of feeling like every email I get suggesting I attend a CPD session is a pointed statement about how crap I am.

As you can see, I put enough pressure on myself as it is.

I can see the benefits of this. The rewards of working hard are relatively low at the moment because we're all equal. Last year, when my Year 8 class achieved a higher number of Level 6s than predicted, I was told 'Well done, you need to improve children going from Level 4 to 5 though.' Fair enough, I do, but it'd be lovely to be rewarded for such things. Also, it might make it easier to spot teachers who do need more support AND it will help to ensure that children are receiving the best possible education which, at the end of the day, should be our priority at all times.

However, another major issue is the potential for this move to create more difficulties than solutions. For example, when applying for jobs in the future, if I've stayed on the same level of pay for a few years, will potential employers see that as a sign that I'm not worth interviewing, or even employing? Or, will it be like we're supposed to do with the kids and have intervention strategies put into place to ensure that we do make progress as teachers?

In short, I can't help but feel like education has become a profession that is too obsessed with targets and progress. The increasing number of academies is not helping the situation, and nor is the government with its incessant demand for more, more, MORE from teachers. The job is hard, the kids are awkward, the hours are long and we all devote ourselves to it; it's not so much a job as it is a vocation - a lifestyle, even. So, why now must I prove myself to warrant being paid correctly?

The government's lust for making teaching a respected profession filled with individuals who have first-class degrees (see the recent changes to the PGCE bursaries) and who reach ever-increasing targets (in spite of it being nearly entirely down to the students anyway), is something which is in danger of alienating passionate individuals who simply just love working with kids. Students must be provided with the best opportunities to learn, I agree. However, all of these government initiatives are only serving to demoralise and stress out the teachers who can give those opportunities. Teaching is in danger of becoming a heartless, soul-sucking profession filled with individuals who are only there for the wage. What a sad state of affairs.

William Blake Meets Year 8.

When my Head of Department said that we could do "whatever we like" with the Year 8 poetry unit this half term, you could see the glee plastered across my fellow English teacher's faces; mine included! One of my big literary interests is John Keats and so I decided to focus on romanticism with my Year 8 class. We began by looking at Daffodils by William Wordsworth and then Ode to Autumn by Keats and the class told me that they were enjoying it. Then, one boy, one little darling... told me he wasn't "connecting" with the poems. So, I felt that this was a challenge and so, I went dark and decided to look at William Blake.

We started off doing a bit of research about Blake and his poetry to whet their appetite. Then we looked at his paintings and I create a mini 'gallery' in my classroom, encouraging the kids to wander round and consider each one and think about how they make them feel etc. Which, obviously, they loved because they got to pretend to be all hoity-toity art critics and say things like: "This one makes me feel uncomfortable" and "This one is beautifully done..." Which, let's face it, is what most of us do when wandering around art galleries whilst the man with dodgy facial hair and a poncey hat stands next to us, adjusting his hipster glasses.

The next lesson, we mind-mapped words to describe Blake's poetry and paintings. They were brilliant at this and it told me that they had really 'got' what I wanted them to know about Blake. They were coming out with words like 'supernatural', 'creepy', 'peculiar' and 'dark.' Perfect. So, I felt they were ready for the next bit: I sent them out around the school in groups, to take photos of scenes around the school which they felt were Blake-esque. I was a bit worried yesterday morning when I got drenched walking into work but then I decided that the gloomy weather suited the task AND Blake suffered for his art, so they should too. They produced some brilliant photos actually - I might get them to email me them so that I can use them in a display. There were pictures of spooky trees, piles of leaves, shadowy lampposts amongst tree branches - they did good!

Today, the kids used these photos to write their own Blake-inspired descriptions. I'm yet to read them all but I was read a few lines and it all sounds very promising. One line involved personifying the tree as 'cancerous' because it was losing its leaves and life. From a middle range Year 8, this makes me wonder what else they've come up with!! In Monday's lesson, the kids will be going back to these sites around the school to film themselves reading their descriptions in the style of Blake. We'll have a screening in the following lesson, I think.

