A Day in the life

With so much talk recently about teachers and what an easy life they have I thought I might tell you about what was, for me, a fairly typical Thursday.

I start teaching at 9am. I arrive at work somewhere around 8:20, depending on traffic. Yesterday the traffic was bad and I was "late" and only arrived at 8:35. After that everything went downhill.

Before first lesson: turn computer on, wait for updates, fill in time by checking calendar for upcoming events like Open Day (8pm finish on that one), discuss upcoming student trip to Bletchley Park and need for somebody to be able to drive the College minibus because even small coaches are very expensive. Apparently if you want to do the driving test to be insured for driving the bus you have to pay for it yourself. That's not going to happen any time soon. Check email and find several from students who want me to do things and also several from the Functional Skills co-ordinator with results and instructions. I should not have been sent the results as they are not for my students, but he's sent all of them to everybody. I have to read all the instructions and results before I can work out that none of them apply to me.

First lesson: Introduction to HTML for level 1 students. Not all of the class is there but we start anyway. They need to be able to use Notepad on their computers. All College computers have Notepad installed. No they don't, not in this room they don't. So my carefully planned lesson immediately goes out of the window. We spend 20 minutes or so going round checking the computers in the room. 2 have the right software and 3 don't work at all. 17 computers, and 21 students in a full class. That's going to work well then. Yell for help with the lack of the correct Software. Tech support is "busy" but will send somebody along as soon as possible. Do different lesson to the one planned but end up in the same place as planned because the next person with that group has planned their lesson based on what I said I was going to do in mine. Students do not find this lesson nearly as much fun as the one they should have done as there is a lot more of me telling them things and a lot less of them doing things.

10:30 is break time. Warn the person following me with the group I just had that the software doesn't work. I catch up with a part-time colleague about what we are doing today without groups, check that the speaker on Sexual health who is booked for the afternoon tutorial slots is still coming (she is). Deal with more email. Just at the end of break somebody from Tech Support comes in to ask what the problem with the software is and which room it is in.

Next lesson is planned round access to a particular web site which the students are supposed to use for research. I checked the site was still there and that everything the students would need was available. 15 minutes into the lesson we got to the bit where they had to visit the web site and carry out a specific set of activities. They can't access the web site. It is blocked by the web software. I knew this. Last term I asked the tech support people to unblock it, which they allegedly did. Or didn't. Anyway lesson number 2 down the drain. Much disgruntlement and an emergency request to tech support to unblock. Which they did - but not until after lunch, which wasn't a lot of use to me. I replaced the lesson with one I prepared for the next session with that group and soldiered on. I got a lot of complaints about marking not being done when work has been handed in. The rule is 2 weeks maximum from due date, but late work can take longer. Several student had work that was more than 2 weeks past due date and not marked yet. I have to speak to my colleagues about that.

Lunchtime. I ate my lunch with one hand on my mouse while I checked attendance for some of my students. I discussed some disciplinary issues with a colleague. Another colleague sent me a bad behaviour report for a student in one of my tutor groups (I have 2 tutor groups - lucky me) so I processed the paperwork to send him to head of faculty because he's on his third misbehaviour report. A student came to see me with problems with their work so I sorted that out. I even managed a cup of coffee.

Free period: Yeah right. I am mentoring a student who has fallen behind with his work. I have known him (taught him) for 4 years. He works for me, but apparently not for anybody else. I spent an hour with him steering him through some work that he was being taught by somebody else. Then my head of section comes along and asks me to support a new-to-teaching colleague with their marking and check that it is being done correctly. I have already done some of that but there is now a significant amount that needs to be checked. I also hear that there is a chance that the layout for the annual course review has changed and that the updates that I completed in March will have to be typed in again on a different form and printed out instead of the electronic submission we had just started using. Apparently it is Ofsted's fault! What this means is that Ofsted said that a lot of the procedures we were using were too cumbersome and not fit for purpose, so management decided to change them. Right now, in the middle of the academic year when half of the stuff is under the old system.

After that it was a relief to get into class. That lesson at least worked out OK and the students did what they wanted to do and not everybody had problems with the software, though several did.

After my last class (only 4.5 hours of teaching today) I did some marking, tried to print the annual course review and found that every time I tried it crashed the system with an exception. Worked with a colleague to get paperwork completed for a suspension hearing (the student, not us) before senior management and finally left just on 6pm.

