On being told to shut up

The kind of child to tell you to 'shut up' (or 'f-off' as a matter of fact) is usually a distraught individual struggling to become human and thinking that being rude and fearless of consequences is what being an adult is all about. As far as they're concerned life is seriously shit and they will fight anything they can by all means possible, just in case.
And most of the time, you can see how distraught they get once they realise what they'd just said. Or, at the very least, how upset and worked up they got before saying it.
You still get angry, you shout at them, you give them detentions, but you don't hold grudges and deep inside you just wish you could use a magic wand make them less miserable and less angry at the entire world.
And then there is Kenisha (not a real name). Kenisha thinks you're dirt. Kenisha thinks that all is due to her and if she wants to talk, she will talk, whether you are trying to teach or not has no importance what so ever. And when you say 'Kenisha, could you please stop talking?', Kenisha looks at you as if you were a fly on her sandwich and says 'Shut up'.
Somehow I think Kenisha will follow into her sister's footsteps and get excluded before finishing year 10.
And I know that next time Kenisha sends a door into my face, I am not going to be willing to talk about it and make it go away in hope of establishing a positive relationship with her.
Screw that.

On Sports Days

We're having a Sports Day at my school soon. Each form had to come up with a team and students to volunteer for different events. There's this one girl, who is an angry young woman, constantly in trouble, but I've put her down for shot put as others claimed she was really good at it.
This morning she came to school after a few days of absence, and I broke the news to her.
"Ain't doing that!" she said "You can't flipping make me!"
An expected reaction, granted, but I wasn't going to give up easily.
"Oh come on, it's just one small event and I hear you're really good at it. Come on, please?"
I have to say, I did expect this to be met with another rude outburst of anger. Instead I heard: "All right then miss. I'll do it."
I still think I must have been dreaming!

This does not, of course, mean that she'll actually show up on the day though...





PS. Later update: She didn't.

Yet again...

Excerpts from my year 10 group:
"Of course you 'do' ski, the French do everything!"
"Miss, what are you doing tomorrow after school?" (he meant could he come and work on his assessment script, but it still sounded the way it sounded)
"Vowel clash! I knew I would find one!" (Lovely that he gets this excited about the language, but no, it wasn't a vowel clash at all)

I know I'm not updating as often as I could/should. I blame the little time I have for myself and the lack of own laptop (RIP).
Yet again, I'll try to be better...

A rant

You can only do as much yourself. You can put them on report, tell them off, give them detentions, call parents, but at some point the person above you needs to take over. Who that is depends on school policies and structures, most of the time it won't be the same person for subject as for form etc. Anyway - one of my such people is mostly useless. She is trying, don't get me wrong, but things are not being chased up as quickly as they should if at all.
And of course the little buggers feel untouchable.
So all your effort, the fact that you chased everything up and did everything you could, just gets wasted.
Seriously frustrating.

On top of that, I had a fight in my classroom today. Chairs being thrown onto people, people being thrown onto tables, serious fight, not a fun 'let's-wind-the-teacher-up' fight. And of course, without thinking, I got right in the middle of it. I managed to separate them, they got removed to isolation and higher powers will deal with them now (much higher powers, so they actually will) but I can't help but think: I could have gotten hurt...

Bottom line: I need a glass of wine and a cigarette. Now.

On English books

There's a girl in my form who would not respond to me, well, even react to me. As if I didn't exist. She would answer to the register but that's as far as our interactions went. She ignored instructions, left classroom before being dismissed, lost counltess reports, forgot countless detention slips, missed countless detentions and I ended up having to refer the case to the Year Learning Manager and we were seriously talking about having her move forms.
Since Christmas she started taking her jacket off when instructed to do so maybe once a week, then twice a week, by now I still have to ask but she does it.
She does not leave the classroom before I dismiss them anymore.
She actually talked to me about options (probably because I spoke to her and her mum at the Options Evening and then nagged and nagged until she spoke to me) - then she came back cause she changed her mind and asked my advice(?!).
This morning she came in early and said "Miss, do you want a look at my English book? I'm working really well in English."
Of course I wanted.
And it doesn't matter that the book was thrown to me rather than handed over.

