Teaching Freedom Writers to Year 9s

Dear Diary

I’ve been teaching the film, Freedom Writers, to my Year 9 English students for a couple of years now. It’s one of those films about a charismatic young English teacher who, against all odds, works miracles with a class full of apparent misfits and delinquents, transforming them into model students. (See also To Sir With Love, Stand And Deliver, Dangerous Minds. The list goes on.)

Freedom Writers, with its action, rap music and sympathetic ‘gangsta’ kids, invariably engages every student. The students in the film are fourteen year olds; Freshmen; the equivalent of our Year 9. (Challenging to find a kid in Room 203 at Wilson High School who actually looks fourteen, but that’s Hollywood.)

And of course, Freedom Writers is a film. Easy. Students see this as a soft option. Oh how they curse me when I pause the film and ask questions about the mise-en-scene.

Freedom Writers is based on The Freedom Writers Diary, by ErinGruwell, the Ms G of the film. (Most of my kids might not be so thrilled if they had to read the actual book although some of them would enjoy it.) In the film, Ms Erin Gruwell, a first year teacher, is assigned to teach the ‘integration’ students: disadvantaged students who’re all together in their English class. No one wants to be lumbered with the class. The kids are seen as hopeless by the school admin. Then along comes Ms Gruwell.

It’s a really inspiring film. I tear up every time this particular boy reads his diary entry to the class. In it he describes his horrific life and how Ms G’s classroom is home. She certainly made a difference to those students.

However, teaching this text can be problematic. Beware if you’re past your prime. Your students are going to compare and you might not measure up.

Erin Gruwell is rendered delightfully by toothy, pretty Hilary Swank. Youthful, coltish vivacious, irrepressible Erin – Hilary Swank - Gruwell. She’s cool and she can really teach. Consider yourself warned.

Another problem I have with this film is its stereotyping. Head of Department, Margaret Campbell, looks to be in her fifties. She’s depicted as a frustrated crone who’s been unable to roll with the changes in her school. She guards class sets of books, not wanting to sacrifice them to Ms Gruwell’s students who she is sure will destroy them. Bitter, vicious and condescending, Campbell tries irrationally to thwart all Gruwell’s efforts.

Ms Campbell makes me sad though. In one scene she berates Erin. “I know what it’s like to be loved by a class of students!” She probably does, given she’s been teaching for thirty years. Whether she’s a composite of a few jaded old teachers or based on a real person, I do feel for her. In the closing credits of the film we find that Erin Gruwell only taught high school for three years before following some of her students to college. Ms Campbell, on the other hand, has endured. She may be afraid to teach ‘integration’ students, with their gang affiliations, but she’s probably been a decent teacher with the right sorts of students. That would be a different film though. In Freedom Writers, Ms Campbell is the archetypal harridan who shouldn’t be inflicted on any students.

There’s another thing I'm sceptical about in the film: the way those supposedly educationally delayed students take to reading and writing. I, too, have bought books for my students, sometimes out of my own money. I devote hours to matching kids to books to try to get them reading. I'm ecstatic when a student finally reads an entire book. It does happen occasionally. More often, I struggle to get most students to read anything beyond the classroom. So when I see Ms Gruwell’s students reading on buses, in locker bays, in squats, I'm cynical. Perhaps it’s different in the US.

I'm currently reading The Freedom Writers Diary and it’s incredibly articulate. Must have been some heavy-handed editorial assistance happening.

Perhaps it’s the Hollywood effect that allowed Ms Gruwell to have total success with all her students. I've witnessed some of our kids behaving badly on a visit to Melbourne’s Holocaust Museum. Have also had bored year 11 students moaning through Schindler’s List, complaining because there wasn't enough action in it.

Ah, enough of being Ms Campbell. I love teaching this film and I love the way all students respond to it, even those kids who don’t do a lick of learning. Freedom Writers may be Hollywood Over The Top but it’s so worthy. You'll find heaps of ready made teaching resources on line and your kids will love it.

Report writing again.

Couldn't move my fingers much this morning when I woke up. Tendonitis had flared after two days' solid typing of student reports. Old age sucks. (And why am I typing again today??)

Proud of those reports though; proud of myself for refusing to use 'comment bank'.

For the past few years, as directed, I've used the school 'comment bank' when reporting. Using the 'comment bank' supposedly cuts down on errors, providing there are no mistakes in the rubric, in which case errors are multiplied. The comments in the bank correspond with the descriptors in AusVELS, the Victorian version of the Australian curriculum. They've been simplified to some extent, but they're bland and generic. Furthermore, students can end up with the same comments from year to year, depending on their progress along the AusVELS continuum. Oddly, there don't seem to be any complaints from parents or students.

Reporting on students is agonising. Lots of data entry. (Love Mr Fill Down, BTW.) Lots of writing. I'd estimate it's taken me 20 hours to create reports for 75 students. Would have been much quicker using the comment bank.

Then there's the proofreading meeting after school. About 80 of us print off our report comments and we swap and check. Last year, some of my comments were checked by a colleague who pointed out some really poor expression. 'It's not me. It's the comment bank,' was my lame response. It wasn't the first time I'd been ashamed of what the comment bank, with my assistance, had produced.

The comment bank may produce uncohesive, bland, generic descriptors of 'what the student has achieved' but it won't allow making even slightly negative remarks about a student. Negative remarks are verboten in these days when a few aggressive parents rule the school and we quake in fear of their wrath.

Reporting what some students have achieved is challenging. What to say about a student who has done nothing all semester except disrupt the learning of others? Who has resisted all my canny efforts and encouragement? "X enjoys contributing to class discussions, often in a racist mock-Indian accent. He has successfully resisted attempting any reading, writing or formal speaking and listening tasks." Suppose that's an achievement.

About 35 years ago, when I began teaching, it was perfectly acceptable to write this in a report: "X is an excellent student in every respect." Done. Too easy.

My first student reports were hand-written in a rectangular box - about 6 x 18 centimetres - on a piece of plain foolscap with the texture of blotting paper. Under that was a sheet of royal blue carbon paper and another sheet of foolscap for the second copy. A metal paperclip held it all together. After you'd written your little comment you passed the pages back to the coordinator who'd pass it to the next teacher of that student. Depending on how early you'd done your reports, you'd be able to see comments written by students' other teachers. 'Good' kids' reports glowed with superlatives. 'Bad' kids were described as disruptive, distracting, talkative, hopeless.

Unacceptable, of course. Even at 22 I knew it was inappropriate to take one's frustration and vitriol out on a student, even if they had caused it.