By the time I got home and cooked dinner I was too tired to do much of anything, though I did do some preparation.

Today I discovered that not only am I going to have to re-write the annual course review but I am also expected to get my students through a new short qualification, in addition to their main qualification and their Functional Skills and another qualification we are running alongside the main course to make up their taught hours to 16 per week. I did manage to deliver the second of my ruined lessons from yesterday because the web site had actually been unblocked. I also managed to leave "early" at 5:20, having spent the time after the end of my classes doing some marking and preparation for next week. I am so glad it's the weekend.

Date posted: 12 Apr 2020

Is it that time already?

Suddenly it's April. I have no idea where the first 3 months of the year went, but they went! Actually I do know. We had an Ofsted inspection in January so we spent a lot of time preparing for it, and then some more time recovering from it. Then there was the usual dashing about like mad things trying to keep on top of the work, and I had an interview for what is essentially the same job I am doing now. The significant difference is that I have gone from a fixed term contract to a "permanent" one. Same contract and pay. Same government trying to make me pay more for less. Same 0.5 percent pay rise.

There was some bozo trainee reporter writing in the paper the other day saying that teachers have a dead cushy life and shouldn't complain about their pensions because it's better than most people get. So what? That pension is part of my contract of employment. She bleated on about the long holidays teacher get (see my previous post about teacher arithmetic) I don't know how she thinks that will help pay the mortgage since I am contractually obliged not to take additional work outside teaching, even in the holidays. I bet she'd be moaning fast enough if all teachers decided, without consultation or negotiation to reduce their class contact hours by 3%. Sauce for the goose?

Date posted: 12 Apr 2017

Review of the Year

Well, it's New Year's Eve and everybody else is doing it, so I thought I might as well, since I'm here in front of the computer anyway. The Madwoman's domestic review of the year.

January - We weren?t too badly affected by the snow, though schools and Colleges were closed for 3 days. The boys had a great time. They may be teenagers but they still like to build snowmen and have snowball fights. The cats were somewhat less than impressed by the snow and stayed in until all risk of cold paws was gone. I managed to come down with some unspecified lurgy and ended up being signed off work for 5 weeks, not fun.

February - Nothing much. Half term came and went, I worked through it, trying to catch up and also trying to undo the damage that the supply lecturer did to my classes. She appeared to be nothing more than a menace. I had an argument with her within the first 10 minutes of meeting her. Apparently we weren't managing our time properly because we didn't have a telephone directory in the office (it's on the intranet) and we also didn't have a year planner on the wall in the office. Hellooo we are a Computing department, we use IT systems, including timetable software (it's a database) and Outlook why do we need a planner on the wall?

March - Busy month, still trying to get back on track. We were still working with unsuitable accommodation and having to work in 4 different buildings.

April - I officially became the short person in the family. No. 2 son had a growth spurt and shot past me. He's still growing, well over 6ft tall now. No. 1 son has also grown, and maintains his height advantage over his brother.

May - A/S exams for No.1 son and some GCSE module exams for No. 2 son. I sang in the Messiah at the Royal Festival Hall. Then the boys and I went camping for a few days at half term. The Isle of Wight was warm and sunny and not windy for the whole time we were there. That was a new experience, the first time ever we have been camping and not endured wind and rain. Both boys want to go back there as soon as possible, so we might think about that for 2012.

June - More exams for the boys and the final push on to get the results we needed at work. Of course most of the good students were pretty much finished by this point, but we still had to nag, drag, push and bully the duffers through so that they could finish their qualifications. Nobody said a word of thanks (naturally).

July - End of term for all of us. I got into a "use it or lose it" situation with my holidays so I decided to use it. That was good. On the less good side No. 2 son's cat, Hoopy, vanished and, despite leafleting the area and going out searching for her there was no sign. I sung with The Really Big Chorus at the Royal Albert Hall. That was good fun, as always.