The bully

On Friday everyone is on their last nerves. Especially in this longest, darkest, worst half-term of the entire school year. Everyone is stressed out, everyone is exhausted, everyone feels like they would rather get an important part of their body chopped off than spend one more day at school. For me this has been a particularly trying week with lots of drama in my form, a year 8 student destroying my favourite jumper using the ink from a pen he personally dismembered instead of working, and the usual lot of gobby cows and cheeky arseholes who think they don't owe respect to anything or anyone never mind the teacher.
Until yesterday however I didn't think such states of mind and emotions justified rudeness.

Yesterday morning I went to reprographics hoping to get a worksheet copied.
'Can't do it' the copy lady snapped 'I have an urgent job now'.
Fair enough, I really should have brought it in earlier. The lack of 'good morning' and 'sorry' did not put me off too much as she has made me rather used to that.
I apologized profusely and decided to try the staff room machine.
The copy lady had beaten me to it.
'Can't do it now' she snapped 'we're doing maintenance'.
After which she told me that I'm not allowed to use this machine for more than a couple of copies (I wouldn't have if she hadn't refused to do them for me on her machine) and I'll have to be better organised, all in a tone of voice that implied that I had offended her majesty by suggesting that she was there to help me do my job and not the other way around and how dare I the little nothing that I am.
I was speachless. Emotionally exhausted as I was, for a minute I actually thought that I did something terribly wrong, broke a rule I had not known existed or something? Until one of the cover teachers who witnessed it all came around and said she admired me for not saying anything because the copy lady had been plain rude.
And as I spoke to people along the day, I realised that as it is, people stay long after hours to sneakingly do their copies in the staffroom because that is the only way they know their copies will be done right (right number of pages, right number of copies, right size etc.) and they won't get told off for daring to want any.
Magalie, who is in my department, said she tries to plan without worksheets so that she won't have to go to reprographics. And if she has to, she sends a kid.
Charlotte (my head of department/mentor) said that had never happened to her but she knows that the copy lady can be like this when stressed out (as if that excused anything!) and that I shouldn't worry cause she will have forgotten all about it by Monday. SHE will have forgotten?!
I am outraged. I am paid to deal with rude children, but not rude colleagues! And she is clearly bullying a lot of teachers (if not all staff) and no one is doing anything about it! But I am not sure if anything can be done. I am however sure that going on any crusade here would cost me more than it would benefit me or others. So I suppose that the only thing for me to do is to start staying longer after hours than I already do and make my copies sneakingly in the staff room...

"I love you. Will you do a French GCSE please?"

I think everyone finds parents evenings draining. I know I do. But then maybe no everyone gets as emotional about them as me? Who knows.
We had a year 9 parents evening on Thursday, and as my form is year 9, I spent over 3 hours talking non-stop. At 7 most teachers had left - I was still there talking. I have to say that I'm kind of grateful to have been abandoned for the day today - at least I don't have to open my mouth!
It is always interesting to meet your students' parents - helps you understand your students better. Also, you can sometimes make powerful allies. Or reward the nice kids, who never get enough of your attention because you're busy dealing with the culprits.
But it is draining - you talk, and you talk and there is often an emotional response to what you say, people getting all proud and happy, others almost crying (I know some teachers find it wrong, but I tend to tell the truth as it is, without embelishing it too much).
By the end of the night I had managed to tell one student I loved her, tell another one he was an idiot (in front of his mother of course), promise another one that I will wear my glasses if he wears his, promise to tell X's teachers she can't sit next to Y, to tell Z's teachers he should sit alone in the front cause then he's less tempted to mess about, to find out for A why her science teacher wants her to do triple science while she feels she's rubbish at it, etc. On top of that I'll have to go through endless sheets of statistical info and past results to help all 30 of my little monsters make informed decisions when it comes to choosing GCSE options. I don't think I'm going to leave school at all next week.
Any volunteers willing to mark my books for me? There's only some 200 of them to do...

