work life balance - Teaching On Ice

Tomorrow I'm back in the classroom, Thursday is the ski trip meeting, next Thursday is Y8 Parents Evening, Duke of Edinburgh lunchtime training sessions start soon, I'm not sure what I'm meant to be teaching and I've forgotten a lot of names!

And then there is Antarctica; I've started to pull together some teaching materials, but they're nowhere near complete and they rely on the data from Portsmouth which isn't available yet. But I do have lots of photos. But there again is death by pretty powerpoint going to motivate and inspire?

It wasn't meant to be quite this disorganised, but my plan of going in last Friday and sorting everything out didn't work as my mouse batteries had run out, the server was re-booting and I wanted to give blood. Oh well, I'll just go in and see what happens!

Happy New Year to everyone and good luck for the start of term, let me know how they go, your stories may make me feel better!

Would more free time raise standards more than new initiatives?

I received an e-mail from the people behind Teaching Expertise yesterday; they were worried that my recent posts were short and failed to bring across my personality. Unimpressed, I went to the posts and was forced to agree. Worried, I asked my Head of Deparment if the same was true at work, it was; for the last two weeks I have apparently been "distant, linear and flighty", not my normal "chatty, idea-sy, salesman self". It would seem that the strain of Ofsted, Antarctica and the last week of term has got to me.

In light of this feedback I apologise and promise to do better. There are three things that should have kick-started my personality today:

1. I didn't get out of bed until 7am.
2. I was touched by what else my HOD said. Apparently, her and the rest of the department, were worried about my health. When they saw my eyes sinking into my head and that I was having to eat lunch during my lessons as I couldn't get a break they decided to help me out. But, knowing that I wouldn't admit to being under pressure they tried to do it subtly so I wouldn't notice. This explains why I occasionally found my HOD doing my register and why hot deserts would appear on my desk during period 4!
3. I got the most amazing good luck card from the students. They had got together, found lots of pictures of me on the internet and made a card. The card was then signed by children I teach this year, students from last year, members of my running club and people in my tutor group.

Reflecting on things today it seems that we have strengths, but the daily chaos of teaching conspires to keep them hidden. I'm good at motivating and coming up with ideas. However, over the last couple of weeks those skills have been buried by the daily grind.

If the school, the Government and Ofsted want to improve education I don't think more training, more initiatives, more paperwork and more targets are the way forward. Instead we need to trust that there are talented people in schools and give them the time to think, plan and inspire. Just because they're staring into space with a cup of coffee in their hand, doesn't mean they're not working.

This weekend I had a full diary of exciting social events, including a 30th birthday football party, watching and cheering on England's rugby team, and a special meal. However, I nearly didn't go in case I injured myself and ruined my Antarctic expedition. Then I had a thought ...

We complain about the sofa-bound, video game wielding, Co-op
loitering youth of today, but have we not fashioned and shaped them ourselves? The news is full of stories about how playgrounds are dangerous, going to London is risky, field trips leave you open to being sued, etc. Is it any wonder that young people end up believing that staying inside or standing around in groups doing nothing is the way forward?

Luckily sense does prevail in most cases. My school, like many others, does run field trips, it has 100s of students doing Duke of Edinburgh expeditions, it has two assault courses and we do visit London. And yes, doing all of that requires dedicated staff willing to spend their evenings and weekends filling in small forests' worth of forms.

Teachers and parents aim to inspire youngsters. Experience is an important part of that – incredible places, strange people, difficult situations and failure. Test your attitude at www.northpole2009.co.uk ; it's the public face of three 13 and 14 year olds (Katie, Ed and Alex) who are going to attempt to sledge-haul the last degree to the North Pole. Do you find yourself drawing breath and then tutting, or smiling and nodding?

Which leads to a final question, should it be students or us teachers heading to Antarctica? To send students would be the best way of inspiring them and their friends, but by sending a teacher you can potentially inspire all the students they come into contact with (over 10,000 in a career!).

So in the light of the importance of experience, I'm glad I spent the weekend having vast amounts of fun with friends. I've seen friends I had lost contact with (hello Becky), celebrated a 30th birthday (Happy Birthday Ben!) and reveled in England's 5-2 win. Caution would have made me miss out on all of that.