We moved to 'goal based descriptive assessment' at our school in the early 1980s. No grades, if memory serves. (No exams for 'junior' students either.) We also received our own 'no carbon required' report pads, designed to fit about four hand-written reports on each A4 page. Had to remember to put a sheet of cardboard between the reports so you didn't accidentally write extra copies

Didn't mind those descriptive reports. If necessary, you could still be honest about a kid's tendency to subvert learning in the classroom. Parents tended to support us back then. (Think that's a fair generalisation too, based on my experience teaching in three state secondary schools.)

Those reports were probably issued three times a year to correspond with three school terms. Don't remember anyone ever criticising my hand-written reports.

We thought we were working hard back then getting those reports out. Now we have computers and the internet you'd think it would be simpler.

At our school, as well as semester reports and two parent-teacher meetings we issue six interim reports.We're also expected to phone and email parents regularly so they 'don't get any surprises' on reports.

In the words of Redfoo , let's get ridiculous.

Lazy teaching?

I'm mixing it up in the classroom. Again. 

I'm trying to make my Year 9 English classroom less teacher-centred as students develop and 'deepen' their understanding of the plot, characters and themes in their class novel, Phillip Gwynne's Deadly Unna?. I'm also supposedly being a 'lazy teacher', re-inspired as I am by The Lazy Teacher's Handbook, which I recommend, by the way. 

I'm employing  "a series of strategies that put the responsibility of learning directly and consistently onto the students... they learn to engage with their own learning, and not just in what they have learned but in how they learned it." That's from the introduction to The Lazy Teacher's Handbook. Hey, baby! Yeah! High five! Students taking ownership of their learning. That will look impressive on my Professional Learning Plan. I can write up my Understanding By Design unit plan and cite the relevant Australian Curriculum learning outcomes.  (All that onerous (unnecessary) extra paperwork is about accountability, after all.)

I've 'scaffolded' my students' learning; given clear instructions, a rubric, even. I've set clear expectations for the learning and behaviour. They've done their 'think, pair, square' and now they have to 'share'. The Lazy Teacher's Handbook, again. After they've completed their group work, students will present their findings to the group using ICT and presentation software. Don’t I sound competent? 

This, however, is what 'learning' sounded  like at about 2.45 yesterday arvo. Bedlam. Screaming. Shouting. Bursts of maniacal laughter, occasionally my own,  

'Learning', group work, looked like chaos. Scrunched up paper flew across my peripheral vision. It seemed to be snowing litter. Suddenly a pen skimmed across the asphalt outside my classroom door, closely followed by one of my students who'd darted out to retrieve it. Sorry, miss, she said upon re-entry.  

I circumnavigated the room again, swooping on groups. Interfering but trying not to because it seemed I was dominating again. At my approach, some students vaguely pretended to be on task, frowning at their computers, tapping a few keys, twisting their screens towards me so I could see a bit of allegedly legit 'work'. So what are we supposed to be doing again? asked a bright student. And this is their second session working in their groups.

I worry that no one is learning. I worry that students will see this as bludging. I worry that the principal will walk in and judge me.  I worry that the acrid smell in the room is me. I sneak a surreptitious sniff of my armpit. It's not. Hurrah. God knows I've worked up a sweat pacing around the room trying to look and feel in control.  

Five minutes before the bell I gathered the troops and assumed the position, barring the door.  I blew my whistle - now there's a useful teaching tool and not just in phys ed classes. "No one is leaving until the desks are straightened, the rubbish is off the floor and chairs are on tables." i bellowed. They complied and the natural order of my teaching world was somewhat restored, or so I told myself.

The positives? The students seem happy. They're not fighting me. They're not complaining of boredom, which many do if one reads sections of text aloud to the entire class. I'd like to think that they are working at their own level. Their presentations will demonstrate that, I expect. I've been able to 'differentiate' the learning and monitor individual students much more effectively that I can in a teacher-centred classroom. 

Lazy teacher? Not so much. And I'm still reaching for the wine bottle as soon as I get home.

Just another day of 'teaching'.

Should have known it was going to be another challenging day when I got an extra for period 1: my only free period. No matter. An extra per fortnight is part of my job. It was the year 11 VCAL class. Gave me a chance to see government funds at work; the brilliant "1:1" program in effect. You see, all these students were issued their own Netbook computers, at no charge, a couple of years ago. Our students are going to lead the rest of the world because they've been provided with this state of the art information and communication technology. 

Or not. 

Besides giving the words 'fucken' and 'cunt' a bit of a workout, two students decided it would be edifying to pop all the keys from their keypads and stick them back on in random order. That was clearly lots of fun until they realised that they didn't know how to return the keys to their rightful places and that some of the keys were now irrevocably damaged.

What was I doing during all this? Trying to encourage students I don't regularly teach to do the set work; trying to discourage the gratuitous 'try-hard' swearing without getting palpitations myself. You've got to feel for the CRTs - casual replacement teachers - who do replacement classes all day. 

Off to year 9 for more larks. The students have been presenting their oral book reports this week and some of them have been damn good. The entire purpose is to encourage reading. Every week since the beginning of the year students have had half an hour of sustained silent reading during class and they're supposed to supplement this with regular reading at home. I really push this because it is so important that students become fluent readers. 

So, Anna is at the front of the room. She's plugged her Netbook computer into the data projector. She's nervously shaking her page a little as she waits to start. 

But what's this? Two girls stand up at the back of the room. 'Someone stole my pencil case, Miss,' says Zoe. She folds her arms, slumps aggressively. 

'Could whoever's got Zoe's pencil case just return it please? I'm not saying you took it, but please give it back.' 

No response. 

So two girls are up the back glowering around, pouting. One is out in sympathy with the other. It's how they function. What am I supposed to do? 

Apparently it's in the rubbish bin. I fish it out. 'Eeuuw!' Yeah, whatever. 

This is the way the 'lesson' proceeds. I can't see who's spiriting other kids' belongings away. I endeavour to keep calm.

And then there are 'the lads' who've been in my face since week one. They swagger around the room at will, perhaps to share a confidence with someone on the other side of the class. Bugger the seating plan. That only works if they choose to sit in their places. 

An older generation mobile phone slides, hockey puck style, from one side of the floor to the other and back again.

Meanwhile, Anna waits patiently. Eventually she is able to present and she's read John Steinbeck's The Pearl. Wow.

So while some kids are 'disrupting the learning of others', as it says on our discipline reports, and being enabled by parents who believe that their children are angels - parents who complain if anyone tries to discipline their precious offspring - other students are quietly learning.

Me? I'm checking my super cos I'm a little bit over it.

Slam poetry. And the other stuff.

