GCSE Results

I have been a nervous wreck for the past few days waiting for GCSE results. Not my own, you understand, or even a nephew or niece this year. No, I have been waiting, as a teacher, for my Spanish class' results. You teenagers and parents have it easy you see. You may get this terrifying, stomach churning, nail biting wait two or three times in a lifetime. I have had it just about every August for the last 17 years, and the experience only gets worse as the responsibility for results gets placed more and more on teachers, and less on less on pupils.
On the whole I am pleased with the results my pupils have achieved this year. They range from a grade B to F. This time around I had a middle ability group, all lovely kids, all received the same teaching, encouragement, support, feedback over the two year course. How then can the results vary so much? In Mr Gove's world, they should all have achieved a B/C grade. I'll tell you how. The pupil with the F grade did the minimum of work. He did not submit a single piece of coursework of any consequence. The same applies to the E and D grades. I can teach to the very best of my ability but I cannot do the work for them That would be illegal and disciplinary action for fraud is something I could do without to be honest.
So now I wait to see what my 'residuals' are. This I how much I am deemed to have improved or not on the grades the pupils SHOULD have achieved. This is worked out by some ridiculous system called the FFT - Fisher Family Trust, or Fisher Price as most of my colleagues prefer to call it. From what I can tell this is an entirely random calculation based on where you live, what you ate for breakfast and what newspaper your parents read. For example Lowestoft/Quavers and Red Bull/The Mirror = E
Burnham Market/Homemade Muesli and Fresh Orange Juice/The Guardian = A*. OK, it is based loosely around how a child is doing at Key Stage 2, when they are aged 8-11. Now, I could be going out on a pedagogical limb here, but I would guess that at this age most children are a) fairly amenable to doing what their teachers and parents say  b) not full of hormones and interested only in their social life and the opposite sex  c) not experimenting with alcohol and recreational drugs. How a child is performing at 9 can surely not determine how they should do at 16 and yet this is what we are all judged on.
I have my own system for working out what grade they should get called the Sian Harrison Indicator Test. It goes like this. Take the average grade the pupil achieves aged 13. Divide by the number of piercings they have. Take away the amount of time they spend on a games console. Add the amount of time they spend doing homework. Take away the number of units of alcohol they consumed the night before the exam. Divide by the number of times they say 'Why do we have to learn Spanish anyway'. Based on the above system I would say I am outstanding and deserve a pay rise!

WTF?

"There's no need for that kind of outburst", came a stern voice from the back seat of the car. "Sorry Bryn", I replied to my eight year old. What had prompted this telling off was my reaction to an elderly driver who had changed lanes right in front of me without any indication whatsoever.
"What the fff....flip", I had said, remembering just in time that I was not alone in the car.
In the old days when I was a good Baptist, my speech was as clean as an obsessive compulsive's house, but as my moral compass came apart at the seams, so too did my language.
Now, I don't particularly like to hear swearing, especially if it is the kind of coarse, meaningless, every other word is an obscenity, which you find all too often these days. Apparently swearing is harder to give up than smoking, and for many it simply becomes a way of life. However, neither do I subscribe to the much bandied about school-of-thought which says that only the uneducated swear because they don't have the eloquence to express themselves in any other way. Enjoying comedy as I do, I believe that a well-placed swear word can add to the humour of a piece whether written or spoken. I also quite like the freedom afforded by the kind of  'text speech acronym' swearing such as the title of this post. I would not have dreamt of actually calling the post by it's full name, but the acronym somehow seems acceptable. A bit like 'Obscenities Lite'.
So, what to do about children and swearing? However good you are as a parent about your language they are bound to pick things up from an early age. I remember Bryn aged 2 and scarcely able to talk coming home from the child-minder one day and saying 'You bar-smudge'. It was so hilarious that he'd got it wrong, so I ignored it and after a couple of days he didn't do it again. A couple of years ago, when I was clearing out his bedroom, I found a piece of paper in his bedside drawer. Written on it, in his best writing and with his favourite gold pen, was every obscenity he knew - quite an impressive list for a 6 year old including the word 'fuke'. Again, I didn't want to make a big thing of it, so I put it back where I found it. However, being a teacher I just couldn't help myself, and a couple of days later felt I had to say something. "You know the naughty word that begins with 'F', Bryn? It has a curly c and a kicking k at the end ok? Bless him, he got it right after that.