7 am

The school is eerie, like a little ghost town of its own. Everything is dark, in the reception area the lights go automatically on as I walk in and I know they will switch themselves off soon after I'll have walked out. The corridors, which are usually full of chatter and noise, are empty and hollow. I feel like I'm the only person there. I know that I am, cause as I left the reception, my name was the only one with 'in' marked next to it.
But I'm wrong.
In the early morning, the school belongs to the caretakers. They walk the grounds and the corridors silently, ghostlike. They go about their business, checking things, fixing things, making sure everyone is safe and warm as the day begins. They smile and greet me as I walk past them, and I feel reassured by their presence.
As soon as I get to my own classroom however, it's just the empty building and me all over again. So I put music on loud and sing along as I get ready for the day to begin. And it's great, because I have lots of time to do all the things I have to do and all the energy I need to do them.
If you had ever told me that I would enjoy being at work at 7am, I would think you were crazy. But there we go.
The only bit I don't like about it is having to get out of bed. But I would hate that part regardless of the hour!

I’m back!

Until yesterday I have been completely cut off from the internet (if you don’t count school, but the network won’t let me access the interesting sites anyway) – hence the long silence. An update is therefore due – lots to tell, could type pages, but will do it in brief:

The school is great. Love it. Absolutely. As of yesterday I even have a form. Inherited from a teacher who was too burdened by his personal problems to remain a good form tutor. They’re spoilt. They lack both care and discipline. They’re year 9 so their hormones are through the roof. It will take a lot of hard work, sweat and tears before I break them into decent human beings. But I will. And in the meantime I shall be faithfully reporting on all the jewels coming out of their mouths.

We’ve moved into our little cottage on September 5th and it hasn’t stopped since. Boxes. CD towers. A drill. More boxes. Throws and cushions (cause we are happy owners of a very comfortable yet seriously ugly couch). Some more boxes. Mirror in the bathroom. Desk up into the loft – take it apart, put it together. Yet more boxes. Shower curtain (cause as it was taking a shower implied a flood in the bathroom). Change address with school, bank… Internet. Boxes… gah.

Weekend? Sorry, what?

At this point we are connected to the outside world (and right on time, as am expecting loads of birthday messages tomorrow!), we don’t have to mop the bathroom every morning, the living room is done and box-free.
The loft contains desk, computer, two chairs, some piles of books and… boxes.
The bedroom is ok but contains unpacked bags.
The conservatory is full of boxes (although some of them empty).
But we have bird feeders in the garden.
And we know how recycling works.
We’re home.

On not being adapted to living on this planet

I realise that I haven’t been posting as much lately but to be honest, there wasn’t much to post about. Unless I would keep posting about being disillusioned with the system and drained into numbness.
And now the school’s over. I should be jubilant. When I think back at how I felt most of the time, I can’t help thinking that the main thing I should feel is relief.
It isn’t.
I’ve spent last three days just crying uncontrollably and being angry about it, cause look, my life is great, there’s lots of good stuff happening and lots of good stuff to look forward to, but I can’t help it.
I think it’s because I’m just so exhausted and I have been sucking it up for such a long time.
And because whatever I might have been saying and however horrid these kids have been to me most of the time, I did get attached to them, I did get somewhere with some of them, and some of them really did care for me too. I had a proof of that last few days when I was inundated in cards, flowers, presents and hugs.
And because yes, the upcoming changes are good, but they are also scary. In any case – I’m off to France now, where there are people who know me with a big supply of wine and tissues. And I’ll drink, talk, cry and relax and hopefully eventually I’ll stop crying at last.

Miiiiss! Tiiiiits!