Nearly finished week three of term one now. It's challenging, the start of the school year, isn't it?

If you're lucky you score a group of amenable students who know you and already approve. You just roll happily with it. This is me this year with my year 10s given all those teething battles were played out back in 2010. Our first session was an emotional reuion. Even teared up a bit seeing how they'd grown. They were all smiles and sheepish laughter as they automatically sat in their year 8 'seating plan'. 

In a big school like mine - nearly 1200 students - you can easily go for a year without seeing any of your former students. It was great to see my year 10s and I look forward to watching them develop as the year progresses.

And then there's that other class; amongst the 25 students there are five fourteen year old boys giving me what for, yelling over me in a  constant barrage of testosterone-fuelled insolence. These lads are IN MY FACE and DID YOU SEE THAT? SHE'S PICKEN ON ME! WHY ARE YOU PICKEN ON ME?? They're chesting up to me, anything to disrupt, to draw my attention, to grab an opportunity to assert themselves over me. My adrenal gland's been getting a bit of a workout. Have to remember to breathe; act angry before I'm really angry. Be patient, tolerant, understanding. This isn't about me, I'm just generic 'old female teacher' now.

Leap on those opportunities to praise, to build self-esteem like a seagull on a cliched chip. Oh so many complex personalities to fathom before it subsides. Well, usually.

My other year 9 class has been a gift; 25 bright, eager students who are open to possibility so why not try out some slam poetry? I attended a VATE conference session last year on slam poetry. (Thanks, Anthony Young @ProffPoet) I showed the students some examples of other students performing slam poetry - a YouTube search was helpful here. The students were a tad skeptical but they gave it a go. I gave them a list of possible topics - places such as the city, the beach, holidays and so on, and emotions that they could write about. As per Anthony's instructions I got them to work in groups as a strategy to help them to overcome their performance anxiety.

I used Anthony's formula for constructing their poem. Poems had to contain a metaphor, an anecdote, a repeated line, a really long line and a really short line. They brainstormed their ideas individually then collaborated with other group members. I darted around the class offering suggestions and encouragement, as you do when you're the alleged teacher.

The students, bless them, ran with it. Today they presented. It was wonderful and they knew it as they savoured the power of their own and each other's words. 

If you haven't given slam poetry a try, it's worth doing. The kids loved it and so did I.

Padlet in Year 10 English

The plan. Utilise Padlet - the web tool formerly known as Wallwisher - to engage year 10 students in a meaningful discussion about youth justice. Basically, with Padlet, you can create a 'wall' upon which you can post things.

At the end of the lesson, the teacher and her students will have created a number of discussion 'walls'. Students will have participated in on-line discussions on the causes of, and possible solutions to, youth homelessness. They will have shared their own opinions, as well as considering, and responding to, a variety of views from their fellow students.

Prior to the lesson, I'd played around on Padlet so I'd be confident with the tool. In class, we'd also discussed various issues concerning youth justice and had just watched the harrowing Oasis documentary. I'd prepared a few questions to promote discussion. (By the way, if you haven't yet seen it, the Oasis documentary is essential viewing.)

As a background to all this, I've done some school based professional development using Padlet. This involved participating in an educational on-line discussion with my school colleagues. We pasted a particular URL into our browsers then responded to a question. The 'wall' quickly filled with thoughtful, earnest remarks. It was the first day of the new year and the principal who facilitated looked pleased with the outcome. I think he mentioned something about aiming to be a paperless school somewhere down the track.

You see, we're in the 'one to one' age now. Every student from years 9 to 12 has been given, gratis, courtesy of the federal government, a netbook computer. What's more, we've been urged to use these computers, especially since the school is expecting years 7 and 8 students to buy their own. We don't want the older students telling the younger ones that the computers aren't being used, do we? That wasn't a question. It was a directive from an AP. Parents Will Complain.

So what happened in my classes today?

First, I had to send several students back to their lockers to get their computers. The government may have funded these computers to make our students the smartest in the world - whatever - but that doesn't mean the kids are going to charge them up overnight, or even bring them to school. (It's a discipline thing and we're working on it.)

Second, I recapped our previous lesson about youth homelessness to remind students of the gravity of the issue.

I gave them the URL for our first 'wall' and made a couple of rules. No anonymous comments. No profanity.

As if. (My favourite phrase.)

The wall was instantly and hilariously covered in totally inappropriate, often misspelled, sexually explicit posts. Students quickly discovered that they could also take photos of themselves and other students and tag them.

In nano-seconds I had a wall plastered in posts that had the students in hysterics. The comments were posted faster than I could delete them - it was my wall so I had some editing control for all the good that did me.

I suppose at least they were all engaged in the activity.

Seriously, I'd like to know what really happens in other teachers' classes when they do these activities.You know, teachers who work, like me, in western suburbs state secondary schools. During the PD session, this activity was presented as a highly effective teaching and learning tool and of course I can see its potential. But if kids can write anonymous comments - and get away with it because it's impossible to monitor - how does this occur?

Will it get better if I persist, once the novelty wears off?

Help.

Seriously, comment below. I really want to know.

Back to high school.

Attended a high school centenary yesterday. Probably wouldn't have bothered except a friend reminded me it was happening and another friend came along with me.

Didn't give it much thought before we turned into the car park where we were lucky to find a space. You see, this event was packed. The school 'playing fields' had even been converted to parking space for the day and they were chockers with cars.

However, I felt really odd, crossing the side street and walking through to the quadrangle, past the staff room. Appeared as though nothing had changed since I'd left there nearly 30 years ago.

I spent the first six years of my teaching career at that school. Those six years went on for a very long time, much longer than the 14 years I've been at my current school. The years flash by a bit these days. My dad used to say that when he was around the age I am now, but in my twenties I had no concept. I was still waiting for the big things to happen: travel, marriage, mortgage, children. In that order.

I encountered a former student almost immediately. An older man: fifty-something? Shaved presumably bald head, portly, acting more confident with me than he should have been. 'I'm going to kiss you,' he said, grabbing me by the waist and pulling me close. I got an unwanted wet one to the corner of my mouth. I generally avoid random kissing.

He invited me to 'stroll' over to the registration table; offered me his elbow. I hooked my arm through his for about ten seconds. 'Sorry,' I said, letting go. 'This feels really uncomfortable. I wouldn't even do this with my husband.' I didn't like the feel of this guy's arm under his shirt sleeve.

I didn't see him again after that. He was in my first ever form five English class. I was 22, in my second year of teaching. Interesting that I could remember him and the quality of his English. Now, I can barely remember the names of kids I taught last year.