I'm seriously excited about this project actually and the kids seem really into it too. Poetry is always such a tricky subject to teach because it's generally dismissed by kids as being boring and difficult. They struggle to understand what the poet means because of all the metaphors and complicated imagery. A couple of weeks ago, I was teaching this class why romanticism has nothing to do with romance and now they're having a really good stab at walking in Blake's shoes. I'm properly impressed with them and I cannot wait to see these videos!!

How to solve a problem like Year 10

I'm afraid that this will be a bit of a rant today. Largely because Year 10 are driving me mad. Their attitude is just so appallingly lacklustre and I'm struggling to get them to realise that this is it now - this is not some silly little KS3 assessment any more. This IS their GCSE and without an English GCSE, they're basically screwed in today's job market/world. I've spoken to them about this a few times now and it just seems to go in one ear and out the other.

I think there are a few questions that immediately spring to mind here:

1. How can I make them realise how important this is? 2. How can I make our lessons both structured and focused as well as fun? 3. Why haven't some of them freaked out after being told that they'd totally cocked up their first controlled assessment this year?

They should all be Band 4 or above. A lot of them were, some of them were the top of Band 3 which, in terms of averages, is still totally retrievable given that it's the first assessment. However, several of them were bottom of Band 3 and even Band 2 which, for that class, is appalling.

Had they all been crap, I'd be sitting here reviewing my teaching methods and questioning where I went wrong. But in a class where the top mark was Band 5 and the bottom was Band 2, it leaves me a bit stuck with what actually went wrong.

My plan has to be focused on differentiation. Tomorrow, I'm going to redo my seating plan to seat the various ability ranges together so that I can focus on setting them work which will really improve their skills. I would encourage a Level 4 KS3 student to do Level 7 work so why should it be any different here? If the setting is such that the class is a mixed bag then differentiation is the only way forward. I need to plan some homework which is tailored to different skills too.

It's just finding the time and energy at the moment though..! Still, I'll have a go and see whether it makes a difference.

Guest Post & Half Term

Following a talk I gave to my school's NQT and PGCE cohort on Wednesday, Dave Rogers asked me to give a guest post for his blog about my top tips for taking risks in lessons. You can read it, here. Also, IT'S HALF TERM!!!! Finally....!! Have a good break guys :)

Independent Learning: how I intend to achieve it.

As part of my ongoing professional development, and following on from an earlier post, I am determined to encourage independence in my students.

In the end, my Year 10 class showed themselves to be capable of writing their controlled assessments without too much flapping. However, I had to give them the basic tools to encourage their slight increase in independence. Arguably, as teachers, that is what we ought to be doing. I feel like I want to 'set them free' more though. So, I've set about doing some research of methods which can help to promote further independence in students. Since we have one more week of 'The Half Term That WILL NEVER END', I'm going to use this week to put them into practice and see how it affects the kids.

Group Work

I already use a lot of group work in most of my lessons. Last year, I spent a lot of time conducting my lessons by asking direct questions and getting the response from the same seven or eight kids in the class. After Ofsted visited us and said I was doing too much talking (moi?!), I realised that I had to shift my game plan. Now, my lessons revolve around the students having a set length of time to discuss their ideas and answers to a question, followed by feedback from each group. I usually record their answers on the board and get the kids to copy it down into their books. So, in the end, it feels like a team effort, led by the kids. It also enables me to see exactly who gets it and who doesn't, and allows me to ask harder questions to the brighter kids.

Choices

Looking around, many sites and experts suggest giving students a choice of activities. Up until now, I've done things such as give them sentence starters for PEE paragraphs and said that if they feel capable of not using them, then don't. Or, I've said that those aiming for the higher level should attempt it on their own etc. But, what I've never done is give them a choice of 'Activity A' or 'Activity B.' It would promote independence, allow them to take responsibility for their learning, and would open up opportunities for 'Ask the Expert' type activities. However, the immediate problem I see with it is how to assess it; whilst one class is reviewing one activity, what are the others doing? Perhaps it should involve some sort of swap over/peer assessment work. Some sites suggest doing it as homework. I think I'll try it in class first and then with homework next half term, now that my department have scrapped the irrelevant IET booklets.