August - is holiday month for us. Because himself is always busy during A level results week the boys and I go away that week, just to get out from under his feet. This year we went to Wales (camping again) on the western edge of the Snowdonia National Park. It rained for at least some of every day and it was also cold. Not cool, but cold. Twice it was so cold by 9pm that we could see condensation when we breathed out. That's colder than it was here at 9pm yesterday! Luckily we have a good tent, so we didn't get wet, but it was seriously cold at night. We now have a tent heater. We went to Harlech and Aberystwyth and did a fair bit of walking one way and another. No. 2 son managed to fail to pack his insulin needles so we spent the first day, trying to locate a chemist who had some. The Medical Centre in Bala was fantastic and looked after us brilliantly. We had to drive a fair distance but we did get the needles in the end.

September - Back to school time for us. I don't know (well, actually I do know but I'm not telling) who it was dithered about for so long on rooming allocation that we ended up moving our entire staff room from one building to another in the middle of Admin week when we were interviewing and enrolling new students. Of course then we had to change all the rooms on the timetable and check that they all had the correct software installed on the computers. 2 years ago my main teaching room was in an old building, it was large enough to get 20 computers round the edge and a table in the middle big enough to seat 20 students round easily. The air conditioning worked. I am now in the new building, there is barely enough room to get 20 computers round the outside (and no room to put notepads or anything next to the keyboards as there was before), I can fit maybe 10 students round the table in the middle - as long as I don't want to walk round and look at what they are doing. There is no air-conditioning and even with the windows (and half of *them* don't open at all) and door open (onto a busy corridor) it is still much too hot. This is progress?

October - Good news. Hoopy turned up. We had had no news of her and since she is micro-chipped we were a bit worried. We got a phone call from the vet at the other end of town. Somebody had taken her in and she had been well looked after . The vet had been trying to sterilise her, but it had already been done, so he re-scanned her and found the chip. We were all very pleased to have her back. Well, all apart from Toffee, the other cat, who isn?t impressed. No trip away this half term, though No. 1 son and I went to my mother's house and cleaned it while she was away with my sister. No. 1 son lost his job and was part relieved and part upset. He's still looking for a new job, so if anybody wants a good part time (evenings and weekends) junior chef I know where you can find one.

November - We got the dining room back. For most of the summer we have had the contents of the sheds inside the house. The taxi firm who had their garage/office adjoining our garden moved elsewhere and the building was sold. The new owner pulled it down and built a house there, but of course the scaffolding had to go somewhere and since their house wall is our garden boundary wall, it went in our garden ? right where the sheds were. They came down, and everything came into the house so we were minus a dining room from the first week in July. All is back to normal (more or less) now though. The scaffolding has gone even if the house itself isn?t finished yet. I sung in "The Armed Man" with my choir mid-month, that seemed to go down quite well.

December - This was mainly Christmas preparation. Some singing with the choir, the usual rushing about. Of course I have the disadvantage of having 2 major birthdays to contend with since both Himself and my mother have birthdays in December, and so did my father. Now we are looking forward to the new year. We have avoided the sales so far, since we have no money to spend and anyway who wants to go shopping? Yesterday I was driving past Bluewater at about 1pm and was horror struck by the sheer volume of traffic trying to get into the place. Have these people nothing better to do than just shop? Have they no life? I was on my way to a concert (see previous post). Today I am planning to settle down with a book for a while before preparing the family dinner and spending time with my family. With any luck it will be at least another week before I set foot in any shop, and possibly longer.

Oh well, it could be worse. Happy New Year everybody.

Date posted: 31 Dec 2011

Distinctly Less than Brilliant

I took my mother to see the "Glen Miller Orchestra" yesterday. She enjoyed it immensely. I was less impressed. Several issues for me though. First off the sound balance was wrong. The singers (especially the female solos) were virtually inaudible above the sound of the band. Surely they can do a better mixing job than that. Then there was too little space on the stage for the dancers - though they were pretty good - to work properly. The male soloist sounded like a cross between Max Bygraves and Tony Bennet with a sore throat. There was a Vera Lynn section, and I detest Vera Lynn. I think it's the sound of her voice that puts me off, which is not great when you are allegedly singing.

The band, particularly in the first half, wasn't on the top of their game. They weren't very much together and they should have been. That splashing noise was Glenn Miller, spinning in the depths of the ocean somewhere. Let's face it, the repertoire is limited, stylistically pretty much the same, so there's no excuse for poor execution.