I saw a few familiar faces, all former teaching colleagues. Mostly, I was incredulous that all these people were so delighted to be there. Masses of them milling around, greeting very old friends. Lots of white hair and quite a few walking frames. They'd all made the effort to go back to their old school with its almost unaltered central quad.

I had my moments back there, made a few life-long friends, learned heaps, had some great memories. But somehow, my experiences left a slightly bitter aftertaste. I think of clashes with a couple of colleagues: people being really unprofessional; some awful behaviour. And of course, i think of my own immaturity back when I knew everything, as many of us do back in our twenties. I was glad to leave that version of myself behind in that place. As if.

I heard bits of a couple of speeches yesterday - the sound system swallowed the rest as I strained to hear beneath those quadrangle eaves. Two former students, one In his 70s, one in her 40s, spoke so fondly of their own six years in the place. Around me, former students and teachers tittered and nodded at remembered characters and anecdotes. The woman who spoke was overwhelmed by emotion. It really got to me.

People's school days are really precious. That's a statement of the bleeding obvious. But yesterday was a bit like a church gathering; worship.

Despite having spent my professional life, since 1978, in secondary schools, I really hadn't thought of schools like that before.

I did make my own pilgrimage to my primary school back in Sheffield, UK, a couple of years ago, but that was about emigration, memory and being severed from my childhood when I was eight.

School, for me, and perhaps for most teachers, hasn't been something intense in my formative years. It has been my life. The continuum. Suppose that's why I was so incredulous that those six years of high school had been so precious to so many people who did the pilgrimage yesterday.

Thanks to the organisers.

"The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas." Why I love reading. And teaching.

Friday, home time. I'd held a couple of Year 10 students back after English. I was giving my annual plagiarism lecture, which usually occurs at about this time of year.

"Look," I pointed to my laptop screen. The girl was standing next to me, arms crossed defiantly. "You'll have to admit that it's quite strange that your essay is identical to this one."

"I swear I didn't read it," she persisted in the face of contrary evidence.

Her friend, packing up her books, was listening in. "I copied an essay from the internet when I was in year 7," she said, matter-of-factly. "I was really embarrassed when I got caught." Had a bit of a laugh at the memory.

The boy was all outraged innocence too when I showed him how easily I'd Googled a few words from his essay, enclosed in inverted commas, and found what he was passing off as his work

I wasn't particularly angry. Plagiarism happens even more regularly in these 'one to one' days - every kid has a computer and internet access - and it's easy to spot. It's good for students to find out early that this is cheating. It avoids more serious consequences in the future.

They left, ruefully promising to repeat the work.

Meanwhile, Chris was waiting to see me.  He's a quiet, intelligent student.

"You said you wanted to read this, miss." He placed a copy of The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas on my desk.

I taught Chris for a couple of semesters in years 7 and 8. He was one of the more talented students in my now defunct Creative Writing class. A couple of days earlier he'd asked for help with his 'wide reading' essay. He was working on the topic "A worthwhile text makes you view the world a little differently".  This is one of five generic topics that my Year 10s must respond to. I'm trying to teach them to write well structured introductions including at least three general points that they'll develop in the bodies of their essays.

I hadn't read Chris' novel but knew vaguely that it was about the Holocaust. I took a stab at an answer. Suggested he could write about those awful perennial themes, survival, racism, inhumanity, good versus evil. He seemed satisfied with this and set about writing his essay. I'd also asked if I could borrow his book, given several students had expressed an interest in reading it.

Well, Chris, your old teacher started reading your book on Friday evening and was easily engaged, as one is by an apparently simple driving narrative. I finished it this morning and I have to say it's made me see the world a little differently.

The simple narrative cleverly belies the wisdom and strength of this story. It is the story of 9 year old Bruno, whose quite self-satisfied life is somewhat spoiled when he, his small family and their servants are transported to 'OutWith' as he pronounces the unfamiliar Polish word Auschwitz. However, at Auschwitz he is on the protected side of the fence, his father being the camp commandant. Bruno's naive remarks on his life in what becomes his new home are profoundly ironic.

The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas has given me another poignant indelible impression of the horror, injustice and cruelty of the Holocaust. I highly recommend that you read it. (Having done a bit of Googling myself, I'm thinking I'm perhaps the only English teacher around who hasn't read it.)

Chris, thanks for putting up with my plagiarism lecture, cos you were subjected to it too on Friday arvo. I'm really moved that you remembered I'd said I'd like to read your book. You've reminded me why I love both reading and teaching. (And you know how I said you might really appreciate Markus Zusak's The Book Thief? I'm sure you would.)

Walking target: an apple for the teacher

All teaching staff have been issued with fluoro vests. These must be worn when one is on yard duty. I've already written about yard duty/aka fruit watch. Well, I'm on duty in the same area this year

'Prin Class', as it likes to be known, has added to our pleasure by increasing our visibility whilst we're on patrol. Suppose this helps the friend of the kid who's having an anaphylactic reaction to find me in a crowd.
Teachers do compulsory anaphylaxis training annually. A good thing. As a parent, I'd want to know that teachers knew first aid in this event. I'm not knocking it.

But as a teacher on duty, I'm highly visible anyway, given I'm in my mid-fifties - albeit with dyed hair. Perhaps I could be mistaken for a dumpy, jowly girl with a dowager's hump? Oh, hang on. I'm not wearing a school uniform. I'm possibly going to be visible as I amble around the yard with my tongs and beatific smile. As I've previously written, kids easily find me when they want someone to hide behind when another kid's chasing them.

Yesterday I experienced my second real assault, in 32 years of teaching. I'm naming the beast. It was an assault. I may be mistaken, but I think my fluoro vest turned me into a target. As I walked through my little slice of the danger zone I was pelted, at close range and with considerable force, by a 'projectile'. I'm reluctant to say it was a piece of fruit cos it sounds so freaking benign and ridiculous.

That apple for the teacher really hurt, so much so that tears sprouted on impact. I turned to see who'd thrown it but just faced a row of hefty 'innocent' year 10 boys, none of whom I teach. Had I known them, it wouldn't have happened.

I was unable to take any retributive action against the culprit, who simply had the delight of seeing he'd hit his target and that his target was really angry and hurt. What a hero.

I went in search of a fluoro vested colleague. Lucky he was wearing it cos I'd never have identified him by the business attire, tongs - de rigueur for prin class on duty - and sun glinting off his bald pate.

He bawled out all the kids in the area, but basically they got away with it. Trouble is, you can't identify your assailant (and issue a 5 day suspension) when it hits you from behind. And of course, none of the kids saw anything.

