School Direct: the 10th week of teaching.

The last time I wrote a post I was embarking on my first half term holiday as a School Direct trainee.  It left as quickly as it had come and whilst I packed quite a lot in, I still didn't achieve as much as I wanted to in those days off.  Part of that has to come down to planning two lessons that I didn't need to teach as I had a training day that I'd forgotten about, that was...annoying.  I do feel that my planning is getting quicker though, I'm learning not to be too much of a perfectionist and not to try and cover all bases.  As much as I'd like to have great lessons every time I've learned that in reality that just doesn't happen, and I'll do myself no good in trying.

As well as wanting to have a life beyond planning, the other reason for speeding up the process is that I have an assignment to get written.  All through my undergrad I was always ahead of deadlines, it was never something I had an issue with, so not being able to be 110% on top of things has thrown me a bit.  I'd already come to the realisation that I'll never reach the end of a to-do list again so I'll just have to add this on top.  It's also a very different type of assignment from anything I'd done before.  The closest I can get to it was a piece of coursework I did for my minor in first year, Psychology in Education, but that was a long time ago!  I think we're all very used to being given a title and being told to get on with it, so having something as wide as this is a bit of a shock.  In theory it gives me a lot more freedom to do what I like, but at the moment it's just a bit nerve wracking as I'm not sure whether or not I'm doing the right thing.  Only time, or the university..., will tell I guess!

A while back I mentioned that I'd started using a tool called Class Dojo, so I thought it was about time to talk about how its been going for me.  At the end of half term I gave out reward points and a little medal (a flashing pumpkin for halloween, of course) for the students that had been using the target language the most.  I also gave out some notes to take home to say how well they'd been doing.  I did this with my year 7s who had been the classes I was testing Dojo with.  I was really pleased to see how happy they were to be getting these, especially the notes to take home and stick up on the fridge.  From the start of half term I have been keeping the points going on a running total, the students get to see how many points they have at the start and end of each lesson, and the change in their behaviour when they hear that points have been awarded is really noticeable.  I've started using it with year 8 too, so I'll be interested to see where that ends up by Christmas.  I'm still ironing out the issues, like making sure I'm fair and being able to give the points out quick enough to have the right effect but I'm definitely getting there.

Also before half term I put myself forward to be one of the student reps, which means I'll be sitting on a regular meeting with the staff that organise our course.  We had rather a long list of feedback to take this time, but most issues were easily ironed out and seeing as it's the first year of the course problems are to be expected.  Representation has been something I've always been interested in and I got involved a lot at Lancaster.  It's even something I looked into for full time work, co-ordinating academic representation in Students' Unions.  I think it will always be something I'm interested in, I guess later down the line it will come back in involvement with Student Voice/School Council or similar.

I've not talked too much in these posts about my actual training and what I'm working on, I guess that's because I was getting to grips with the basics and getting used to being in the classroom.  My main targets at the moment are working on using the target language in the classroom (with my target language prompt sheets and Class Dojo) and student independence.  I'm trying to talk less and get them doing more, both through more active tasks and encouraging them to be more independent in what they do.  I've been using 3Bs before me (brain, book, buddy) for a while now, but I've added a 4th B.  I wanted to try out something I've read about, a 'help desk' which could include different things each lesson, a dictionary, a conjugated verb, a grammar rule, anything.  Students then visit the desk when they feel they need it.  Making this into a 4th B was a little tenuous, and not the best language I know! Spanish has become "el boletín" (noticeboard rather than desk) and le bureau des renseignements.  I'm not sure how this is going to work out but I'm giving it a go this week and will report back!

Languages show live, parents evening and the end of the first half term.

This weekend marked the end of my first half term in school and 10 weeks on the School Direct programme if we include the two weeks worth of summer school.  In many ways it has been a long half term, and in others the last 8 weeks have just flown by.  Until now I have been teaching four hours a week on my own and observing and helping out in 6 others.  I've been taking bits and pieces of starters, plenaries and half lessons in years 7, 8, 9 and 10, some French and some Spanish.

A week or so ago now another MFL trainee and I went to the Languages Show Live at Olympia.  It meant losing the usual weekend lie in and getting on the train nice and early in the morning and making our way across to Olympia, with the usual barriers that Transport for London like to throw in for good measure!  There were loads of stalls and so as well as attending talks on using the target language in the classroom and the new national curriculum for 2014 we managed to spend quite a lot of money...!  We justified it by saying that we're investing in our future by helping ourselves to do better this year, at least that's what we've convinced ourselves of anyway!

As I've been teaching year 7 on my own for a few weeks now they are my classes and so I took the lead in talking to the parents on parents evening this week.  Although I went to year 11 parents evening a few weeks ago I didn't really participate other than to add a couple of comments so this was quite a big step up.  At first it was quite scary sitting on the other side of the table and telling parents how their children were getting on in my lessons but by the end of the evening I realised I was actually quite enjoying it.  It was really interesting to get to meet the parents and hopefully I'll be able to see the effects of some of the things we talked about when we're back in the classroom after half term.

