Starting term

After a week's delay dye to being trapped with several other teachers abroad, it is surprisingly good to be back. As many of my students have been (or still are) missing and there is a lot of examination pressure, my scheme of work has had to be particularly flexible.

Many students are nervous about what they might have missed, so a considerable amount of effort also has to go into reassurance. Conversely, students who are not staying at the school beyond the summer term are also beginning to withdraw and become less cooperative. This is all a completely different dynamic to the last two terms. My response has been to be even more enthusiastic and supportive but I am taking a much harder line on distraction (especially the presence of mobile phones) which I feel is really unfair to already tense students.

I can empathise to an extent as I am a week behind with my work for college, so I can offer practical advice - don't panic and re-schedule!

End of term rant

I have noticed the tendency of younger members of the PGCE cohort seem to do an awful lot of talking across lecturers and this has been extremely annoying. I'm grateful that one of my colleagues mentioned this to the group at the end of module wash-up but I was horrified by the reaction of the chief culprits. Basically, they seemed completely unaware of their own behaviour, despite reaching the ludicrous levels of asking the lecturer to repeat things they hadn't heard because they were gassing!

As the topics for this module have included learned behaviour, I can only assume this must be an example of the influence of school/college/university tutor behaviour. Has it been 'tolerated', ignored or just badly handled? What I do know is that it's never going to happen in any session I teach, for my sake, the other students sake, and and other tutors who might inherit the miscreant in the future.

It might be difficult to unlearn, but I will do my best to help them!