I felt like packing in teaching. Had I driven to school, instead of cycling, I would have taken the rest of the day off. I was shaky and profoundly hurt by the incident. In my time I've stepped between warring boys and grabbed them by the shirt-fronts, narrowly avoiding being clouted in the process. But that's not about me. I don't think yesterday's incident was particularly about me either. I was just 'generic teacher'.

My assault yesterday was about disrespect. Made it really hard for me to teach my year 9s and 10s for the next two lessons. But I'm okay now. I got to document it on Edusafe, so everything's all right, isn't it? I've got my day off to get over it.

Help! I can't teach but I've been practising for 32 years.

I read lots of inspiring educational blogs. I find them through Twitter, or other people's blogs. I also read lots of educational articles. All these wonderful things are happening in these other educators' classes. It both inspires and overwhelms me. I began my day reading the wonderful things that are happening in Rich Lambert's school. I was put to shame before I'd even had my breakfast.

I must confess that no one really learned anything in the past 75 minute period I spent with my Year 9s. I know that for a couple of reasons:
1. My feeling of despair as I charged around the room, vainly trying to keep abreast of what 19 kids were variously doing on their brand new free government issue netbooks.
2. I asked them at the end of the lesson. 'Put your hand up,' I demanded, 'if you've learned anything this period.' Shrugs. General uninterest. Resumption of various conversations that I'd briefly interrupted with my stupid question. One boy did say he'd learned how to create a Google account. Suppose that's something.

The teacher's aide - I have 3 integration kids in the mix - shuffled past me to get out the door early but the kids weren't going anywhere.

With about a minute til the bell, I asked students, as I do, to put their chairs up and stand behind their seats. I was blocking the doorway and shooing kids back to their places, because some try to barge past me and make a run for it.

Seeing that all the chairs are up, the desks are straightened and the rubbish generated by a class full of 14 year olds is in the bin, I release them. No one learned anything, but at least they left the classroom tidy.

The lack of learning resulted from a number of things:
1. New computers. I'm hoping the novelty will wear off, that we'll get a couple of decent routines happening and that I'll be able to teach the class.
2. It's a new year and the class dynamic hasn't found its level yet.

Another big problem for me this year is the texts that have been booklisted. Won't mention company names here, but a 'package' of texts, complete with hard copy dictionaries and thesauruses, was on the booklist. It seems to me that no one closely investigated these texts, back when booklist decisions were made. (That's a bother, isn't it?) The books include their own unique codes so kids can join an internet site and access the entire book and a couple of lame games on line. And of course, the texts are related to AusVELS.

You know what though? I'm not sure that my particular kids, who've reached age 14 with no real exposure to grammar, are going to see any benefit from being able to identify phrasal verbs, gerunds and the future perfect continuous tense. My throat closes over just thinking about it.

Shakespeare's sonnets with middle school students

Experienced a little frisson this morning as I was preparing for my year 8 poetry lessons.  Shakespeare telepathically communicated with me from somewhere circa 1590.  He was talking to me.

In my youth I wasn't a big fan of Shakespeare.  I enjoyed Macbeth in Form 5, taught by a great teacher. At fifteen, I also liked the idea that I was studying Shakespeare.  But more or less left to my own devices in Form 6, through a special combination of my own ignorance, immaturity and an uninspiring first year out teacher, Othello was pretty much lost on me.  I'm better now, you may be glad to hear, given I've been teaching English for over 30 years.

My copy of Shakespeare's sonnets is a Signet Classic. In 1975 I covered it in some recycled plastic.  The plastic has a red RCA records logo on it.  I'd saved it from some throw out pile when I was a sales assistant at John Clements Records in the city. Melbourne, that is.  Loved that holiday job.  Was actually sad to leave when I finished my degree and had to start teaching.  (Sorry, can't remain focused and don't really care.  Just saying.)

The pages of my Signet Classic are 'maiden' - see paragraph 2 - and yellowing with time.  There's an irony there, if you're familiar with Shakespeare's sonnets.  That tyrant Time, 'Devouring Time', has been at my little book, and the rest of me.

I've been 'doing' some poetry with my year 8s.  I always like to begin this work, as you do, by getting the students to write out the lyrics of a song they like that they can remember, or look up on their phones.  This really appeals to most of them, despite my 'no profanity' clause.  (Have to explain what profanity is, but that's okay.  Vocab development.)  I tell them they can choose anything, even a nursery rhyme - sad how many kids don't know what they are (and these same kids watch Underbelly and other unsuitable stuff on their own in their rooms).  I tell them they can even choose the theme from a television show. 

To demonstrate I sang the theme from Gilligan's Island - a ballad?  They loved that, and how surprised they were to hear me singing, quite tunefully and going the full soprano on the last line.  Have to say it took some courage to sing the whole song, complete with swaying motions when the weather started getting rough. 

The kids didn't mock me.  They clearly enjoyed the show and understood the task.  I told them they could sing their lyrics if they felt confident.

They also listened respectfully when I recited Vanessa Amorosi's Shine, especially given I'd told them that her original refrain had been 'Everyone you see, everyone you know is going to die'.  Considered too dark, apparently, hence the change to something quite different, if perhaps less striking.  Or so I've heard.

So the students wrote their song lyrics and recited or sang their lines in front of the whole class.  Quite confronting for them.  A few students opted out but most had a go.  My theme was that words have power.  Even a pair of students reciting Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star created a certain mood and presence when they took turns to say each word.  They added value to the words and the student audience could tell.

One boy with a lovely voice sang Bruno Mars' Grenade.  The audience was moved by his rendition and easily able to appreciate the power of the imagery in the words.  I was able to segue into a talk about the pain of unrequited love; how so many songs - so much poetry - is about these human emotions.

Which led me to dig out my old Signet Classic and read a few sonnets; wonder whether I could possibly read these arcane verses with my year 8s, many of whom are below their expected VELS level in reading and writing. 

I photocopied sonnets 16 to 19 on one A4 page for the students and searched for some translations on-line.  Too easy.  It was sonnet 18 that worked its magic on me.  I had shivers and tears sprouted, because there was Shakespeare's adoration for his love, and his love alive in his words, just as he said it would be.  Shakespeare writing it back there in 1590 something, and me thrilling to it in 2012.  Felt amazing.

And what's more, my year 8s, who've never heard any Shakespeare before and often struggle with the simplest text, were moved by the words and the experience.  They listened respectfully to my very brief history of Shakespeare's times and enjoyed the sound of the words in the sonnets. 

Once more Shakespeare was immortalising his love down through time.

It worked.

Fruit watch. Another side of secondary teaching.