My Haribo Habit

Now, I know that I am not alone in adult circles in being a bit partial to the odd packet of Haribo and I have found that the more open I have been, the more people I have found over the age of 25 who share my gelatine addiction. I'm sure there are support groups out there somewhere for the real hard-core users, and a twelve-step plan to wean you off the gummy bears.
Normally when I am at home I am ok, as we tend not to have Haribo in the house, but my real downfall is when I'm at school. I  keep a big stash of this type of sweet in my desk as prizes/bribes/danger money for the kids I teach. I'm sure this goes against all guidelines on good practice, what with our being a healthy eating school and all that, but I find that fresh fruit doesn't keep so well and is nowhere near as effective. "Come on Tyler, just finish this piece of work and you can have some grapes".
Normally I can resist. The Haribo are in a tin in a locked drawer, otherwise they do tend to 'disappear', so I have to make an effort to get to them - but after a particularly challenging day I do sometimes find myself reaching into the pupils' sweet tin for a little something. The trouble is once you've had some it is hard to stop. I guess the combination of sugar, e numbers and chewiness is meant to be addictive otherwise they wouldn't sell so many.

I have sometimes toyed with the idea of buying sweets which I don't like, such as toffees or mints, but the trouble is the kids don't like them either. One 13 year old girl asked "Miss. Why don't you buy us chocolate instead?". I found myself in one of those painful situations where you can hear yourself saying something, know it's stupid, but it's too late to stop yourself. "They wouldn't last too well in a stuffy classroom, and there's nothing worse than a sticky mess in your drawers", was what I said. I hate it when that happens. She might have a point though? I'm sure melted, congealed and re-set chocolate would be much easier for me to say no to.

Blogging

A few weeks ago I really wasn't entirely sure what a blog was. Until a year ago I didn't even have a facebook page, mainly on account of hearing horror stories about teachers being sacked for inappropriate posts which their pupils had somehow got hold of.
A couple of close friends and family members had suggested I should start a blog and, being the sort who is easily flattered, I decided to give it a go, hoping that I wouldn't become the blogosphere equivalent of those poor souls you see in the early auditions for The X Factor. You know the ones; their Auntie Jean once told them they had a nice voice so they decided that going on national TV to face certain humiliation would be a good move.
I have learned so much in the last fortnight, all about URLs, HTML, SEO and many more exciting acronyms, as well as link-backs, hits out and kicks in the teeth (OK I made that last one up). I have been obsessively refreshing my STATS, waking up in the morning and the first thing I think about is checking my page-views. I know a lot of readers are friends and family, but I wonder about the fairly large following I have in Russia and hope it's not the KGB; and what of those other places, Turkey, Honduras, Greece, Serbia, South Africa? How have people there stumbled across my little blog?

Then there was the process of getting approved for advertising on my site which was a steep learning curve too. I keep checking what are hilariously called my 'earnings', at time of writing the princely sum of £1.54. One of my friends is due a cut of 30% for suggesting a post title so I reckon I'm left with about a pound. I also now worry about 'illegal clicking'. It sounds like the sort of thing which might go on in a contortionists' sex club, but apparently it is clicking on your own adverts or getting friends to do so.
So, for now I shan't be giving up the day job, but my nearest and dearest had better be careful not to do anything even remotely funny or you may end up as Normal for Norfolk blog fodder.

Lost in Translation

As a Teacher of Modern Languages, mistakes made using the humble dictionary (yes I am quite old) and later the online translator have caused me much amusement. I wish I had written more of them down over the years as I find now that my 40 something mind is not what it used to be. A dictionary or translator is a tool and therefore there is a direct link between how effective it is and the intelligence of the person using it.
One that does stick in my mind from my very first year teaching, when my French was still good enough to teach 'A' level, was an answer from a reading comprehension. The text was about holiday destinations and talked about the fact that travellers were wanting to visit less 'touristy' places. It talked about 'Tierres Vierges' (sorry to all francophiles out there but I don't appear to be able to get a grave accent on this blog) and the question asked why such places were popular with some tourists. One girl answered 'Because there are lots of virgins there'. Quite possibly a more honest answer but unfortunately not what the exam board was looking for.
One very popular translation howler doing the rounds at present on facebook is from a Spanish menu. The item is 'Vino en botella' which should translate as 'Wine by the bottle'. However 'vino' is also the past tense of the verb 'venir' - to come, so some bright spark has translated it as 'He/she came in a bottle'. I'll just have a glass of water, thanks.
Quite a few people have asked why I don't do my blog in French and Spanish as well. The answer is that whilst I could probably have a shot at a literal translation, there is no way I would be good enough to convey the humour in anything but my own language. However, the other day I did decide to try out the 'translation' button which you can add to your blog. I used it into French on the 'Stamp Competition' post and had a look at the results. I am very glad I checked as the results were atrocious. One English phrase 'Mummy and Daddy have a row' was rendered as 'Maman et Papa ont un rang'. 'Un rang' is not 'a row' as in 'an argument', but rather 'a row' as in 'a row of cabbages'.
However, my absolute favourite comes courtesy of a Polish friend who heard this anecdote about a fellow Pole who had moved to Britain and had not yet mastered the language. He wanted to buy some meat, so checked on google translate for what he needed. Feeling reasonably confident he went into his local Butcher's shop and asked for 'half a kilo of chicken tits'. To było upokarzające