The band was not helped by their "leader" who stood out of sight of half the band most of the time. Not that it made any difference because nobody in the band was looking at him anyway. I could just hear the comments of the musical director of the choir I sing with about people who don't pay attention. In between the bits where he was waving his hands about with no clear purpose, the orchestra leader talked to us, introducing the songs and whatnot. Either he was drunk or he had very poorly fitting (just like the costumes) false teeth. He repeatedly addressed the audience as what I think was "Laydiz and journalmen"

However, the worst was yet to come. The band played a rendition of what was allegedly Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue". I say allegedly because it was like no version I have ever heard - including Miller's. The tempi were all over the place (not an uncommon occurrence during the concert), the piano was inaudible and the different sections of the band didn't seem to be able to hear what other sections were doing.

The second half of the concert was an improvement. The group of people along the row from me didn't wait long enough to hear it - they left at the interval, never to be seen again. I don't know what was said to the band during the interval break, but there was a greater focus on the core Miller material and I suspect that helped. The band leader (didn't catch his name, the announcement was muffled) indicated that a standing ovation would be in order and they got it. It would have taken wild horses to get me out of my seat.

Date posted: 31 Dec 2011

Strange Happenings

Not all that strange as things go but still a bit odd for us. The boys and I went away for a few days holiday during half term. I mean actually away somewhere, not just lying around the house or going on day trips. The original plan was to get No. 2 son out of No. 1 son's way while he revised for his AS exams. Except No.1 son only had 1 exam after half term, most of them were before it. So, instead of staying home and revising, he came with us and we took the big tent instead of the little one.

We didn't go far, just to the Isle of Wight. We didn't go luxury, we camped. It was really good. Not only was it not very windy, but the sun shone all week. This has never happened before. Never in the history of the Madwoman camping with the kids has this happened. The longest sunny spell we have had before was 2 days. We always seem to get wind and/or rain when we go away. That's why the tent has a sewn in ground sheet, fewer draghts and less chance of waking up in a puddle. That's the theory. The tent needs a few minor repairs, replacement guy ropes and a coupld of replacement toggles but the biggest need is new tent pegs. We managed to bend almost all of them. The dry weather had made the ground incrediby hard. Once I have counted how many we will need no doubt we will be off to the camping shop to get some more. We are off to North Wales in August. Somehow I doubt we will have the same kind of problem.

Date posted: 12 Jun 2011

Teachers Arithmetic

You know it's getting towards the summer when people start whingeing about the long holidays teachers get. As people start coming back from their cheap off-peak, out of season holidays they took their kids on because they, after all, have a "right" to take their kids away on holiday, even if it is disruptive. Why complain now? Because this is the time of year when some people realise that the free baby sitting service called school isn't available in the summer.

Let's look at a little teaching arithemetic shall we? Teachers are required to teach a certain number of hours in a year. In my case that's 865. Spread out over an academic year of 36 weeks that works out at just on 24 hours per week. That means actual teaching time, when I am in a classroom with other people's children. Generally speaking, every hour taught generates an hour of preparation, and another hour of marking. So every teaching hour gets multiplied by 3. That gives 2595 hours a year teaching and related duties. Now, add to that staff meetings; if it's only an hour per week then that's an extra 36 hours (I doubt it is as little as an hour per week but it'll do as a ball park figure). That gives 2631 hours. Now add on communication with parents, carers, social workers. On a day to day basis that's probably another hour a week - on a quiet week. So another 36 hours gives 2664 hours. Now add formal parents evenings, say 3 per term and 3 hours each (usually 6pm to 9pm but not always) that's another 27 hours, giving 2694. Add to that report writing; a class of 20 kids (and it's usually 30 or more), done properly, can take 2 hours. An average teacher might have to do that for 10 classes over the course of the year. That's another 20 hours, making 2,714. I'm not adding in things like school concerts, trips, sports days, and all the other things teachers do for the "love" of it. Assume then a 40 hour week. To work that number of hours the average teacher would have to work for 67.75 weeks per year. It isn't until a teacher works 60 hour weeks that the number of working weeks drops to just over 45, which gives 7 weeks holiday.

Put it another way, if a teacher is at the top of the pay scale they will be paid 31,552 GBP per year. That is working outside London and not getting extra allowances for additional duties. This gives an hourly pay rate of less than 12 GBP. For somebody who has trained for a minimum of 4 years (degree and teaching qualification), who frequently has a higher degree and who does a lot of professional updating in the course of their work.