Best to keep on the move on yard duty, twenty-five minutes of which I endure each week.  (Full-time teachers get more.)  Even better to grab some barbecue tongs and a bucket and pick up kids' rubbish.  The time goes more quickly, the yard gets cleaned up and I can avoid engaging too closely with some of the bestial behaviour one is sure to encounter on one's tour.

But on this particular Friday, fate had other plans for me.

Morning briefing.
"Teachers on yard duty in Zone A need to be particularly vigilant.  Especially at recess.  We've had some serious fruit throwing incidents."  That's the principal speaking.  He does a spoonerism on fruit-throwing and laughs at his tongue trip.  It is hard to say fruit-throwing fast.

Guess who's on yard duty in Zone A at recess.

I'm to plant myself amongst the picnic tables and watch for rogue Year 10 fruit throwers.  Great.  Standing still on yard duty invites confrontation with randoms: kids who don't know me and don't care that I Am A Respected Former VCE English Guru and Coordinator.  Kids will generally utilise me as they see fit.

On good days, especially when the sun's shining, some kids will bail me up for the simple pleasure of a catch up.  I love that.

Other days, I can be a prop in whatever boisterous game they're playing.

"Miss! Miss! Did you see what he did?" they cry as they climb up each other.  I'm also 'barley'; the safety zone.  If a kid's chasing you, run behind 'Miss'; dodge behind her, grab her by her hips and whip her around, your human shield preventing your assailant from catching you.  That's me.  Buffer zone.  No matter that buffer zone is a 56 year old woman.

That's all good; part of what I signed on for back in 1974 when I accepted my studentship and guarantee of three years work in one of our state secondary schools. Thirty-two years later...

But on this particular TGIF, I am stuck guarding Zone A, at recess. I'm eating an apple.  Several teachers scurry by on their way to the refuge of the staff room.  "Now don't throw that apple core!"   They all say words to that effect; wagging fingers.  Hilarious. 

I'm already attracting student attention.  A couple of big boys gawp at me and laugh.  I resist flipping them the bird.

My problem? I can't ignore all the blatant littering going on around me when there are three big green bins in the immediate area.

Girls are generally more discreet than boys.  Girls gather in groups on the very expensive and quite aesthetically pleasing fake lawn. (Seriously, this stuff works.)

They cross their ankles and lower themselves effortlessly to the ground as thirteen year old girls are wont to do.  Some hands are thrust deep into those little multipack snack bags.  They blithely drop empty bags by their sides and let the breeze have them.  Or they stand simultaneously and walk away, leaving a circle of tetra packs, orange peel, half eaten apples and sandwiches.

"Girls!  Pop your rubbish in the bin, thanks!"  I have to shout over school yard noise but my tone is polite.
"That's not ours.  It was there when we got here." They're all stunned by my rude accusation.  "Is she serious??  Oh my god!!  Get a life!!"
"Put it in the bin! Now!"

They sullenly comply, casting me filthy looks, muttering.

How dare I demand that they put their own rubbish in the bin?  Clearly I'm deranged and a Big Bitch to boot.

If I have somehow communicated that this school yard interaction is benign, it's not.  You have to really stand your ground.  Doesn't affect everyone like this, but my little heart will be thudding in my chest.  It's a battle of wills.  Yes, I know.  I could just ignore it, and often I do.  But yesterday I was stuck there.

That was when a portly boy strolled down the steps.  He threw the lid of his icecream cup vaguely towards the bin.  Suppose I should have just given him credit for trying and picked it up myself.  But I didn't.

"You missed," I say.  Well, he's had eye contact with the hapless teacher on fruit watch.  What could I do?  "Go back and put it in the bin."

He keeps swaggering towards his group of mates, all the time, eye-balling me.

I step towards him to block his path.  "You can either pick up your own rubbish, or you can clean up this whole area."

Reluctantly he backs up. leans down and hurls the lid into bin, snarling at me now.  He stomps to his group who've been watching the show, which unfortunately must go on.  He scoops a huge spoonful of icecream and plops it onto the fake lawn. 

"Clean it up."
"No."  He's huge; towers over me.  The crowd closes around me and Mr Plop, who continues to defy me. 

My hackles rise as I'm  taunted by twelve year olds, none of whom I can put a name to.  My arms are out now, clearing a space around me.  I order them off.

"Coordinator's office.  Now."  Mr Plop stands his ground.  I reach behind him and steer him in the appropriate direction.
"Get your hands off me!" this gruff giant threatens.
"Yeah, what are you going to do?"

Without further physical contact I barrel the kid along the gauntlet of year 7s who part in front of him, with his melting strawberry swirl in one hand and his plastic spoon in the other.

He sits outside the coordinator's office and I feel ridiculous explaining the situation to the twenty-something male coordinator - who's in his second year of teaching, BTW, but, you know, he's the Year 7 coordinator; he has power - and a shitload of work that he's welcome to.

Mr Plop, true to form, denies any transgression.
"So you're calling me a liar?" I demand.
"Yes," he sneers.
"Leave it with me," says my young champion. 

I trail off back to fruit watch, dragging my dignity behind me.  Definitely didn't win that one.

Bet Mr Plop is in my class next year.

First world problems.

PD workshop worked; Edmodo, Wallwisher and Changing the Paradigms

Even though the business of education is teaching kids, I find it a relief when they aren't actually in the school.

Not that I don't generally enjoy teaching.  It's just that one never knows how much stress - ie. shit - one is likely to incur in each 75 minute period.  So Thursday, the day before a pupil free day, felt like a Friday, and Friday, Curriculum Day, felt like a gift; a junket.

First mid-year curriculum day we've had for a while, like most Victorian state schools. For the last four years, under a different state government, the curriculum days had all been bunched up at the start of the school year.  I've found that arrangement wanting.  Lots of time wasting for various reasons.  And I'm quite cynical too, in case you hadn't noticed.  Most of the PD offerings at school have seemed to me to be 'under-graduate' and I'm too long in the tooth for that.  There have been exceptions, of course.  

Today's focus was ICT.  Given all our year 9s and 10s have been issued with notebook computers, this was timely.  As I've said, I'm keen to use the computers with my year 10s more effectively, even if it does mean assessing student work on-line.  

The day began inauspiciously when 80 plus of us crammed into the learning centre.  The principal had made a powerpoint.  The screen was so low as to prevent all bar those in its immediate vicinity from being able to see it.  I struggle with my eyesight at the best of times so that first half hour was literally a blur with me twisting, squinting and craning to see between the heads and shoulders of my colleagues.  Something about how we're no longer preparing students for one life-long career; things have changed.  To be honest, I don't remember much other than writing a note to my mate asking her if she thought I'd had my hair cut too short.  I did notice a student teacher opposite earnestly taking notes with a fountain pen.  Or perhaps she's already learned my trick of 'journaling' whilst feigning interest in the proceedings.  Just keep that brow furrowed, nod occasionally and incline your head in the direction of the speaker.