Unfortunately this half term break is not going to be that relaxing.  I've had a weekend off but work starts tomorrow as I not only have 6 hours of lessons to plan for the first week back but a 4000 word assignment for the PGCE and I'd really like to get at least a first draft done.  I might even have to pop into school at some point to help plan the primary link we are starting in November.  Hopefully I'll get it all done, but it'll be nice to not have to get up quite so early every day in any case.

Busy, busy, busy!

Since my last blog post around three weeks ago a lot has been going on and it's all gone past in a blur!  I've taken my first whole lessons with my two year seven classes, taken starters and plenaries with year ten, helped out with year eight, nine and eleven and been assigned a tutor group to help out with.  The anonymous buddy system we have at school is making things better though - we've been assigned someone that we can leave notes and buy little gifts for.  My buddy has bought me chocolate and biscuits so far - I think they've got me sussed - and they've left me notes like 'eat away the stress' and 'share these and make everyone love you'.  Just the sort of thing you want to see at the end of a busy week.

Reality is finally beginning to set in as I arrive at school at 7.45 and leave for my 45 minute journey home at 17.30/18.00.  I'm forcing myself to take time for myself at the moment as I'm more than aware that if I don't set aside this time now when my workload is comparatively light, there is no way I'll be able to do it later in the year.  I'm doing something I really enjoy and going to the adult music school at my old secondary school once a week and something I enjoy considerably less - exercising at the gym. My ex-headteacher used to tell me that she played in the band as her 'Wednesday night music therapy' and I can see why she did it now (and still does), it's something that I have to keep up/

I've been getting involved as much as I can at school at the moment, especially whilst my timetable is light enough to allow me to.  This meant that last week I went to year eleven parents evening and shadowed my mentor.  She only has one year eleven class and I'm in with them once a week as well as their GCSE speaking interventions after school so I've got to know them a little bit which was useful.  A couple of weeks ago we all spent the day off timetable for what was called 'Shaping the Future Day'.  Each form was competing in a variety of tasks as part of their college (the school is spilt into 3 colleges [houses]) for a trophy.  These tasks were intended to represent the school values of commitment, respect, self-belief, excellence and strength.  The school also has a system of rewarding these values for points for each college and prizes for students.  This has only just relaunched so I'm yet to see quite how well this works, but I like the look of it.  There was also a presentation for each college where all year sevens and new members of staff in the college were called up to the stage to be welcomed into the Academy.  I must admit that I was sceptical to begin with but it was actually quite a nice session.  I spent Shaping the Future day with the form of one of the MFL teachers but I've now been assigned to another form which is really nice as I'm getting to know another group of students and learning about the role the form tutor plays.

I'm starting to get used to school policies and the way things are done.  For example I know that I need to wrack my brains for a good word before staff briefing on a Friday as we have a toy dog that gets thrown around to decide the word of the week.  We've had things like punctuality and confidence so far, but my mind goes blank every time!  Another policy I'm getting to grips with is the marking policy... I won't go into it, but lets just say it's time consuming for me at the moment!

In terms of my training I am still going to other schools every week for Professional Studies days, the most useful one that we've had before was on behaviour management and inclusion.  Three students with different Special Educational Needs came to speak to us, we were all very impressed with how brave they were to come along and speak to 26 trainee teachers!  There was one blind boy, a girl with dyslexia and a boy on the autistic spectrum.  They told us about how they find school, how their teachers help them and most importantly what LSAs do for them.  All three of them told us that they couldn't get on in school without the LSAs that help them.  It was really good for us to hear from the students themselves rather than the theory of it all the time.

My focus at the moment with one class is classroom management and with another is the use of the target language.  I'm using Class Dojo to help with both of these things.  Class Dojo assigns each student a little avatar and then you can reward certain behaviours and give red marks against others.  I'm using it to keep track of when students spontaneously use the target language.  I've helped them along with this by providing target language prompt sheets with questions like 'est-ce que je peux enlever ma veste?' and 'puedo abrir la ventana?", just the sorts of questions that they would ask during the lesson but that they can easily say in French/Spanish.  I'm also using it to reward hard work, team work and listening to instructions as well as warnings for talking out of turn and not being on task.  I've only used it for one lesson with each class so far but I'll be keeping an eye on how it goes.

So now it's Saturday and I'm sat in front of the X Factor writing this blog at the first opportunity I've had.  I know everyone told me I'd have no social life this year and I knew it was going to be hard work but reality has hit now.  How long until half term?

School Direct: Reflecting on every breath, or so it seems!