Learning Goals

We spend so much time setting targets for students - levels, grades, AFs - but how can students really attain independence if they aren't setting their own goals? When I set myself goals, if I don't achieve them, I feel like I'm letting myself down. If someone else tells me what they want me to do, I feel significantly less attached to them and a lot less motivated. It's like that great feeling you have when you achieve something for yourself, by yourself. So, why do we take that away from the kids? This week, I'm going to spend time with all of my classes and allow them to create their own targets. We had book monitoring this week and the feedback I had said that I need to let the kids have time to respond to my feedback because I'm putting in a load of work and it ends up being ignored. So, my plan is to let them have ten minutes to go through and review my feedback and then spend some time setting their own goals. We can have review lessons every few weeks.

Self Learning Facility

An interesting idea which I read on one website is the idea of having a 'Self Learning Facility' which is a space full of resources, activities, quizzes and ideas for students to access and/or add to. The idea being that as students become more self-aware as learners, they will recognise their weak areas and by accessing a store of extra resources, they can actively work to improve their skills in their own time, or, if they complete an activity faster than their peers during lessons. This will take quite a lot of time to develop and implement. I'm thinking it could work by dividing resources up between AFs and then encouraging the kids to develop their skills, based on their learning goals. This facility could even take up part of the learning goals lessons - I can't think of a better way to encourage students to immediately engage with their goals and to also maintain the independent feel of a lesson. Again, the only issue would be assessing their progress. Short of giving myself hours upon hours of disjointed extra marking, it would need to be peer or self-assessment again.

In short, all of these things would need to be practised, trialed, and adapted. It's not going to be a quick fix solution, but rather something which will take a lot of time and effort. I'm excited though and, with Ofsted due back in January, it gives me a couple of months to get started. Game on!

Keep it under your hat, but...

Had a lovely chat with a Year 11 boy today which warmed me slightly. Reminded me it's all a front really..!

Me: so what's the plan after school then?
Year 11: *being all macho* well, I'll do the football academy at South Downs I expect.
Me: oh right, cool. Do you think you might need a back up plan?
Year 11: well *looks about to check nobody is listening, leans in to me and whispers* I quite fancy Animal Care.

Lovely! Restored my faith a bit :)

Secret Independent Thinkers

One of the biggest questions that seems to face modern teaching is how we can encourage students to be more independent in their learning.

I remember, once, very smugly talking to my brother about college and the expectations my tutors held in me. He had been ill and was telling me how his teacher hadn't remembered to collect in his homework, which he hadn't completed. I, being all 'I'm 16 and doing AS levels and know everything', told him that he should have gone out of his way to make sure it was done and handed in. He was a bit cross with me and, on reflection, probably rightly so, but still, he wasn't showing independence in his studies and nor are my students.

Last academic year, I was only teaching KS3 and it worked well because they're still quite malleable. Lots of my lessons are now geared up with a focus to develop independent learning and group work and whilst students are in the lower school, it's still reasonably easy to help them form good learning habits. At least, it is, once they're past the incessantly, irritatingly needy stage the Year 7s are currently in anyway..!

However, I realised today that my Year 10s are not going to be quite so easy.

This week, they're sitting their first controlled assessment, discussing the play Whose Life Is It Anyway by Brian Clark. We've spent six weeks studying this play, during which time I have built in independence-encouraging activities to every lesson. They haven't always been quite as enthusiastic as my younger students but I had hoped that their engagement with the text was one based on their independent exploration of it. Alas, I was wrong.

Today, they were supposed to be planning their essay for the assessment. Put simply, they couldn't do it. I should clarify that they are one of the top sets in the year and their understanding of the play, its characters, and the question is excellent. They have understood everything through our study of it. The question is a broad, excellent topic which gives them the opportunity to really go into detail. In short, it is an easy question, in my opinion. And not just because I'm an English teacher... (which is what they claimed when I was a bit exasperated earlier).