Next hour for me was a KLA - Key Learning Area, ie. Faculty - meeting.  More of the same, but not too bad now I'm not the coordinator.  Time to 'booklist' texts for next year.  Same old discussion.  Basically, the sixteen or so members of the English KLA have divergent tastes for various reasons. What some want to teach others want to drop and vice versa.  I no longer care.  I can 'teach' anything unlike some of my colleagues who fear setting a new text that may not have a prepared assignment.  Sheesh.

During the next part of the program we'd elected to attend one of three ICT sessions.  Unfortunately, before we could get started we all had to herd into the learning centre again for a useless ten minutes of the curriculum coordinator needlessly providing a summary of the contents of all three workshops.  Why? Why not just send us our separate ways so we can get on with it? Power trip?

 Happily, after this my day picked up.  My workshop was led by three male science teachers, two of whom don't ordinarily lead.  That was refreshing; different.  One is my vintage and one of my friends on staff.  So good to see someone who's seen it all, with 30 years of teaching experience, rolling creatively with the changes.  The second speaker is probably in his forties but is still a 'beginning' teacher.  (I could be doing this guy a disservice.  I'm estimating his age based on his bald head and a five o' clock shadow that developed into a full beard during a two hour session.  Yes, I know.  Irrelevant, but nonetheless remarkable.)  The third presenter is probably around 30 with perhaps four years teaching under his belt. 

Basically, the three of them prompted in me a storm of emotions and ideas concerning the way I teach.  I felt variously like an absolute beginner, an anachronism, borderline redundant and, happily, capable of changing and improving the way I teach some of my students.  (Not all.)

They began their session with a short film, Changing the Paradigms.  (Perhaps you've seen this RSA Animate film already.  Perhaps I'm the only teacher in Australia that hasn't seen it.  Highly recommended.)  It made a lot of sense.  Based on a lecture by Sir Ken Robinson, it's one of those powerful, assertive pieces that seduces the viewer with its matter-of-fact confident tone.  We didn't discuss the assertions in the film; it wasn't that sort of a workshop.  But it's something I wouldn't mind doing in the future. 

One thing posited in the film was the alleged 'epidemic' of ADHD and the consequential anaesthetising, with Ritalin and the like, of so many kids.  Robinson suggested, I think, a link between the hyper-stimulation of the 21st century and the phenomenon of ADHD.  Not so sure.  Those hyper-active easily distracted disruptive boys - usually - were certainly around, unmedicated, when I began teaching in the late 1970s.  I also remember how savagely they were beaten back in primary school in the 1960s, subduing all but the most extreme by my high school days in the late 60s and early 70s.  Those boys continued to get 'the cuts' regularly, administered by the principal, who strode around our western suburbs school in his academic gown.  Think it's more a case of some parents these days needing to 'pathologise' their kids' unorthodox behaviour and having the means to do so, given the willingness of medicos to prescribe Ritalin etc.  (I say this knowing my own son would have been beaten to a pulp by those strap and cane wielding school masters of my youth had he been born a generation earlier.)

The point? This film made me think about things, rather than sitting cynically feeling my time was being wasted, and it led appropriately into learning about what seem to be potentially more effective ways of teaching my year 10s.

I'd chosen this particular workshop because it was about using Edmodo, an educational Facebook of sorts.  But I also learned about Wallwisher, a web program that could enhance the way note-making occurs during discussions with year 10s. 

Love it when I learn something new, but I especially love it when presenters recognise that we're all teachers already and they take it to the next level.  All three presenters spoke efficiently - I could learn something there!  They didn't jaw on for the love of the sounds of their own voices; no time wasting.  They showed us the programs and got started.  It was easy to access the on-line tutorials and videos they'd prepared to explore the media.  Meanwhile, they modelled effective teaching by roving and assisting as required.  

It was very good, so much so that I, and many of my colleagues, turned up early after lunch for the second part of the workshop so we could get on with it.

Now to develop a bit of expertise and put it all into practice.  That just might help my year 10s.  My year 8s?  Na-ah.  That's a whole nother blog.

BTW, I hadn't heard of the brilliant Sir Ken Robinson.  It was worth going to school yesterday for that pleasure alone.

Fahrenheit 451? Welcome to my year 10 English class.

Ray Bradbury's imagined future is happening now, in 2012, in my school, and more especially in my Year 10 classroom. Last week, Guy Montag and his crew of firemen would have had to burn just four paperback copies of Bradbury's book. Irony.

Recently, every Victorian student in years 9 and 10 was issued with a small notebook computer. They all had their computers in class that morning, but do you think they could manage to bring the set text, Fahrenheit 451? Why did I even expect they would?

I had repeatedly reminded them to bring the text, all to no avail. Just about every kid in the class has got a mobile phone. Many of them have new iPhones. Most have the white headphones, plugged into at least one ear under a wadge of hair, or swinging around their necks. But many of them still haven't acquired, so they say, this book-listed text.

If I want to chat to them about The Shire, or Masterchef or their mums reading about sex in Fifty Shades of Grey, I'm on. But trying to get them to engage with something that uses figurative language - huh? - or complex ideas? Apologies to the writer of Fifty Shades if he/she uses figurative language. Don't know. Haven't read it. I'm currently getting my gratuitous sex courtesy of Boardwalk Empire. (BTW, the teacher's aide was keeping quite a poker face as she read Fifty Shades during Year 8 sustained silent reading recently.)

Re those free issue computers: Good that I'm getting lots of typed essays handed in - takes me twice as long to assess on line so I'm not going there again. Bad that plagiarism's on the increase. You have to be really limited to hand in something brilliant and not think the teacher is going to do a Google search. Tip to sad plagiarist students: at least put it into your own words. You never know, you might learn something.

And another thing. Students who've never done any work before are now eagerly flipping open their computers and concentrating furiously and quietly while I try to teach them the finer points of using language to persuade. Must be making tons of notes; all those intense, furrowed brows. As if. They're checking their uploaded weekend photos or browsing pictures of 'muscle cars' on line. And the rest.

So, taxpayers' hard-earned money at work. Well, at least in my class.

Yes, I know, I know. Computers are here to stay and I certainly love my gadgets and social media. These kids were born into this world and I'm an immigrant.

The task is for me to get the kids to use their computers to do some complex learning. I'm working on it.

Suggestions gratefully received.

