The Amazing Afterthought Girl

So I've had the sneaking suspicion since I arrived that I'm pretty much an afterthought at the school, and nobody really knows who I am or what I do.

Okay, first it was the being sold on the job by being promised my own room, only to find out that I'm the 8th teacher in a 7-lab school, so I'm living out of a suitcase for a year. Fair enough, they did rearrange things so I wasn't tearing around between blocks all day.

Then there was the "surprise! You're teaching maths!" thing. Again without really being told what the heck is going on. Got kind of thrown into the deep end on that one, left all my math resources at home. Fair enough, I'm dealing.

Then I got to the form tutor meeting only to be told eventually that I don't have a form. Probably because I don't have my own room. Not really complaining on that one, as it gives me an extra 30 minutes every day (eaten up by the room switches usually, so it all balances out).

Then there was pupil interview day, where I was sent to multiple trainings only to find out the day before that I didn't have any interviews and was in fact not actually scheduled to be anywhere. Again, fair enough. I got a lot of work done that day.

We had the supervisor for the Essex board in observing maths today. I was doing the last lesson of a 5-hour planning session, had the kids actually working in groups for the first time all year, had them actually interested in the answers, had them LISTENING to each others' answers, and all in all had the most successful class all year.

She told the department head that none of the teachers put any effort into the classes.

And then I got my staff ID badge today.



Yeah.
posted by Sarah E. at 1:16 PM

---

Open School

So last month (I know, I know, shut up) was Open School, and I finally managed to get photos of the hallowed halls where I am tortured teach five days a week.

It's actually quite telling that on Friday, one of the girls in my year ten class got exasperated and yelled out the following:

"You know, I feel really sorry for Miss. She came all this way from Canada to teach us, and when she gets here, she gets us. No offense to you, Miss, but we are pretty horrible."

At least they can recognize the problem, anyway. I also had one of my year 8 girls try to throw me by asking me "Miss, how come you're still single?" (my impression is that the average marital age on Canvey is seventeen), but when I replied without missing a beat "because I really don't have time to train a boy right now," the girls were suitably impressed.

Anyway.

My day begins before dawn. I wake up at quarter to six, grab my things, and walk down the street, across a bridge, past the library, to a corner out front of the entrance to the Ford Dealership car park. This is where I wait for Andy, another science teacher, to pick me up. This is usually what it looks like:



Only now I don't really see dawn until somewhere around Rayleigh. This photo, incidentally, is titled "Sunrise on Leigh... it's almost a Proclaimers song". My Dad is thus far the only one who gets it.

Arriving at the school, we usually take the back way in to the library block (so called because it houses the library), where my 5 classrooms are located. This is a pleasant change from the beginning of the year, when they were six classrooms and scattered between the library block and the admin block (to the right of this photo).



To the right of the library block is the admin block (which houses the staff room and the other half of the science department).



One of the rooms I used to teach in was Sean's in the admin block, before they realized that having me run between blocks during classes was soon going to reduce me to a weeping, dribbling mess. For Open School (the day when we try to convince parents to send their children to us instead of the other school on the Island), it was the Biology Room.



We actually have some cool things that I nearly never see. Such as the vivisected rabbit, which both fascinated and horrified the students.



The teacher in pink is Tania, the other Canadian in the department. Glenn the lab tech is next to her, and the one with the red hair is Kim, my buddy teacher and one of the few reasons I have not yet gone completely insane.

Kim knows what a biology geek I am, so even though I was assigned to the Physics room for the day, it became my job to cut open the sheep's heart at the beginning of the day. Oddly enough, I'm the only person in the department who views dissecting a major complex organ with glee. Go figure.



The room that I usually teach in, Kim's room, was reorganized from its usual convenient rows of desks into the Chemistry Room. Assisting in there were Rob and Francis, our two Australian teachers (yes, there are four new Overseas Trained Teachers in the department this year. Apparently, turnover in the department is high. Probably because only the very strong of heart survive when they keep sticking the new teachers with the bottom sets).



Francis's room is where I teach my mid set 7s maths and science. It's a challenge. His is also one of the few touch screens you can't draw on with a light pen, which means I have to rejig the slides I use with my Set 1 7s before every set 3 class. Fortunately, the top set 7s let me work out the snags so that things run fairly smoothly with the mid-set.



I teach my year 8s in Andy's room, which was set up as the Physics room (which, not coincidentally, is what I'm actually teaching). It was fairly dull, though I did get to play with the Van de Graaff generator.



Coming home, we just managed to catch a rainbow. Yes, it rains a lot here, but there are also a lot more rainbows than I'm used to seeing at home. It's hard to see, but the second photo actually shows a triple rainbow -- the first two are stacked one on top of the other (the really bright band), and the third is off to the side about 2/3 the way between the first rainbow and the rearview.



Then I was dropped off at Kent Elms corner to hike back over my bridge to get home. The bridge averts the certainty of death that would result from attempting to cross the A127, but going up and down those spiral stairs when you're carrying a heavy backpack, laptop, and box of books for marking can be a real pain. Especially in the dark when it's raining.



And that, in a nutshell, is my school life.
posted by Sarah E. at 3:18 PM

---

A day in London

Okay, it's been a long time coming, but I'm very busy all the time now. So here is my long overdue report on my trip into London with Shira to do very touristy things (which is photoblogged beginning here).

The day began with my first real English fog (and thus far the heaviest, as well). Standing on the very empty train platform in Leigh (apparently nobody goes to London on the weekend, so it's £11 to buy a return ticket including all day travel on the tube) I couldn't see much past the end of the station (hence my lack of pictures of Hadleigh Castle).



Since it was to be a very touristy day, we set our sights on the London Eye. We'd long realized that we were going to have to go on it at some point. Shira wasn't happy about the haze, but I was content to go "I'm in London!" and have done with it.



Before the Eye, however, we decided to go on the Thames River cruise. It was appropriately cheesy (our tour guide definitely had hints of "yes, I enjoy my job, but this is the seventeenth time today I have given the same damn tour" about him), but we did get to see cool stuff.



And speaking of bridges, and , here's #1:



...#2



...#3



and for #4, I have yet to find a pub in London to rival this one right here in Leigh:



Of course, we had to go up the London Eye after the river tour. Despite the haze, I was very taken with the view. Damn, did it get hot in that pod though. We had to take turns standing next to the air conditioner.



Also somewhat unsettling is the fact that the Eye doesn't actually stop moving. You have to jump on and off the cars as they pass through the loading area. Fortunately, the staff are very efficient, and the thing moves slowly enough that they have time to sweep the cars with bomb detectors between unloading and loading.



After disembarking the Eye, we headed toward the London Aquarium (housed in the same building as the Dali Exhibit).



It's certainly no seaworld, but it did serve as home to some of our Pixar friends. And a very curious stingray.




And that was our tour of London. Next up: Open day at school post, in which one of my students is incredibly perceptive and I give some others something to think about.
posted by Sarah E. at 4:50 PM

---