Family Holidays Part One: Journey and Arrival

So, as I stagger towards the end of term (I've always thought that Gok Wan's efforts would be much more profitably spent on a series called 'How to Teach Good Knackered') I begin to reflect on that greatest of oxymorons 'The Family Holiday'.
The majority of my childhood/teenage holidays involved the caravan, trekking off with my parents and two brothers to various corners of the UK and France towing this mobile torture cell, sorry I mean 'home' behind us. If it was ever in front of us then we knew we were in trouble.
As we know, every holiday begins with the journey. Now, I am sure that this points to a huge character flaw in me, possibly even a personality disorder, but when I'm going somewhere I just like to get there. The less time spent in the car/air/train/sunshine community minibus the better. Unfortunately my father does not share my point of view, preferring to take his time, stop every hour and shun major roads. Don't forget, these were the days before Sat Nav so we would spend many a happy afternoon getting lost on country roads with pensioners on push bikes overtaking us and probably covering about 15 miles in the process. On this basis driving down to the South of France could take several days.
Eventually, after days spent in a hot vehicle (no air con in those days) with precious little to do (batteries on 'personal stereo' went flat at Calais) we would arrive at 'Le camping Merde de Cochon' or similar. Great, time to get out, stretch your legs.... Oh no! We children had to remain in the car until dad had 'put the stays down'. To this day I am unsure what exactly this means, but it seemed to take an intolerably long time and involved much bad tempered shouting from Dad and encouragement and placating noises from Mum. We would finally be allowed in to the inner sanctum, with stern warnings to take our shoes off. The kettle would go on, tea would be made and for a few glorious moments all would be well with Famille Bennett. It would, dear reader, be all too short-lived...

School Reports:The Revenge

So, having spent the last few weeks dishing out the reports I am now on the receiving end, and took possession of our son's yesterday. Now, I know what you're thinking. He's in year 3. Surely his report will just say 'Bryn is eight years old and therefore knows everything. There is nothing more I can teach him'. You may laugh, but to listen to him sometimes you would think this was the case. I have spent most of my life labouring under the misapprehension that I was of at least average intelligence and am so grateful to my son for showing me how wrong I was.
Anyway, back to the report. I quickly skim read to see if I could find any obvious 'teacher code' alerting me to the fact that my son was doing poorly at school and was therefore destined to become a drug addict/petty criminal/estate agent but could see no such comments. Parts of it were quite difficult to understand and I had to ask Bryn what some sentences meant.
'He needs to use inverse relationships to verify the accuracy of an answer'
'He needs to independently use appropriate ways of presenting data ...using appropriate scales for each axis'. Whatever happened to 'Could do better'?
There were a couple of other phrases which caught my eye. In the R.E. comment it said 'This year he has learnt about submission in Islam'. Submission in Islam? How about teaching him about submission at home?! Perhaps we should convert. The other one said 'He is able to mix paint economically'. Well, that's good to know. If the whole Brain Surgeon thing doesn't work out then at least there'll be a job for him at Home Base.
Finally I had a last look through to make sure I hadn't missed anything vital. Nowhere could I see the phrase 'Bryn is a pleasure to teach'. Phew, what a relief. He is not the Head Teacher's son.

Decisions, decisions ...