Give a year 10 students, recently promoted to year 11 by a controversial decision to start the new school year early, a cultural book called “Germany Live” with a task to carry out using it. Most of them will open it to keep up the appearances, and immediately relax into a conversation. One or two of them will diligently set about to do what they were told to. One of them will start flicking through the book and suddenly cry out: “Miiiiss! Tiiits! Guys, look at page 34, there’s a naked broad! Miss, look at page 34!”
All of the male students will immediately revive and find page 34. Some of them will join in with “Miss, tits, no really, look at page 34, there’s a naked broad”.
“I know what breasts look like dear” I’ll say and reluctantly open the book on page 34. Sure enough there is a picture of people on a beach and one woman indeed is topless.
Follows a lengthy discussion about nudist beaches in Germany and Poland and my acquaintance with such beaches, at the end of which one of them states a firm decision to go to Germany.
“There is a slight problem” I say. “You’d need to actually speak some German.”
“Oh no, miss. I’d just wink and say ‘bedroom’.”
“Well, do you know how to say ‘bedroom’ in German?”
Ah, the educational side effects of naked women in secondary school textbooks…

On misbehaviour

Once she told me I had the job, my future Head of Department said that what made her mind up about me was how I had handled misbehaviour during my interview lesson.
I wanted to burst out laughing.
One kid turned around to speak to a friend a couple of times and another one wrote a note, then apologetically handed the note over to me. That’s nothing.
Try this: you have two of them punching the crap out of each other, one of them running around the classroom with someone else’s bag, that someone else following them trying to retrieve the said bag, four or five of them just carelessly walking around socialising with their friends, a couple listening to music on their phones/i-pods and a couple more shouting invectives out of the window. And then telling you to get out of their face when you try to get their attention.
That’s misbehaviour.
Even if the behaviour is in general three times worse than it was in my interview lesson, it’s going to be a friggin’ holiday.

And now dear children...

There was this TV presenter ages ago in communist Poland who had the misfortune to have said or done something to offend the Party (I’m not quite sure, I only know the story from my parents). The Party decided to punish him by moving him from evening news to a children’s programme where he read stories live on TV. He loathed it absolutely. And one day, once the story was done and he thought the cameras were off, he stood up, pulled his trousers down and said dramatically: ‘And now, dear children, kiss my arse!’. Unfortunately, the cameras were not off just yet…
The reason why I’m telling this story is because it reminds me of how I feel these days in my hectic crazy classroom full of nasty vile children who are betting on who will make me cry first, and all because I finally got a job for September – in a nice school with nice kids who are genuinely happy to be there.
So these dear children can kiss my arse.

On survival

This weekend we went to see Craig and Ann in their home in the middle of nowhere and it was brilliant – I hadn’t seen them for too long and I’ve missed their faces. We got way too drunk eating a delicious barbecue , playing cards and sharing horror stories (we’re all teachers). The next morning Ann made banana and chocolate chip muffins (that I had too many of) and Craig shared some of his wisdom with me (he used to work at a school that was possibly even worse than mine). And what he said was 10.000 times more useful than all the advice I get at school. Simply because instead of focusing on ‘good practice’ he focused on my sanity and getting my classes to a state where I can actually attempt proper teaching. Here are my two favourite ones:
1. Time out.
Put a chair outside the room. Spot the most disruptive kid and offer him ‘time out’ as in ‘I think you need to chill for 5 minutes, so why don’t you sit outside for a bit.’ If you’re lucky, he will simply bugger off. If not, at least you will have 5 minutes to get the rest of them going. Cover your arse – send a note to behaviour management that the bugger is at large.
2. Note.
Again, spot the most disruptive kid and ask him to take a note to your head of department or anyone else for that matter. The note should say: ‘I’ve sent XY to you because I need him out for 5 minutes so that I can start the others on their work. Thank you!’ It needs to be sealed of course. Again – if you’re lucky, the kid will just bugger off. If not, etc.
I shall put those in practice and we’ll see how it goes!