The key to teacher training, or so I am lead to believe so far, is reflection.  In fact, it would seem like I have to reflect on every waking breath!  For anyone that doesn't know, these reflections are used as evidence that I have met 8 standards to gain Qualified Teacher Status (QTS).  In the past there used to be something like 32 of these, each requiring a folder full of evidence.  Some training routes still require a folder per standard, which can be confusing when trainees within one school are on different programmes.  As I'm doing a PGCE I will just need one folder at the end of the year, this includes my weekly journal, a reflection on each of the standards and yet more paperwork and forms.  As well as this I will complete 3 assignments over the course of the year, they are Professional Investigations: Professional Studies, Enhanced Studies and Curriculum Studies.  I only really know anything about the first one at the moment and that the Enhanced Studies will be researched whilst I am on a two week non-teaching placement at another school.  I'll also be doing a teaching placement for four weeks at another school, this has to be a contrasting school to my main placement so I presume it will be a grammar school.

Over and above my training requirements I'm trying to get involved in other things going on around the school.  So far these have centred around my own department, I've gone along to after school sessions, marked some primary transition work and even been out to a primary school to talk about how the school can work with them on some MFL sessions in year 6.  This week I get the chance to be involved outside of my department when the students are off timetable for the day, working on activities in their form groups and colleges (or houses).  As far as I know this event is to start off some competition between the colleges for the rest of the year and to encourage what has been described as a family feeling.  I'm really looking forward to it and think this has to be one of the main advantages of School Direct as it is allowing me to be part of the school from day one and really get involved just as any other member of staff.

In terms of the school/PGCE balance things are going fine so far, but I can already see that changing as I start to take over starters and parts of classes bit by bit from this week.  I'm conscious that there is going to be so much to do and so little time to do it in, but I knew that when I applied for this programme so it's just something I'll have to deal with.

On a less personal note, the ITT figures for this year have been released recently.  They show that whilst there were many many more applications for School Direct than places available there were many places left empty, I think it was around 45% or something similar.  It seems that this comes down to the schools involved in the process.  As schools have a much bigger say in the selection of trainees than they would with PGCE placements they are applying the standards that they would in selecting their own staff.  Unfortunately, this seems to mean that there are many unfilled places for teacher training this year, as less PGCE places were available.  Although the quality of School Direct training is high, there won't be enough Newly Qualified Teachers around at the end of it.  What worries me is that the mistakes made this year are going to tar what could've been a very successful programme in the future.

Three days in and not a student in sight.

After all this time I can finally say I have started School Direct and am officially a trainee teacher!

My first two days in school were INSET days, or Professional Learning as the academy I'm at calls them.  I've been to all the same sessions as the usual staff as well as some specific sessions for new staff members and trainees/NQTs.  I have a feeling that I'm going to be swimming in paperwork this year, and next for that matter.  I have journals, assignments and reviews to complete for my university, but at the same time I have reflective logs, records and more reviews to complete from the academy.  It's going to feel like a lot but hopefully it should make it all easier for me at the end of the year.  For those that don't know, there are 8 teachers standards that all trainees must meet in order to be awarded Qualified Teacher Status and these have to be evidenced in a portfolio at the end of the year.  At the end of the day it's all about ticking boxes but if I don't collect all the information and evidence as I go along it will be a total nightmare.  I'm not quite sure how I'm going to go about managing all this yet but I'm sure I'll get used to it once I'm settled into school.

I guess I'd never really considered how much has to be done in those couple of days before school starts.  As well as attending all the training sessions the staff were sorting out timetables, seating plans, books and boxes.  As a new member of staff I had to get my laptop sorted, get an ID badge, class keys and access to the car park, not to mention sorting out somewhere to keep all my stuff in the day.  All seems straightforward enough but it takes a while to deal with.

Today was the first day of term at my school but unfortunately Wednesdays are my training day out of school and so I missed it.  It was good to see all the other trainees today, there's been so much going on that it feels like ages since we last saw each other, in reality it was only Friday but we had plenty to catch up on.  It's at this stage that we realise the variations from school to school.  We have all been assigned different amounts of hours on our timetable, different expectations for when we will take over the class and access to different resources in school.  I think this is part of the draw of the programme, in theory it can all be tailored to our needs, although at the outset it does seem a little inconsistent.  We still don't have a concrete schedule for our training, and there is still some confusion on where we will be, when we'll be there and who we'll be with but I'm sure it'll get there soon enough.  What I do now know is that I will be spending the first half term in January in two other schools, 4 weeks in a school contrasting to my own and 2 weeks researching in another school before returning to my main school.

There is just so much to take in that I'm trying to take as many opportunities as I can to write my thoughts down and get things straight in my head!  I'm observing classes tomorrow and Friday before the weekend so I'll be able to get a sense of things and start with that in mind next week.

It's been a long time coming...