This morning my lovely boss (he'll be reading this) asked me what kind of Teacher's Planner I would like for next year. This always causes great excitement as it is the only freebie we get these days, following the discontinuation of valium-tipped board pens. (Dear Customs and Excise/Drugs Squad/Ofsted - that was a joke - no dawn raids please.)
His first question was quite simple. "A4 or A5?" "A4 please. It's easier to hide my mobile phone from the kids with an A4 one."
Second question. "Ring bound or loose leaf?" " Loose leaf"
Third question. "What colour?" "What colour? Ooh the red is quite nice but I had red this year so maybe not. I don't like the orange one - looks like a baby's nappy. Um, how about green? Oh, no it's that horrible dull green isn't it. What other colours do they do? Is there a pink?"
My boss was trying very hard to appear patient but I know him well enough by now to spot the signs.
"I know", I exclaimed. "I'll have that colour!", pointing to the vivid shade of puce which was spreading from his neck up his face.
In the end I plumped for blue. I may not be needing it anyway if I get my P45 in the next few days.

Working Mum

I'd be happy to bet whatever I had left after bailing out the Eurozone that many of my readers are of a similar 'demographic' to me. I have no idea if  'demographic' is the correct word to use here but it makes me sound as if I know what I'm talking about so it's staying. Anyway, what I mean is I would guess that many of you are female, 40 something, a child or two and probably a job and by 'job' I mean one you get paid for.
Being a Working Mum is fraught with manic juggling and difficult choices. The first rule of 'Working Mum' is don't expect to get it right. The second rule of  'Working Mum' is don't expect to get it right. I can remember that pang of guilt combined with amusement that I experienced when Bryn, aged only 2 at the time asked, "Daddy. Did Mary go back to work after Jesus was born?"
I'm sure that Mary had a much stronger faith than I do and relied on the Lord (and Joseph) to provide. However, Boden, White Stuff and Radley did not exist back then so she was at something of an unfair advantage! All that temptation removed!
One of the things I do notice about being a working mum is that it leaves me tired and irritable. Bryn and I used to play a game where we drew shapes on each others' backs and had to guess what they were. On one occasion he drew a star and said "That's what you are, Mummy". For a moment I felt quite choked up before he added "I didn't know how to draw a grumpy cow!"
Anyway that is all I have time for right now as I need to get to work!

Insomnia, School Trips and other Ramblings.

I find myself awake at stupid o'clock this morning, a time usually only experienced in any meaningful sense by shift workers and small infants. Speaking of small infants, I am taken back to the days when Bryn was tiny and 5.30 am was considered a lie in and you knew it was going to be a bad day if the baby had woken you up before the CBeebies channel had come on air.
There could be many reasons for my current bout of sleeplessness: clammy nights, feeling hungry, things on my mind. However, on this particular day I like to think that I have woken up in sympathy with my colleagues who, as I write, are setting off for Germany with 35 excited teenagers. I myself have been on this trip a number of times but, more recently, have gone over to the dark side and accompanied the Spanish jollies (let's face it, that's what all you non-teachers think they are!) instead. On the last German trip two years ago we had literally been on the road (or to be more accurate, the school drive) for 20 seconds when one 13 year old girl threw up over herself and her (ex) friend. At this early stage of the trip I was still feeling reasonably fresh and enthusiastic and so set about cleaning up the mess. If anyone thinks teachers have an easy job then they should try cleaning up someone else's child's vomit on a moving coach. The novelty will soon wear off I can assure you.
...and so it was that I earned myself the (unpaid) title of  'Teacher in charge of Vomit'. Later on in the trip, the lack of fruit served at the hotel necessitated the addition of 'constipation'  and 'rickets' to my responsibilities. All in day's work!

School Reports

It's that time of the year where most parents will be getting their little darlings' end-of-year reports, and where most teachers will be reaching for the gin as they write their 104th comment about how well/badly little Johnny is doing.
As a teacher with nearly 20 years experience of report writing I thought I would de-code some teacher short-hand for you.

• Tom always works with enthusiasm. = Tom cannot sit still and keeps shouting out.
• Annie has an enquiring mind. = Annie never stops asking pointless questions.
• Jessica is quiet and conscientious. = Jessica is a teacher's pet.
• Hugo is a pleasure to teach. = Hugo is the Head Teacher's son.
• Sam is confident and not afraid to express his opinions = Sam is annoying and full of himself.
• I have seen a real improvement in Kyle's attitude = Kyle hasn't hit anyone this week.
• Emma has worked steadily this year and has made reasonable progress. = Emma has done sod all.
• George needs to make more effort in order to make the progress he is capable of = No chance.