Dropping back into things

Well the Christmas break is well and truly over.

Happy New Year everyone.

The first week back was approached with dread. I'd had nothing but problems in the last week of the holidays- so I've been playing catch up since then. Got pretty injured too so been a bit slow and delicate wandering around school.

The big essay was due on Tuesday and my first official observation was also due to happen on Tuesday. And I had lessons to create for this week.

Thank god it all worked out.

The essay was submitted on Monday night. I hope it's good enough for a pass.

Tuesday, I was very nervous. My university mentor had chosen to observe my difficult y8 class. And I'd planned to do drama. Oh.My.God.

To their credit, the kids were brilliant (not that I told them that I was being observed); and they seemed to really enjoy the activity. Yesterday's lesson showed me that they actually learnt something from it.

I got some fantastic feedback from my mentor. And when I ran the same activity with the other half of the class on Thursday, although the lesson seemed to be a disaster and the kids behaved badly, I did get some lovely comments from a passing member of staff. He said it was great to see someone doing something different with the kids; taking advantage of all the open spaces in the school, and experimenting with approaches. This was lovely to hear, although I'm never quite sure how to react to compliments.

I also feel as though I've made real progress with my other classes this week. My organisation has improved and, although I haven't made the resources yet, I've been ready for what I'm going to do next week, and have been able to create this week's lessons to lead into next week's lessons.

I think I've had some of my best lessons this week. The pupils are seeing me as their teacher now. Things feel good, more comfortable. And I'm getting a Y10 lesson next week. I'm very excited, I just hope I don't mess it up. The class is lovely though, and I've been in their lessons since the beginning of December so they know me.

Overall, a brilliant first week back. Someone's created a countdown of working days until the next half term, which is when I leave this school. I cannot believe there are only 20 working days left! Too soon. I'm not sure that I want to leave.

Merry Christmas

Survived the first half of the placement.

Having a lovely Christmas break. We finished on 21st December, and I was well and truly ready for a break.

I've done no work since then.

Tomorrow work on the essay and the lesson planning begins.

My first formal observation by my mentor from the University is on the first Tuesday back.

Normal service shall resume on this blog once the essay is finished and submitted (also the first Tuesday back).

I've switched off my alarm for the holidays and I'm finding it terribly easy to stay in bed for ages.

Only five weeks left in this placement school. Mixed feelings about that. I feel as though I'm learning, and I get along well with the department, but I'm also really looking forward to seeing how a different school works.

I shan't think on that for now. It is the Christmas break.

Merry Christmas all.

Pants and more Pants

This has been a bad week in terms of professional relationships.


Obviously I won't go into too much detail on this public blog. In brief: a misunderstanding between Person X and myself has been blown out of proportion and now I feel incredibly awkward in the department.

Thank goodness I have a mentor and an ITT co-ordinator in school to reassure me that I haven't done anything wrong.

Still, I feel rubbish and unwanted by Person X - who has acted unprofessionally towards me, and who believes I'm at fault, but refuses to discuss things.

Seriously questioning my placement, which is a shame because I love the other members of staff.

At least this week's teaching hasn't been a complete disaster.


Hopefully next week will be better- although part of me is dreading going into school, which makes me even more sad.

Top Tips:

1. Use your mentor for support, if you can. That's what s/he is there for.
2. Regardless of the situation, remain professional and civil. That way you've done everything you can.

Back to School

I've completed one full week in school and now it's December and freezing! Where did November go?

It's been a mixed week.


Good points: Delivered some starters which weren't complete disasters. I have things to evaluate and have begun identifying (and working on) my biggest weaknesses. I planned a 'sketch' (it's slightly more detailed than a medium-term plan, but not to the extent of actual lesson plans) of what I want to do with y7 when I take them. Their host teacher seems impressed with my ideas. I feel more like a part of the department now- being there everyday helps.