So the question is: how can I encourage them to be more independent?

I had intended to try and answer this question here but since it's been about 20 minutes since I typed the last sentence, it seems clear that I won't be doing that. Arguably, if I was able to answer it then I should probably avoid publishing it on the internet and begin talks with the TES for quite a lucrative publishing career. However, tomorrow, I will endeavour to build their independence and I shall report back then. Wish me luck... *whispers* I'm going to need it!!

Open Evening

Tonight, was open evening at the school.

The English Department, in our infinite wisdom, decided that we should all dress up as literary characters. I must admit, I was dubious beforehand but, in the end, I had a lot of fun tonight!! I was talked into being the Queen of Hearts:

We also had Moll Flanders, Lady Macbeth, the witches from Macbeth, Hamlet, Dr Frankenstein and a host of others, not least the (quite literal) spelling bee which consisted of my second in department dressed as a bee, nursing a dictionary, and handing out sweets to kids who spelt words correctly. Genius.

We laid on a load of activities in three themed rooms: Shakespeare, Gothic, and Poetry. All in all, it seemed to go really well. We handed out leaflets, answered questions, encouraged the kids to guess who we were dressed as for the quiz, played with Shakespearean insult fridge poetry, and loads else too.

The rest of the school also laid on an equally as brilliant spread and the whole thing seemed very positive, with loads of excellent feedback from parents too. Here's hoping we did good!

8 Week Half Term of DOOOOOOM!!!

I feel like I've hit a bit of a wall this week.

I woke up on Monday morning and felt exhausted before I'd even lifted my head off the pillow. All I kept thinking was 'THERE'S THREE MORE WEEKS...' Normally, we'd be breaking up this Friday, or even next Friday, but instead it's 3 weeks away still.

From a practical point of view, I've been trying to elongate the current schemes of work to fit from a 'five weeks plus assessment' format, into a 'seven weeks plus assessment' one. I'm failing miserably at that. I've given in and I'm starting assessments with all of my classes. The up side is that I might not have loads of marking to do over half term, as a result.

I'm just tired. We all are. The Summer was only 5/6 weeks ago but it feels like forever ago. The kids are tired, we're all tired, and I'm being a proper grump. The weather isn't helping either - this rain is dragging everyone down and the kids are behaving like they've never seen precipitation before.

Better still, I'm being observed on Thursday, when we also have Open Evening too.

On the plus side, I was told today that in the half term leading up to Easter, it's only a five week half term, which is awesome. In April, we MUST remember how hard we worked now.

Basically, I know I'm whinging a lot here but it's more of 'we're all in the same boat' type thing, with a tiny bit of whinging thrown in for good measure.

May the next two and a half weeks go quickly and may we not all go insane in the process.

Success!!

So, DeBono went well with both classes in the end. In fact, after my concerns, it was the Year 10s who took to it better than the Year 8s. Upon reflection, it is a difficult thing to comprehend and the Year 10 students seemed more mature and capable of adapting to the requirements of the task. Whereas Year 8 did need a lot of guidance and I did away with the 'meta-cognition' styled blue hatmformthat lesson, although I did introduce it. Once I have my run away progress success stories later in the year, I'll use it as a differentiation tool.

The Year 10s played the roles of doctors for the character of Ken Harrison in Whose Life Is It Anyway, and, for the most part, they took their roles very seriously. The question I asked them was 'What would be best for Ken' - a character who, following a road accident, is paralysed from the neck down and decides he wants to die, rather than live half a life, as he sees it. The conclusions ranged dramatically and the kids really stayed focused on their hat's perspectives. Only once or twice did I have to remind them of their focus and guide them back on to the right path. After allowing them a chance to discuss it in their groups, a representative from each stood up and argued their case in a forum. One or two seemed more up to that task than others so, next time, I might leave it so that anyone can jump in more easily. Although, I did encourage them to put their hands up if they wanted to cut in.