Teachers are judged every time they step into a classroom, by 30 very observant pairs of eyes. Those eyes often belong to children of parents who don't value education, who say frequently, and loudly, that teachers have an easy life and are over paid. Those children often seem to think that they have the right to disrupt a class and fail to do their work. There is no hiding place. Teachers can't have "off" days when they aren't quite on top form, because somebody's child will be looking to take advantage of the slightest apparent weakness.

If you are a parent of a child, of any age, ask yourself this; can you make your child do something they don't really want to do (like sit still, read something, write something, leave the mobile alone, don't surf the Internet, don't talk) for an hour? For 6 hours? While your child is in the same room with 30 of his or her friends, who also don't really want to do it?

Still think teachers have an easy life?

Date posted: 16 May 2011

Not quite the relaxing summer I hoped for

That about sums it up. We ended the academic year with the threat of redundancies in our department. This soon turned out to not be a threat but reality. Two of our seven and a half members of teaching staff were made redundant. We all had to re-apply for our jobs and generally justify our existence. I was OK but it was a very stressful time

We started the summer holidays with himself in hospital. A fairly major infection which took a while to sort out kept him in for 10 days. My peaceful few days at home before the school holidays started didn't happen as I was in and out to the hospital, visiting and delivering supplies.

After that, I was working a couple of days every week to get things organised for the new academic year. My mother was here for a week but we didn't do much, which included several things I had meant to do. We have a new kitten (number 2 son's birthday present) which is fun but time-consuming, expecially cleaning up after it or chasing number 2 son to clean up after it.

Our main holiday was spent camping just south of the Lake District at Bolton-le-Sands. It was good, the first three days especially so, as it was warm and sunny and there was no wind! That last point is significant. By the Wednesday of our stay, the wind was getting up a bit. On the Thursday night I got very little sleep because of the noise. Not too worried about the tent falling down, but the noise was awful. Not only was everything flapping about but there was heavy rain as well. Even light rain makes a fair amount of noise on a tent roof. The boys, of course, slept through most of it, even number 2 son who managed to forget to do a BM before he had his bedtime snack and had a hypo about 10 minutes after he'd finished. So we were up quite late while he ate a couple of bowls of breakfast cereal. I woke him up every few hours to check he was actually asleep and not in a coma, but he was fine. The last night of our stay we came back to the tent after a day out and the back had blown in. One of the guys had snapped and the pegs across the back attaching it to the ground were out. Luckily we had some spare pegs so we double pegged the back and tied the guy together and survived the night. Another night without much sleep.

Number 1 son has been working a lot this summer. He has been doing split shifts and zooming back and forth on the train. He had a great time and is enjoying spending some of his income. Of course, it's not much fun for us when he phones at just after 11pm to say he's missed the last train (or it has been cancelled) and he needs to be collected (him and his bike - which is actually my bike). He got his GCSE results this week and they are OK. Not as good as we had hoped, but a lot better than we feared. We did the school supplies shopping this week, he starts 6th form in ten days time.

Number 2 son is just starting his GCSEs this year. It will be a tough couple of years all round because he's not known for doing homework or coursework so it could be a complete nightmare. Almost every negative comment on his reports for the last three years have been for lack of homework, now it's a lot more important. He wants to get better results than Number 1 son. It's possible, but not if he doesn't get his act together. We have still to get his school stuff sorted out, including new shoes which isn't easy, given he's a size 13 already, just like his brother.

At the moment my mother is in hospital having been admitted in the middle of the night by ambulance. Chest pains. It seems not to have been anything serious and she may go home today. I will still need to nip up there (over a 100 miles each way) to make sure she has everything she needs, like food and milk and to see that she's OK. Good timing Mum, I really need to be doing that on a Bank Holiday Weekend when the world and his family will be driving somewhere. I'm not even thinking about the M25 roadworks which took me almost an hour to get through last time I went.

I still have some things I need to sort out before starting back at work properly but they won't take long, I hope. I went in one day this week and did nothing but go to meetings and do student enrolments. I hate meetings!

Maybe next term will be a little less activity packed. I can hope I suppose.

Date posted: 28 Aug 2010