Grumbles: Haven't begun my next essay, which is due early January. I only have a couple of lessons that I'm teaching with Y9 before xmas. I hope I'm not going to be at a loss for when I move to the second placement. Hopefully I'll get more after xmas. The y9 host teacher is lovely so I don't feel awkward approaching her to request stuff.


Still quite surprised by how little time we have on-placement.

My first 'profile review' is in two weeks- eek!

Pretty much finished my xmas shopping this weekend! WOW! So prepared.

And now to plan starters on paragraphs and apostrophes...

Busy Week/Next Phase

Last weekend I went to London for the London Festival of Education. I was fantastic. A great chance to catch up with an old friend; and to listen to interesting ideas about education and different approaches and what should happen in the future.

I was a little late, so I missed most of what Michael Gove was saying. Although I saw some of his interview that was being broadcast to a small TV. He looked every bit the politician.

I went to talk from the head of Swiss Cottage school. The approach there intrigues me. If I lived in London, I'd try so hard to spend some time there. Then I caught the end of a talk called 'Should we use the curriculum to impart values?' while I was waiting for the talk between John Hattie and Pasi Sahlberg on 'What makes great teaching- the global view'. Initially John Hattie was the reason I went to the entire Festival; however I found Sahlberg to be far engaging and on topic. I don't think some glitches with Hattie's mic helped matters.

I listened to Andrew Adonis and Christine Gilbert talk about the value of Academies. However, Gilbert barely got a word in edgeways.

And finally- Michael Rosen and Anthony Horowitz "How can we stop killing the love of reading". Absolutely fantastic. By far the best talk of the day. Rosen issued a call to arms basically, and Horowitz was on topic, understandable, clear and full of great ideas with possible ways to implement them, rather than just spouting unrealistic ideals. This talk was also absolutely hilarious in places- especially Horowitz laying-in to Dan Brown's writing.

Very pleased I went.

Aside from that, this week saw the end of University until February- eek!

I start full-time in TP1 on Monday. Thankfully, my mentor has reassured me that I won't be thrown in at the deep end with all full-time lessons and planning straight away; but that they'd be doing me a disservice if I didn't get anything to do. So I'm getting a y7 class, I have two weeks to crack on with the planning for their module. I'll have a Y8 class, which is the same class I used for my assignment lessons. I'm really getting to know this class. They're a tricky bunch, but lovely really. And I'll have a y9 class. We're doing Macbeth! I'm sitting down with their current teacher on Monday to plan; but I'm not sure when I'll be taking them full-time.

It really isn't long that I get there. Only 4 weeks until Christmas, and only 5 weeks there after Christmas. Quite a lot to learn in not a lot of time.

The first assignment was due in yesterday. I submitted it, but titled it wrong, and as a .docx instead of .doc GAH! I've emailed to explain to my mistake and offer my apologies and sent a correct copy; but I've not heard back from anyone. Will just have to wait and see.

The lessons I taught for it though weren't too bad. The first was better than the second- surprisingly. Still, I took loads of things from it; what worked, what didn't, and ways to avoid the same kind of scenarios.

So now it's time to crack on with the planning - not today, obviously. Tomorrow. Today, I tidy the general post-essay debris, and then pop to the shops for much-needed food.

Week 8

I feel as though I've actually made some progress this week.

In uni we've been looking at exam boards. We had to give presentations on WJEC and a local teacher visited to talk about AQA. Apparently they're the main exam boards for this area.  My school's chosen OCR.

We also looked at many many ways of teaching Cormier's Heroes. We had a play at some of the activities ourselves- it's nice to feel like you're in school again. University's been great this week.

For some reason I was dreading going to school this week. I still don't fully know why. I'm thinking it was a combination of not having been in school for so long because of half term, and of not really knowing what I'll be doing when I'm there full time, which is only about 2 weeks away- eek!

Thursday in school is my busy day. I have four lessons (just observations at the moment). Being busy really helped dispel the dread. I was also invited to attend parents' evening on Thursday night. This made for a very long day, and a very tired Lotte; however, parents' evening was a fantastic experience. I am very pleased that I've seen one.