The Year 8s were less confident and did require a lot more guidance. I plan on spending a lesson devoted to their understanding of these skills and their application in the classroom. Some of them felt happier than others but some of them seemed quite lost.

All in all, I was pleased. Both lessons saw students making progress and resulted in a neat, student-led plenary too. It was hands off teaching and encouraged group work, social skills, developed their thinking skills, and incorporated all manner of SEAL and PLTS bits too. Definitely a goer!!

Thinking Hats

Tomorrow, I'm planning to do two lessons using DeBono's Thinking Hats. The first lesson is a Year 8 lesson which will see the class picking apart the plot in Shirley Jackson's The Lottery; the second being my Year 10s using it in a role play exercise where they will play the doctors and nurses of Ken Harrison, the paralysed protagonist in Brian Clark's play, Whose Life Is It Anyway?

De Bono's Thinking Hats is an exercise which is designed to challenge students to analyse ideas/texts/subjects from a number of different angles. We all tend to adopt particular stances when thinking: those of us who struggle to see the positives will naturally see the negatives in things, whereas the more logical of us rather deal in facts. These two are approached by the black and white hats. In short, the hats work like:

Yellow - the positives/benefits Green - the creative applications White - the facts/information Blue - thinking about thinking Black - the negatives/problems Red - emotions/our gut response

The kids must consider all aspects of the thinking hats to develop well-rounded thinking and analytical skills. It is surprisingly difficult as we tend to revert to form. The kids, in particular, tend to wear the red hat most comfortably, from my experience, because of their gut instincts and less mature approach to decision making.

My hopes for tomorrow will be that the Year 8 group will go on to use this throughout the rest of the year with me. I hope that they're young enough for the use of this to enhance their thinking ability more naturally. I am concerned, after the Socratic circle lesson last week, that the Year 10s will be less amenable. They're quite set in their ways. I've structured the lesson carefully around a strong focus with a central aim so, with any luck, that will help them to adapt more easily.

I shall report back tomorrow evening!

Socrative

Something I did try the other day was Socrative.com.

Following a demonstration of it by two students on an inset day, I was excited about using this tool. For those who haven't heard of it before, it is a free web tool which allows the teacher to create and control a quiz; students access the quiz by entering a specific room which is only accessible via a specific serial number, and the teacher can see live responses as the kids answer the questions through their phones or computer. It reminded my of the Playstation game, Buzz. Plus, with its total lack of students' personal details required, it is a safeguarding dream too. In short, I walked away from the training session thinking 'free, fast, safe and use of technology: win.'

Alas, it did not go quite to plan...

I decided to do the quiz with my Year 9s who are currently studying spoken language and so I set up a six question quiz on accents, to use as a starter activity. In my head, I envisioned them all having smart phones and the activity taking 10 minutes at the start of the lesson.

The first problem was that only five kids actually had phones which could access the Internet so I divided them into teams, which took time and involved arguments ("why does E get to work with J and I can't?" and yes, I did say Year 9). Then, some of their phones wouldn't actually access the page (I'm looking at you, Three UK users) and so, in the end, we had to wait around for people to log in to the computers and then retry accessing the site. Then, of course, because they were working in teams, each question resulted in lots of noise and discussion, added to the fact that they were up and excited because they were using the computers and it was... hectic.

In the end, the task took 40 minutes of an hour lesson. It was a disaster: the kids didn't learn anything, I was stressed out, my classroom was in disarray but, in the end, we all had to laugh.

On reflection, I'd have all kids come straight in and log on to the computers. I'd avoid having the need for external resources too (I used YouTube for presenting the accents in the questions) as that added complication, and I would plan a lesson around the computers so there wasn't too much to-ing and fro-ing.

Lesson learned: do not rely on technology and/or kids!!! But, it is still a brilliant resource if it is used correctly. I don't think I planned sufficiently for it but, it was a real 'try it and see' lesson that didn't work this time but, maybe, with a tweak or two, it just might next time!