Ab Circle Pro Obsession

Here's proof that I really am strange.  Read about my OCD and my Ab Circle Pro experimentation at Fraudster's Musings

Happy holidays to all those teachers out there who have just started their two week break.  Commiserations to those who haven't.

I'm celebrating no longer teaching VCE Year 12 English.  First term holiday and NO marking.  Hurrah!

Cheers.

Me, Evernote and parent-teacher interviews

Note: ditched Evernote some time in 2016. They changed the conditions of use. Non-premium users were limited to use on two devices only, if memory serves, and the price for a premium subscription went up. Was good while it lasted. Changed to OneNote. It's free.

Yesterday was part one of the biannual torture: parent-teacher interviews.  I've blogged about this before.  Let's just say it was a four paracetamol gig; a variation on a theme that won't end until I leave secondary English teaching.  Just need to remember:  it's not about me.

What was different was my use of the Evernote app on my iPhone 3 - a tad slow, but functional all the same.  (I've just paid off my iPhone and I don't feel inclined to upgrade it just because the newer model is available.  Could be tempted by an iPad though.)

Heaps of tech-savvy teachers are already using the Evernote app. You can read about it in some detail on Richard Lambert's blog.

But as a new user, my experience is thus:

Having decided to give the Evernote app a try,  I photographed at least one piece of all my students' written work.  This added thirty seconds per piece of work to assessment time.  Yes, in my anally retentive way, I counted out the seconds.

You can get Evernote as a free app for your phone or iPad.  However, half way through my piles of marking I exceeded my monthly data upload allowance.  I bought the premium upgrade for $46.99 for a year.  Suppose it's cheap if you use it.

All the students' work is stored alphabetically on my iPhone and on the web, so I can access it anywhere.  It's easier to view the students' work on a computer monitor than on the iPhone, of course.  So without any other records, apart from the VELS grade in my chronicle, I can see at a glance the quality of each student's work, including their typical errors.  I also photographed my final comments.

Unfortunately, I couldn't use my laptop during the interviews because I was sitting in the centre of the indoor basketball court.  My laptop battery is on the wane and only lasts for 90 minutes.  But I could use my iPhone.

At the first round of parent-teacher interviews there's always the concern that one won't be able to provide accurate assessments for parents - given it's week eight of the school year and secondary teachers on a full load teach perhaps 125 students. 

I teach 75 kids this year.  Yesterday, during seven hours, I saw the parent/s of 45 of them.  Mostly, I was able to recall student details accurately.  However, for a number of students, or when parents wanted more specific information, it was Evernote to the rescue.  Had to do a bit of 'finger-spreading' on the screen to enlarge the relevant pieces of work sufficiently to see them, but it worked.  Think several parents were impressed with my efforts too.

So thanks Evernote.  And thanks Richard Lambert on Twitter for giving me the idea.  I expect my Evernote records will be invaluable come report writing time.

Meanwhile, I'm preparing myself to get ticked off tomorrow by the principal for playing on my iPhone during parent-teacher interviews.

Day off.

Day off today.  Besides weekends, I have two other days off a week.  I'm off work more than I'm on.  A good life.

As on every day off, weekends included, I wake up in the morning, full of big ideas of what to do with this brilliant pool of time ahead of me.  Start writing a novel - cos the last one was such a big success - not.  Write a blog.  Maybe.  Do a twenty k bike ride.  Too windy.  Such are my thoughts.

Could have rolled on my back all day in bed, reading.  Currently, I'm reading Kathryn Stockett's The Help.  If I was going to read anything all day, that would be it.  Great book set in Mississippi in 1962, so far, written from the perspectives of a couple of 'colored' maids working for rich white families.  Apparently there's a film too.  I'll get around to that eventually, I suppose.

But the truth is I can only read all day when I'm away from home on a holiday.  If I'm here, there are jobs to do, even though there are only me and my husband living here full time.  My son's in and out.  Tidying around the kitchen - ten minutes, max.  Make bed - three minutes.  Washing:  four minutes sorting and loading then Asko takes over.  Ten minutes hanging it out; five to bring it in; ten to fold and put away.  Gives the day a bit of structure.  Don't know why I felt I had to prune the agapanthus today, but there you go.

Could have spent a few units of time blogging about my feral year eights, but it's the same old.  The fourteen year old kid daubing ink all over the desk, chair and the kid next to him yesterday was a newie, but I'm hoping if I don't detail it, it will recede into my vacuous head.  In that group, it's all about four domineering boys and one domineering girl.  Me standing up the front trying to teach and these five kids keeping me too busy to do it effectively.  Still, it's a breeze compared to all that prep, marking and stress incurred teaching Year 12s for the past thirty years.  Middle school classes are busy at the time, but I've done no homework so far this year, apart from endlessly analysing it all and planning how to do things differently tomorrow to make a success of it.

Got a bit panicky trying to get onto the sodding Ultranet - the DEECT website - at about ten this morning.  Couldn't log on.  Tried the virtual help-desk and went around in circles.  Did a bit of to-ing and fro-ing on emails to colleagues for advice.  Nothing was useful.  Finally decided to start again by re-registering.  Got into the system to discover that not only am I already registered - derr - but I'm a 'designated administrator'.  Well, really, ROFL.  Couldn't do anything on that page so logged out and started from scratch.  Logged in successfully this time, using exactly the same user ID and password that had failed several times earlier.  But you know what?  I had no idea what to do once I got onto the Ultranet.  And clicking around left me no wiser.

It was about 11 am by this stage and the possibilities of my day off were drying up and my anxiety levels were rising.

Seemed like a good idea to ride that bike.  But only a few k.  And how did the wind manage to turn around while I was in the supermarket so that I was cycling into it on the way home as well?

So what's my point?  Too much time on my hands.  And loving it.

Stranded in Saigon

Our travel misadventures in Vietnam continue.  Update at Fraudster's Musings.  Link in sidebar.

Cheers, sort of, again.  Fraudster.

First world problem in the third world.

So teachers get all these holidays they don't deserve? Well, I'm paying for it now. Lost credit cards, passports and cash in Vietnam about ten days ago. Read about it at Fraudster's Musings. Link in side bar. But hey. It's not life threatening. Cheers. Sort of.

Last gasp pre Christmas

Interested in what tired teachers get up to at their end of year break up? At a lawn bowls club for pity's sake?

At least it was different from the usual contrived knees-up with bad karaoke singing that almost drove me to take up smoking again.  (That way I could hang around the entrance with the other escapees from death by off key singing.)

Read about it at Fraudster's Musings .

Season's Greetings from bad fairy, Fraudster.