On swearing in the classroom yet again

It was a horrid week. Last night I’ve spent an hour sobbing on the phone to Paul about how I didn’t want to go back. And today, which could have potentially been a bit better, given the groups I had, was not. Possibly because some of the kids I have in my Spanish class are the same ones who were so totally horrid yesterday. So just seeing their faces made me want to get out of there as quickly as I could. Or maybe I just didn’t have it in me today.
Anyway, by the time I got to my year 8, I was more than overwhelmed. And they were as horrid as I’ve ever known them to be. So at the end of the lesson, when they were all ready to go, I stood in front of them and told them, in clear loud voice, to ‘f*** the f*** off’.
It was beautiful.
And I won’t even get in trouble for it, cause I said it in Polish and therefore no one understood. But I knew what I was saying and it felt wonderful. I left the classroom with a huge smile on my face.
I'll have to do it more often. I’m just afraid that the effect will wear off rather quickly…

On Sunshine

The spring is now officially here. We’ve changed the time, the sun is shining, the birds are singing – although none of them are coming to my brand new bird feeder Paul got me cause the goldfinches in his parents’ garden kept stubbornly refusing to feed when I was watching.
Last weekend we’ve spent a few glorious hours in the garden playing Scrabble – the initial plan had been to go fly our kite, but Paul’s foot does not yet allow for him running.
And in just 5 days I will be in Aix, sipping Pastis on Papi’s balcony warming my bones in the Provencal sun.

In the meantime, however, it’s the last week of school and last week of school means that try as you might, they will not co-operate. My lovely year 7s today were totally appalling when all I wanted them to do was a brief exercise summing up the most frequent mistakes I found in their books, which was supposed to be followed by a film. Yeah right. The film didn’t happen, cause the exercise didn’t either. I ended up going with them to their registration after school and having the Head of Year give them a proper bollocking. To my lovely year 7s. Seriously.

But then in my Year 9 Spanish group I have this boy with ADHD, whom I used to be sending with work to the Behaviour Manager every lesson, cause he made it absolutely impossible for me to teach. And lately he’s been just lovely. Yes, still fidgeting and still problematic but doing all his work and nothing compared to what it had been before. The Behaviour Manager would not believe me when I told him how good he’d been. And today they were doing posters about Spain using words of their choice and he came up with this absolutely amazing piece of work that I’m definitely going to laminate and put up on my wall. When I told the Behaviour Manager, he said that I must be doing something right, cause he gets just complaints from all his other teachers. That’s a lovely thought and it made me feel really good about myself for a while. But then I realised that Spanish being their second language, I have 15 of them, not 30, so I have time to give the boy all the attention he needs. But then again – it’s probably also because it’s the right kind of attention. So it could be not only about the group size. Maybe I am doing something right!

Hell has officially frozen

I had fun with my vile year 9. Actual fun. I’m not being sarcastic.
I had a game prepared for them, not for the first time, but for the first time I actually had an alternative worksheet in case they wouldn’t let me go through with the game like before.
But they did.
And we had fun.
They had fun.
I had fun.
The lad who assaulted me and is a pain in each and every lesson had his hand up all the time.
The lad who has learning difficulties and can never be bothered had his hand up all the time.
The girl who thinks that a lesson is where she can socialise with her friends squeaking and squirming and being all over the place stayed put and had her hand up all the time.
The girl who never says one word, always sits alone and doesn’t like being talked to had her hand up all the time.
Some of them came up to me and said ‘Miss, I didn’t win’. To which I invariably replied – ‘You did. You’re a bigger winner than the ones who actually got the prizes.’
Cause they did.
And I did.
And we had fun.
Together.
After the lesson, I went to the staffroom and sat there staring blankly at the wall for good ten minutes in a genuine state of shock.
I had fun with my vile year 9.
Miracles officially happen.