I acknowledge that this blog has been a long time coming, I've not written in more than a month and then every time I intended to write this week and last I drew blanks.  It's not that I've got nothing to say, more that there has been so much going on that I'm still trying to make sense of it all myself!  Since last Monday I have been on a summer school before I start at school next week.  As anyone who has been reading these blogs from the outset will know it's been very much a step into the unknown for all of us on School Direct.  To be totally honest there is still much to be found out, the more we find out the more we realise we don't know.  But that goes for many things, doesn't it?

Our University partnership is the only one in the country to be running things this way with a summer school, and we're one of the biggest too.  The partnership is made up of the university, two sets of students from academy chains and a consortium schools from my local area.  As well as providing an interesting variety of people from different backgrounds this has caused some confusion at times.  We're all working towards different goals, some with a full PGCE and QTS with 60 Masters level credits and some QTS with 40 Masters level credits, and that's just our partnership, countrywide there is even more variation.  As well as this, the students from the academy chains seem to be expected to do a lot more from day one, regardless of whether they are salaried or non salaried, they will be teaching their own classes from the beginning.  One thing this week has made me realise is the role our schools will be playing in our training, a lot of the responsibility is in their hands as opposed to the university or even the lead school.  I guess maybe I could've deduced that from the name though, couldn't I?

Being one of those people that likes to be in the know and in control I'm pleased to have the details of my first assignment, the deadlines of all assessments and a rough idea of what I'm aiming for at the end of the year.  The content of the sessions has been elements of Professional Studies and Curriculum Studies to prepare us for the classroom, much as with the usual PGCE I believe.  This has been a good kick start to get our brains into gear, but I need a context to put it in and try it out before I'll really learn it's value.

I have to say that one of the most valuable parts of the summer school has been getting to know the other trainees.  There are 26 of us in our consortium from a range of subjects and across nine or ten schools.  This has been really good as we've all got to know different people and attended different subject sessions but we've had sessions together as well.  During the year we'll be meeting weekly for our Professional Studies sessions so it's important we get on, and luckily we have.  I've read enough articles, blogs, forums etc now to know that we're going to need each other to keep ourselves sane this year!

I'm starting in school on Monday with two INSET days, looking at the timetable from school it looks like it'll be pretty intense but I'm looking forward to getting to know the other staff and getting settled at school.  Unfortunately Wednesday is our first training day so I won't actually be at my own school for the first day of term.  I'm still unsure of how much observation I'll be doing before I start teaching, hopefully this will become clear on Monday.

For now I can only apologise, my brain is frazzled and I've just written my thoughts as they come out of my head.  I've not left myself time to read it through so I imagine the spelling and grammar is appalling but I'd rather post something than nothing.

Wish me luck, I'll blog again at the end of week one if I'm still in one piece that is!

School Direct: Criticisms and variety, don't tar everyone with the same brush.

About a month ago I wrote this post about School Direct and the unknown aspects and misconceptions.  Since then there have been many more articles that only seem to further these misunderstandings.  The coverage of School Direct in the news is overwhelmingly negative and I believe that a lot of this is due to misunderstanding as opposed to criticism of the facts.  I am going to use this opportunity to give my views on some of the criticisms I've seen around:

1) Trainees will not see the same variety of schools that they would via a university-based PGCE route.

As much as this may be true to some extent all School Direct trainees will be expected to spend time in more than one school as required for obtaining QTS.  In fact, some school consortiums are able to provide their trainees with experience in a greater variety of schools.

2) Trainees won't get the important reflection time away from school that they would if they were following a university based training route.

I don't know how this will work for those trainees not gaining a PGCE, but I know that one day a week I will be training in curriculum and professional studies away from my school with other student teachers.  This will give me the opportunity to meet with other students, like I would do had I been at a university, and discuss issues and share experiences with them.

3) There won't be a strong enough focus on theory and academic study.

Again, although I don't know quite how this will work for non-PGCE trainees (presumably in a similar way to the non-PGCE GTP route) but so far I am under the impression that there is still a strong academic focus to my course.  I will be attending university for 2 weeks next month with full days of curriculum and professional studies.  I will still be required to complete academic assignments in order to gain my PGCE and I am still expected to study the same texts as the university based PGCE courses.

As far as I can tell so far, many of these criticisms of School Direct would also apply to Teach First, SCITT or the previous GTP.  

I understand the concerns related to applications and the knock-on effect this is having for university providers and this is certainly an issue that can't be ignored.  That said, in the cases where the School Direct training route also leads to the award of a PGCE I don't see the downside or the risk to teacher quality.

The variety of provision for School Direct across the schools and universities involved is yet to be seen, some with PGCE, some without, some with a wider variety of experience than others.  I guess what I'm saying is when making judgements about School Direct this variety must be kept in mind and we mustn't tar all of the training providers with the same brush.