Categories: uncategorized
Date: 26 January 2005 20:53:54
OK, why do I love teaching so much? More to the point, why on earth do I enjoy teaching in a school where the kids just don't want to learn? I must need my head looking at. Honestly, if the authorities really think that the reason our results are so unimpressive is simply because we have a three-tier system, they should come and listen to some of the kids we teach and see how their barriers to learning are so difficult to break down.
Take parents' evening, for example. I requested to see thirty sets of parents. How many came in? Five, only one of whom was one I'd requested to see (and typically my appointments were spread out with an hour between each, so I had to spend my entire evening in school!) I set homework and, when I come to collect it in, I am greeted with "I haven't done it". Then, when I set a detention after the third such event I get letters from parents saying that they won't allow me to pick on their child like that. And the latest game - believe it or not - is for half my year 8 class to declare that they don't intend to come to my maths lesson because I expect them to work and get cross if they don't. So we start every lesson with a debate on who precisely would like to come and learn something and who doesn't see why they should.
For a moment or two the boot was on the other foot on Tuesday as I found myself getting increasingly nervous before my massage class. I have finally decided that my Tuesday night treat is too difficult to organise with it becoming less straightforward to leave the boys with Dad overnight, but instead of letting me simply drop out of the course, the college were fantastic and organised for me to have 1:1 tuition with another tutor on a Tuesday afternoon instead. All hunkydory until I go for the first session and she announces that the best way forward is for me to do a complete massage unaided and for her to watch and assess me! Oh, the nerves! The pressure! As the day drew nearer I felt more and more nervous and, if a reason had cropped up why I couldn't actually go, I am sure I would have been nothing short of delighted! I couldn't remember the routine at all, and couldn't even make any sense of my notes.
Needless to say, all my worry was totally unfounded. I could remember most of it and the tutor was brilliant at giving me guidance on the bits I'd forgotten. (She was actually quite complimentary, but I think she was just making me feel a bit better!) I thoroughly enjoyed it, and learned more in those two hours than I had learned in the weeks I'd done before Christmas. Hmm.. the only trouble with this 1:1 teaching, mind, is that I don't actually get a massage myself!