Wherever I end up in September, it will be a holiday

When a visit to the dentist’s is the highlight of your day, something’s definitely wrong.
I’ve had two unusually nice days at work, probably because of the training on Monday that made me miss out on one of my year 9s. But yesterday and today were just dreadful, year 9s, year8s, year 10s, you name it. If it wasn’t for year 7s I would seriously start questioning myself as a teacher.
At lunch break, I was sitting in Tabitha’s car, smoking a cigarette and ranting, feeling that I don’t want to go back to school, I can’t go back to school, please don’t make me go back to school.
My mentor meeting was all about me not being able to keep it together.
And everyone says it’s not me, it’s them. According to Ute, my mentor, I’m actually doing really good (sic!). And I know it is them, but I can’t help thinking that I’m failing. Cause I’m fighting and fighting and nothing changes. Cause when you have a group of 30 and 25 of them are playing up, there’s not much you can do really.
Every day, after school, my classroom looks like a battlefield.
First thing I do every morning is put my display into some order all over again and sort kids’ books into neat piles all over again.
And yes, this is a rough school and the kids are more difficult then elsewhere. But then, I have the same kids in my Spanish lessons, and those are all right, not perfect, not easy, but not dreadful to a point when all you want to do is sit down and cry.
The difference?
Well, there’s 30 of them in my German classes, and 15 in Spanish. There’s your difference. So maybe the important people up in London, who came up with the wonderful yet unrealistic policies of Every Child Matters and Personalised Learning, should go back into a classroom and see for themselves. How the f*** do you want me to cater for the needs of each of my students if I have 200 of them? How the f*** am I supposed to give attention to each and every one of them when I have 30 of them in a classroom? Maybe instead of putting shitloads of money into rebuilding schools, you should just build new ones, create more teaching posts, and reduce the number of kids in each class? Cause as it is, I am not teaching. As it is, I’m just growing more frustrated each day. And I seriously would not mind working in an old building with smaller classrooms with less modern equipment if that meant I had less kids in each lesson and could teach each and every one of them instead of hoping that the good ones learn something inadvertently while I waste my energy on shouting at the rest of them just to keep them in their seats.

Back to school

I went back to work this week – not that I felt particularly ready to, but being paid through a supply agency means mainly that if you don’t work, you don’t earn. No sick pay for me. So I went back.
I should I have probably taken a few more days off but, in the same time, I think that I’m recovering faster now that I can’t lick my wounds at ease and have to suck it up and do what I have to do.
I decided to tell the kids the truth about my absence, simply because I needed them to understand why I ask them to move things that are within my reach for me or lean forward to cough (‘Oh, miss, you can bend over whenever you want, you know!’ – ‘Have I made it clear that I can’t laugh either, dear?’).
(But the worst bit is sneezing. If you ever suffer from a seat belt injury, whatever you do, do not sneeze. I did. It took me around 10 minutes to get over it.)
The general reactions to my return were heart warming – ‘Oh, miss, good you’re back, it was boring!’, ‘Miss, I missed you!’, ‘Miss, miss, where have you been?’. But, unfortunately, even if I do not doubt that the intentions were sincere, the reality of my come back to the classroom did not reflect all those warm feelings with the exception of my Vile Year 9 who were unusually good and cooperative. I have however no illusions that they will be back to their ‘best behaviour’ in no time. Like today.

Ray

What do you do at the end of a last week of half-term, a week where you got hurt by your best friend, you got assaulted by your student, had an interview in that perfect school with students who don’t assault you and don’t throw things out of windows but actually let you teach them, in that cute little village where you could have had a little house with a piano in it and maybe even a cat, but didn’t get the job, and you’re just so tired of it all?
You go to see Ray. And Ray’s voice makes you cry like a baby all through the first part of the concert and then lifts you up, soothes you and rocks you into serenity. And then you move on. You forgive your friend, you write and incident report, you fill in another job application. And you hope for the best.