Year 8 in 'love talking' shocker

And so the new year is now fully underway and it already feels as though the summer never happened. I, and all of my department, are already exhausted and grumpy. That said, this promises to be an exciting year for me as my NQT year is an ever-distancing memory and I'm taking on more and more all of the time. I am already doing an NQT CPD session concerning the use of innovative teaching practices, and I have agreed to be a lead teacher on a trip for the first time, started a Film Club, and trying to organise my own trip out too. I'm keen to get involved in all aspects of school life and I feel positively that I've hit the ground running already.

In the classroom, I've been attempting to get to grips with my new classes and my first experience of a year 11 class, not to mention teaching KS4 after a year in the KS3 desert. I must admit that I do feel somewhat out of my comfort zone but I'm a great believer in that being a good thing - should never get too comfortable. It has been lovely to return for a second year though; I'm a familiar face and for most of my students, they already know me and my expectations of them which means we've slipped straight back into things. I've never had this before and it's amazing; this time last year, I was battling it out with my classes, trying to get them hw I want them etc. and with some of them, it took until Easter to really establish myself. It's been brilliant to walk in and just get straight on with things. I feel as though I'm pulling a fast me after the hard work I had to put in to build those relationships last year!!

So far, I've tried using my old favourite, the Socratic Circle, with Year 10 and Year 8, and surprisingly, the younger ones did it so much better. I'm not sure if that's because Year 10 don't know me as well or if they've never done it before. My line manager suggested that it might be that they haven't learnt the technique at a young age and, like the rest of us, are a bit resistant to new things. I will definitely do it again as, when we have a whole class discussion in a less structured setting, they're really bright and capable of really great thinking.

Year 8 are currently studying Short Stories and have been looking at Roald Dahl's Lamb to the Slaughter. They have really enjoyed it as it's a bit gruesome but still suitable for the kids - perfect! They seemed really keen to keep talking about the story (even when the Head came in - poor bloke was enveloped in their enthusiasm, bless them!) and so I decided to give them a proper outlet. We included mini plenaries which addressed our learning objective and had peer assessment in the form of feedback as to how well the discussion had flowed and who had fed into it etc. Plus, the kids loved that there was no writing too ;) We got the post-it notes out for the plenary: the kids had to write one conclusion the discussion had reached and then used to place their vote on the board: did the wife plan on killing her husband or not? Hands off teaching, independent learning: fun lesson.

I'll be updating this soon. We have Ofsted due back imminently so I am anticipating a myriad of panicked marking and planning, so it might be longer than I'd like!

Hello and welcome!

Hello,

Thank you for taking the time to come by my new blog. My intention for it is to discuss my pedagogical practices whilst also reflecting on my teaching. I hope that, in time, it will act as a journal for my progress as a teacher and a professional person, as well as being a sounding board for ideas, methods, successes and failures.

So, a bit about my background. I completed my PGCE in Secondary English in 2010 at the University of Portsmouth. I began my NQT year at a school in Colchester but, for personal reasons, I chose to come home and take a break from teaching. However, I took up my NQT year again in Portsmouth last September. I have just completed my NQT year and I am really excited about starting my first year of fully-qualified teaching!

Arguably, my strengths lie in a predominantly modern teaching style: I have gained a reputation for the use of ICT and media in my teaching, as well as being enthusiastic in my use of innovative pedagogical methods. I have played about with the use of Kagan strategies, Socratic Circles, group work, and AFL strategies, amongst other things.

I try to take a holistic view of teaching and whilst my subject is English, I work with the idea that we, as teachers, should be shaping young minds. It is not enough to just teach a child to read any more; it is crucial that students learn to read for meaning, learn to look below the surface of the text, learn to question what they read and develop skills which will protect them in an ever-increasingly media-driven world. The importance of English is not just to fit in with the National Curriculum and teach students about Shakespeare; it is much, much more than that.

I hope that this blog will act as a way of charting my progress, and might go some way to helping other young teachers with potential problems they're experiencing or even just offering up some ideas.

Thank you for popping by and I hope you'll continue reading...