Friday was the weekly meeting with my mentor. I used this opportunity to ask my mentor to check over my lesson plans, for the lessons I'll be teaching next Thursday and Friday. These lessons make up part of my first assignment, so I'm desperate to get them vaguely on track. Her feedback was positive. She said it was clear that I'd thought carefully about the activities and levelled them well for the ability of the group. BOOM! Massive confidence boost. I am well chuffed with that. It's nice to have some kind of reassurance that I'm  not completely missing the mark. I'm nervous about teaching them, but I have spent quite a bit of time with the class, so I know which characters to watch out for, which are shy, cheeky or general boundary pushers. Just got to get my resources ready.

I used the meeting to ask the questions which had been worrying me. Can't believe I worried and worried when it was just so simple to ask. Sometimes I think I try to do too much myself- and I have to tell myself that I'm not expected to be able to do everything right now. I've been training for less than two months. Anyway, now I'm far more relaxed about things, and have some idea as to which direction I'm going. I'm really looking forward to starting full time.

This week's top tip is:
  Do not be afraid to ask questions. If you're nervous about asking in front of everyone (for fear of looking stupid or something) just take someone to one side to ask, or wait until your mentor meeting.


And now, back to the assignment.

Week 7

This week has been half term but only for school.


Monday was an incredibly long lecture about bringing technology into the classroom. It was interesting and I've definitely taken away some ideas, but, we were stuck in a lecture theatre for 3hours, mostly listening. It wasn't particularly interactive and I know I shut-off at points. Some people from the course had a 3-hour round trip for this. I agree with them when they say a lot of this could've been done online. For all its faults though, I am genuinely more interested in the potential of technology in the classroom. I'm certainly going to talk to the ICT guy in school to see what opportunities I can take into my lessons.


Then I went home. Monday evening to Wednesday afternoon was my half term break. I couldn't completely switch off from the PGCE because I was very aware of what I still needed to do, but it was nice to be away.

I've quite enjoyed the train journeys of the past week though. I've used them to catch up with some reading. On the journey home I read Robert Cormier's Heroes. We need to read this for our English sessions next week. I'll probably discuss this in more detail in a later post. On the journey back I started Robert Swindells' Stone Cold, which I intend to finish today, and then crack on with Natalie Babbitt's Tuck Everlasting. These are both books that the kids at school are studying. I'm halfway through Stone Cold and it's not as bad as the first page suggested.

Once the above have been read I'll start Sophie Coulombeau's Rites. I won a copy of this book over at Jen Campbell's blog where Coulombeau was guest blogging, and I'm so eager to start reading it. I was excited by the potential this book has in the classroom, especially with regards to narrators. There will definitely be a review blog.

Thursday was a day working on our Method project. Researching and creating a thirty minute presentation on an exam board. We're presenting on Tuesday.

The first PGCE assignment is due in twenty days- eek.
The assignment is to plan six lessons, write a rationale and analysis of the six lessons and teach at least two of the lesson, then write an evaluation of the taught lessons. Easier said than done when, currently, we're only in school two days a week.


I created a medium-term plan and my lessons have been sitting there for a little while. Yesterday I sat down and applied some structure to them, using the University's lesson planning forms (which I'm not overly keen on). They're the first full lessons that I've actually planned, and it took me about 6 hours. An hour/lesson. Not bad for the first time, I think. It did feel slightly redundant as I know that, due to the dynamics of the class, I'll only have the opportunity to teach the two classes that are needed for my assessment. I only hope that I can leave my ideas with the school for future use/adaptation.


Tomorrow I'll be sitting down and writing a rationale; and attempting to link it to theory.




As I do all this, I have one eye on Ofqual saying teachers are cheats- way to boost morale- and the other eye on my department in school, who are jittery because Ofsted are overdue. I hope they show up soon so everyone can calm down.

I feel I've earnt my day off today, even if it is to catch up with the odd jobs that need doing around here. I'll enjoy reading though.

I'm still on the lookout for Teenage Fiction, so please keep your suggestions coming.