Today is the first day of my life as a non teacher. woop woop!

[vernon]

Yesterday was the last day of my career as a GCSE grade delivery unit optimiser/manager and I can't say that I am sorry.

I return to school as a one to one science tutor in September where I have the freedom to do real science teaching with small groups of kids and individual pupils who fell off the 'assembly line' and became 'damaged goods'.

Pros -

• No pointless polemic staff meetings.
• No parents' evenings.
• No training days spent wasting time on pointless exercises to which could have been summarised in three bullet points.
• No intensive measuring, statistical analysis, 'flight pathing', RAG rating, intervention strategy formulating.
• No massaging of statistics to enhance the performance profile of the school
• No adoptions of new additional strategies without evaluating the success/failure, mostly failure, of previous strategies.
• No being held to account for things over which you have no control
• No performance management.
• No delivery of lessons via inflexible templated lesson structures which do little other than demonstrate that inflexible templates lesson structures have been used.
• No working on Fridays
• Can do more FNRttC rides
• Can get to festivals early on Fridays to get better parking and camping spots
• Can have as many long weekends as I want
• The opportunity to deliver bespoke organic and evolving lessons
• Independence in the classroom
• A return to real teaching
• Freedom of expression
• Working with youngsters to address real science learning issues

Cons

• Can't think of any.

 

[Kies]

Excellent!

..... We all hate you!

 

[Noodley]

• The opportunity to deliver bespoke organic and evolving lessons

Cons:
you still have a mindset that garbles bollox that means nothing

Enjoy

 

[vernon]

Cons:

you still have a mindset that garbles bollox that means nothing

Enjoy

Check your irony detector. I think that its batteries might be flat.

 

[Night Train]

If it was in furniture making then it would be my ideal teaching career!

I hope it works out that way for you.

 

[swee'pea99]

Eloquent. And sobering. And 'bespoke organic and evolving lessons' isn't bollox; nor, I suspect, did you mean it in any sense ironically. My take on it was that you're looking forward to engaging with the humans and responding to their needs, enthusiasms and capabilities, rather than dumping a succession of standardised prefabricated 'modules' in their laps, regardless of who they actually are and what they actually need or can benefit from.

Enjoy the 'rest'. I suspect you've earned it.

 

[vernon]

@swee'pea99

Twice in the past fortnight I overheard conversations between colleagues that went along the lines of:

Teacher 1: I have a class of 3Bs to 4Cs and I think that there's some 3C's in there
Teacher 2: My 4Bs to 5Cs are doing ok though half of them are a sub level down on their aspirational target
Teacher 1: How many of them are in the Jessop group?
Teacher 2: Twenty percent and most of them are FSM
Teacher 1: I've RAG rated mine and six are green, two are red and the rest are amber
Teacher 2: I've got two on intervention level level three, two are SEN level one and three EAL

The have clearly taken on board the advice: Get to know your children through the data.

It's shame that they don't have at their finger tips:

• The domestic crises that explains the disruptive behaviour of some of the 3Cs
• The death of the father of the withdrawn underperforming 5A
• The encyclopaedic knowledge of all things astronomic of the 4A that should be a 5C
• The persistently tired pupils who are responsible for the care of a disabled parent, most of the domestic chores and the care of younger siblings

There's simply no opportunity to get to know the kids through conversation.

 

[subaqua]

@swee'pea99

Twice in the past fortnight I overheard conversations between colleagues that went along the lines of:

Teacher 1: I have a class of 3Bs to 4Cs and I think that there's some 3C's in there
Teacher 2: My 4Bs to 5Cs are doing ok though half of them are a sub level down on their aspirational target
Teacher 1: How many of them are in the Jessop group?
Teacher 2: Twenty percent and most of them are FSM
Teacher 1: I've RAG rated mine and six are green, two are red and the rest are amber
Teacher 2: I've got two on intervention level level three, two are SEN level one and three EAL

The have clearly taken on board the advice: Get to know your children through the data.

It's shame that they don't have at their finger tips:

• The domestic crises that explains the disruptive behaviour of some of the 3Cs
• The death of the father of the withdrawn underperforming 5A
• The encyclopaedic knowledge of all things astronomic of the 4A that should be a 5C
• The persistently tired pupils who are responsible for the care of a disabled parent, most of the domestic chores and the care of younger siblings

There's simply no opportunity to get to know the kids through conversation.

this is why Mrs Subaqua loves doing her little groups of 6 booster groups for science maths and english . takes the ones at the bottom end and gets them some confidence ( my words not hers- she puts it far more elegantly) she knows the whys whats hows etc of every child and can teach to their best learning method.

Vernon , I have never met you but when I do remind me to buy you a pie n a pint . Education needs more teachers like you.

 

[growingvegetables]

Good luck to you, Vernon - ENJOY!

 

[annedonnelly]

Good luck Vernon. I've just finished a year as a one-to-one maths tutor and loved it. Unfortunately the school can't afford to renew my one year contract so I'm job hunting.

Hope yours is a permanent contract.

 

[Pikey]

Grade delivery unit.... Pmsl

Sadly that is so true.

It has become teaching by numbers and farming marks under the threatening shadow of inadequate management.

 

[jazzkat]

Eight years ago I got out of the classroom to become a peripatetic instrumental teacher. I love the lack of target driven bollaux, there is still quite a bit of politics in my organisation most of it pushed from the management, and the economic climate is starting to bite a bit but I wouldn't go back!
I wish you all the best, you won't look back.
Good luck!

 

[deptfordmarmoset]

That sounds like a great move, Vernon. I've always found working with small groups of children very rewarding, and I'm sure that children benefit greatly from the chance to learn and think in small groups. You can tell us all about it on one of those Fridays rides!

 

[Trembler49]

You could always get a proper job!

 

[Julia9054]

@swee'pea99

Twice in the past fortnight I overheard conversations between colleagues that went along the lines of:

Teacher 1: I have a class of 3Bs to 4Cs and I think that there's some 3C's in there
Teacher 2: My 4Bs to 5Cs are doing ok though half of them are a sub level down on their aspirational target
Teacher 1: How many of them are in the Jessop group?
Teacher 2: Twenty percent and most of them are FSM
Teacher 1: I've RAG rated mine and six are green, two are red and the rest are amber
Teacher 2: I've got two on intervention level level three, two are SEN level one and three EAL

The have clearly taken on board the advice: Get to know your children through the data.

It's shame that they don't have at their finger tips:

• The domestic crises that explains the disruptive behaviour of some of the 3Cs
• The death of the father of the withdrawn underperforming 5A
• The encyclopaedic knowledge of all things astronomic of the 4A that should be a 5C
• The persistently tired pupils who are responsible for the care of a disabled parent, most of the domestic chores and the care of younger siblings

There's simply no opportunity to get to know the kids through conversation.

Good teachers do have this knowledge at their fingertips. They do know the kids through conversation. They know the data as well. When I was at school you sank or swam. No-one intervened whether you were under performing through home circumstances or because you were plain lazy.
I am a teacher. I love my job.